Trolley Thursday 7/8/21 - A Brief History of the Bay Area Rapid Transit, Part 1

When the name, "Bay Area Rapid Transit", or its acronym, "BART", is mentioned to the average layperson, they immediately conjure up images of an outdated, incompatible and filthy system that anti-transit lobbyists love to use as a punchline or a warning. However, the BART is more than merely a punching bag, as it was originally one of the most forward-thinking and ambitious plans for a new American rapid transit system in the wake of National City Lines doing away with the Bay Area's streetcars as well as the best solution to the long-suffering problem of getting across the San Francisco Bay. On today's Trolley Thursday, consider this humble and passionate defense of this maligned and mischaracterized mass transit system as we look at the factors, figures, and fuck-ups foibles that make up today's Bay Area Rapid Transit.

Bridging the Bay

A Key System "F" Line train exits the Northbrae Tunnel in Berkeley, CA, inbound to Oakland.
The tunnel was later converted to road use but suggests what a Transbay Tube for the Key System
may have looked like.
(John Harder, Key Rail Pix)

The classic West portal edifice of the Twin peaks tunnel,
with a streetcar inbound to the Castro and the Embarcadero.
(Horace Chafee, SFMTA)

The origins of what eventually became today's BART actually began in 1900, when Francis Marion "Borax" Smith opined the Bay Area's need for an electrified subway connecting Oakland and San Francisco. His reasoning, outlined in a San Francisco Chronicle editorial, was to eliminate the need to change trains for a ferry and create a one-seat ride that would entice potential passengers to depend on his rapid transit railway, the Key System. Similar schemes in San Francisco desired to clear up Market Street by installing a third-rail subway running from the Embarcadero to Twin Peaks Tunnel in the 1910s, with a 1915 rapid transit study further suggesting the "imperative" need for a rapid transit link between Oakland and Berkeley. However, despite all of these studies and needs, the technology (and more importantly, the financing) was not quite there to allow these things to happen. The closest people got to a "Bay Area Rapid Transit" was the Key System's Transbay trains to San Francisco via the Bay Bridge, but this otherwise-normal interurban service ceased all operations by April 20, 1958.

Key System No. 163 is inbound to the Transbay Terminal in this 1940s view,
after the Key System was purchased by National City Lines.
(Emiliano Echeverria)

Original concept designs for the BART trains.
(Unknown Author)

While the Key System struggled into the fifties, the state of California was already concerned with developing a new rapid transit system for the Bay Area. Not only were Bay Area business leaders wanting to avoid congestion and increased citizen migration through the area, but even the United States Military concluded that an underwater tunnel was the best possible solution across the bay. In 1951, the "San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit Commission" was formed to study the best possible way of going about this business and satisfy the long-term needs of an increasingly-car-oriented West Coast society. As the study went on, interest was drummed up in the local newspapers that promoted all sorts of pie-in-the-sky prototypes from futuristic Gerry Anderson-esque monorails to googie nuclear trains that were virtually silent and floated under the bay on a cloud of electric energy. As the public's appetites were wettened, the BART Commission eventually concluded that it was in the best interests of all Bay Area counties to come together and form their own transit district to more effectively link the cities and suburbs under one banner. By 1957, the report was submitted to the state legislature and the "San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit District" was officially formed.

This conceptual mockup of a BART train was actually designed by Syd Mead,
who later went on to be production designer on Blade Runner, Tron, Aliens,
and Star Trek, the Motion Picture.
(San Francisco Examiner)

The Nine Five Three Counties of BART

The original Bay Area Rapid Transit logo back in 1958, when five counties were involved.
(Eric Fisher)

A county map of the Bay Area.
(Researchgate)

During the initial planning stages, nine counties surrounding the bay area were included as potential constructors, funders, and operators of the new BART system: San Francisco (the smallest and the most powerful), Marin (the richest), San Mateo (the southern San Francisco peninsula), Sonoma and Napa (wine country with two interurbans), Solano (I have a friend who lives there), Contra Costa (former Sacramento Northern territory), Alameda (East Bay Electric and Key System territory), and Santa Clara. By 1957, however, these numbers were whittled down to five as Santa Clara dropped out to focus on its own expressways and Napa and Sonoma were discounted from being included in the new BART map. That new map involved three branches across San Francisco Bay connecting with Concord in the east, Richmond in the north, and Fremont in the south. 

