June 13, 2015
C&S/IT

BART 2016 budget: $1.57 billion

Written by William C. Vantuono, Editor-in-Chief

The Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) board of directors on June 13, 2015 approved a Fiscal Year 2016 $1.57 billion combined operating and capital budget “designed to increase passenger capacity and improve on-time performance.”

BART, stressing that record ridership is stretching its resources, said that the budget assumes a revenue increase that will be derived from a Jan. 1, 2016 “inflation-based” 3.4% fare increase. The increase, scheduled as part of BART’s multi-year “Inflation Based Fare Increase Program,” is expected to help fund capital needs the agency says are extensive.

The FY 2016 budget also funds operational changes that are designed to place 30 additional railcars in service during peak periods and add 16 train trips each weekday. “This is accomplished by moving railcars from maintenance to passenger service at a faster pace; adding shifts for railcar maintenance workers; repairing and putting back into service four to six badly damaged cars; using the Contra Costa Crossover to add 10 train trips to the Yellow Line, and adding six train trips to the Red Line,” BART said.

BART said all its rapid transit lines will see service improvements. Minimum train length on the Orange Line (Richmond to Fremont) will increase from three cars to four, marking the end of three-car trains on the entire BART system. Red Line service (direct Millbrae to Richmond service) will be extended by one hour on weeknights, with the last train departing Millbrae at 9 pm. On the Blue line (Dublin Pleasanton to Daly City), Yellow line (Pittsburg/Bay Point to SFO) and Green line (Fremont to Daly City), trainsets will be lengthened.

The budget also includes money to boost on-time performance through improved maintenance, repair and emergency response functions. Two additional train control technicians will be hired to quickly address ATC failures that currently account for almost one-fifth of BART’s late trains. These new technicians are expected to improve response time to failures by 15%. BART will extend the hours for standby paramedics to respond more quickly to medical emergencies in and near the Transbay Tube during peak periods. Six additional railcar technicians are expected to improve vehicle reliability. As well, the agency has revived its long-mothballed CBTC (communications-based train control) initiative and is expected to award a general engineering/program management contract in the near future. CBTC is expected to improve system reliability and train throughput.

exterior train body “Until the new Fleet of the Future railcars (775 cars from Bombardier Transportation) begin to be phased into service over the next few years, we need to be creative in finding ways to meet our customers’ needs now,” said BART Board of Directors President Tom Blalock. “This budget does that. With these new investments, we’ll squeeze more capacity out of our existing railcars, tackle some of our recurring reliability issues and even invest in keeping trains and stations cleaner.”