Author: Bay Area Rapid Transit Communications Department

BART's bubble tiles are seen on a wall at Powell St. Station.
Commentary

The Story of BART’s Iconic Bubble Tiles

There’s just something about BART’s bubble tiles. Long a fascination for riders, the white hexagonal tiles with a domed center have been capturing the Bay Area’s attention since the opening of BART’s Powell St. and Montgomery St. stations in 1973.

Commentary

50 Years of BART: The Most Iconic BART Ads

“Take your BART, please!” If memes existed in the late 1980s, comedian Henny Youngman would undoubtedly have become one with these four words–a take on his signature phrase, “Take my wife, please.”

The memorial at the San Bruno BART Station plaza based on a Dorothea Lange photograph of Mochida sisters departing for incarceration at Tanforan. (Photograph and Caption Courtesy of BART)

BART: Power of Art in Times of Tragedy

“It’s incredibly important to keep this history alive because, even though it happened 80 years ago, with Executive Order 9066, it’s still a history not everyone knows. It hasn’t been covered extensively in the history books. This exhibition is a place for remembrance and acknowledgement, education and healing.” —Na Omi Judy Shintani, Curator, “Tanforan Incarceration 1942; Resilience Behind Barbed Wire”

BART Manager of Scheduling and Planning John FitzGibbon (BART)
Commentary

Podcast: An Inside Look at BART’s Complex Scheduling Dance

Changes coming in September will revolutionize BART’s schedule by adding a layer of consistency in the timing of trains across all seven days of the week that will be unlike anything BART riders have experienced in the last 50 years. The latest edition of BART’s podcast series “Hidden Tracks: Stories from BART” explores what the schedule change means for you and takes an inside look at everything you’ve ever wanted to know about how the schedule is made.

Actor Will Smith with BART employees on-set of “The Pursuit of Happyness” in 2005. (Caption and Photograph Courtesy of BART)

50 Years of BART: Behind-the-Scenes Movie Filming

There’s an early scene in 2006 hit film “The Pursuit of Happyness” in which Chris Gardner, played by Will Smith, races to catch a San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) train with the bone density scanner he’s hawking. Gardner makes it on the train, but the doors slam shut on his hand that holds the prized scanner.

Bah Bah BART: Grazing Goats Are Back, Reducing Fire Danger

Editor’s Note: In another rather offbeat story, Bay Area Rapid Transit employs goats for brush cutting and “lawn maintenance” on some portions of its right-of-way prone to trackside fire. We thought this rather innovative use of natural resources would grab your attention, not get your goat. — William C. Vantuono