My First Time Riding BART in San Francisco

Bay Area Rapid Transit, or BART for short, is perhaps one of the most well-known transit systems in the United States. It stretches an impressive 131 miles (211km) on both sides of San Francisco Bay. It may come as a surprise to you that I have never visited the Bay Area yet, nor had I been on BART. Well, when we arrived into Richmond on Amtrak's California Zephyr, I set out to rectify that. We rode a Red Line train from Richmond to Powell Street, and got lucky enough to catch a ride on the 50-year-old Legacy Fleet just a few months before they were all pulled out of service for good.

Trains Are Awesome!

Date of filming: May 10, 2023

Chapters
0:00 Introduction
0:27 Transferring from Amtrak to BART at Richmond
2:20 History of BART
5:27 Uninterrupted train noises
8:03 Running through Oakland
8:45 The Transbay Tube
10:05 Goodbye to the Legacy Fleet
10:42 Fleet of the Future
12:31 Powell Street Station

[crazyoncoffee]

6:30 The SOUND of BART is just unique. They’re unparalleled anywhere you go in the world. When I was in middle school I used to take these trains once a week on Thursday from Embarcadero to Millbrae for the Rotary/Interact club meeting. The clack of the tracks, the muffled announcement, and the high pitch stepped motor noises all form an intense auditory childhood memory for me (especially the A/B cars). The views and sounds of BART make me feel like I’m home, right here in the Bay Area.

[artvandelayimports]

Loved the train noise section! The whine of the older legacy cars is what I think of when I think of BART

[SeaBassTian]

One day I gotta make it to SF to ride the BART. The station at Powell St looks gorgeous and I'm glad you're showing downtown SF is not all doom and gloom.

[buttongod]

I rode BART back in the summer it opened. A bunch of us kids from Kansas were in SFO for a marching band competition. We rose from the Montgomery Street station out to Daly City and back. That was something pretty cool for a bunch of teenagers from Kansas.

[coolmasterztv]

That is also my favorite way to explore a city :)

[ostwestexpress]

Thank you for this video. On all of my visits I have used the BART and it was always perfekt . Greetz from Germany.

[robertlee]

Great video! Believe it or not, the first stirrings of BART were in the late 1940s . There is a video out there showing an experimental BART wide gauge car. Really cool stuff.

[rikkichunn]

My fave BART story is from the first year of operation. The computer control system was not yet worked out. In fact, one train ran off the end of the track! So, the state of California demanded that BART implement a manual backup system. Here's how it worked. At each station there was someone you might call a station agent in a little booth at the end of the platform. He was connected with the agent at the next station by telephone. They could call each other and report the progress of trains. How did these agents communicate with the motorman in the train, who could manually override the automatic control system to hold the train at the station. The agent communicated by colored light signals, of course. A light switch in his booth could turn off the red stop signal and put on the green go signal. And what did they use for signals? They went down to the local hardware-garden store and bought backyard flood lights. Red and green flood lights!

This ultimate jury-rig system lasted until the state authorities were sure that BART's control system was working. It's all true. I saw it with my own eyes. And it's the last time I've ever claimed to understand how BART works!

[PrimeR]

They were taken out of scheduled service on *September 11th* of this year.
As of right now, they run at least 2 to 3 Legacy Fleets for supplemental service throughout the day, usually on the Orange or Blue lines and occasionally on the Green Line. They will have a final farewell run, scheduled for 2024 before they are officially retired for any and all service.

I really love this video, it truly captured my childhood on BART. Glad you enjoyed the many aspects of BART's Legacy Fleet like many of us in the Bay Area did as well. I have a few BART Content of my own if you wanna give that a look, and I'll definitely be checking out your next video on BART when it releases. Take care!

[ratedpz]

Growing up partially in the Bay Area, I can remember in Preschool and Kindergarten every Friday I took the Caltrain with my grandpa to go on a transit adventure. I loved and still love the diversity of transit in the Bay Area, and how you can take transit to many places. I went Minigolfing in Santa Clara and went to the San Jose Children’s Museum all on local transit like VTA, and especially loved taking BART all through the area. I am sad to learn that the legacy trains are gone, but I did go to San Francisco to visit my grandpa in early 2023 so I did get to ride the legacy series one last time. I still go on transit adventures for fun, and I gotta thank my grandpa and the transit in the bay area for making me a transit lover. RIP legacy series!

[ck]

Looks like you had a great BART experience!!! And you got to ride a legacy train!!! Awesome!!!

[MiaCollinsNeighborhood]

Welcome to the Bay Area Thom! It’s been an honour to have you ride my local transit system. Thank you for covering it and sharing it with the world. Hopefully more visitors to San Francisco would like to ride it when they come!

[haj]

Cool video! I visited the Bay area only twice, but I coupd feel that the city of San Francisco is a wonderland for transit fans, because it has a commuter rail system, a heavy rail metro system, a light rail system, streetcars, trolleybuses and even a ferry system at the same time. I look for your video discussing about them!

[hauntedhouse]

You’re really lucky to have had a chance to ride the legacy fleet before it’s retired. Watching the video brings back great memories to me. I lived in the Bay Area 28 years ago and loved the ease of getting around on public transit especially compared to where I live now, Southern California. I also love the noise the legacy trains make. When I was a kid in the 70’s I thought it was the sound of the future.

[Catswhiskerdetector]

The old fleet looks really cool. Love the old futuristic look

[coachkappa]

I work for BART and this video made me so happy!! I can't wait to watch the rest of your videos covering BART! Thank you for including the history as well, I learned a lot today!! I used to the ride the legacy fleet all the time when I was in college, and I miss the iconic noise it used to make.... have a good day!~

[TheLIRRFrenchie...]

fun fact, you actually don't enter the actual tube until your ears pop which is when the trains run through the ventilation shafts connecting the tubes to the underground sections.

[bobsykes]

Fantastic! I lived int the Bay Area for decades, and used BART, MUNI, and the Capital Corridor for some 30 plus years. Transit is really awesome out there. I hope you two stay in California for a good while and keep making videos out there! Have fun.

[matthewharty]

Literally the only American train I've used. I caught it from the city to the airport

[adammuggleton]

Experienced the BART system a few years back, was totally cool, and like entering a dystopian sci fi future from the 1970s. Love the look of those legacy Train cars.