A finalized 1967 map of the BART system, reaching into Contra Costa county as well as Daly City.
A larger version may be accessed here.
(Public Domain)

An AC Transit "Old Look" bus trundles through San Pablo
and 40th Streets, old Key System stomping grounds.
(Ron Johnsen)

However, back on the peninsula, San Mateo County left the project on April 12, 1962, citing the high costs of developing and building the BART being too much for their local governance, their then-current dependence on Southern Pacific's "Peninsula Commute" service (which later became CalTrain), and their local business worries that San Francisco would be taking their shoppers away. The next month, Marin County also left the project as they were more than aware their voters would not give the 60% approval in bonds to pay for the BART under the Golden Gate Bridge. This decision eliminated the planned Geary Subway that cut under most of northern San Francisco. By July, the only participating counties left were San Francisco, Alameda, and Contra Costa county (the latter two sharing a municipal transit system under AC Transit). Daly City, despite being just a few feet over the San Mateo County Line, now became the southernmost terminus of the BART, with the most extreme East Bay terminals being Richmond in the north, Concord in the east, and Fremont in the south. 

BART trains are seen in this conceptual art in the East Bay, displaying both the streamlined "A" cars
and the unstreamlined, blunt-ended "B" cars.
(San Francisco Chronicle)

America's Future Transit, Today

Various early concepts for the BART rapid transit vehicle show off its wide, low look, 1966.
(Devin McCutchen)

The first BART test train is compared with its  original, boxy testbed.
(Mercury News)

By far the most futuristic aspect of the BART development was its trains and tracks. Around the same time that BART was out of the planning commission and into the design phases, the United States Department of Transportation was looking to the project as a means to re-invigorate rapid transit in a post-National City Lines country. If the trains on BART worked, as well as the whole system, it could be sold to other cites as a prototype. This meant that mass transit designers were now given whole-hog to create their perfect rapid transit without any design constraints holding them back. To say that they probably went too far would be an understatement. When looking at a BART train, the first obvious thing to notice is that the tracks are way too wide; this was because of the consulting firm Parsons Brinckerhoff (who built railroad and road tunnels all over the world, as well as Henry M. Brinckerhoff co-inventing the third-rail electric railway) stating that a broad gauge of 5'6" was more stable and smoother to ride on than the thinner 4'8.5" gauge found everywhere else. 

The first production BART train is revealed to an excited public on November 1971.
(Bill Young, San Francisco Chronicle)

The exceptionally clean interior is inspected by the press.
(Bill Young, San Francisco Chronicle)

Other departures from the norm on the BART included a third-rail electrification system powered by 1000V DC instead of the normal 600, 1200, or 1500V. No reason for this was given but it is assumed that for the long distances and high speeds demanded by the train, a moderate level of high-voltage electricity was needed to maintain the current, especially given the line from Daly City to Concord was about forty miles. The trains themselves, which first debuted in 1965, were similarly futuristic and introduced the Bay Area to a whole new brand of train. Instead of clattery old steel-rivet interurbans and subway cars, these new Rohr-designed-and-built trains featured fiberglass fronts and stainless steel sides with wide interiors, automatic opening vestibule doors, and no straps and bars for standee passengers because, in the words of the first BART President, Adrien J. Falk: "we expect to seat everybody". He also said, "We tried to make the car so attractive it will discourage malice of this sort [...] Anyway, the cars will be equipped with a radio system so passengers can notify headquarters or the station ahead when vandalism occurs." 

Definitely the sound of hopeful optimism.

BART trains being assembled at Rohr Corporation's facility in San Francisco, October 1971.
(Chula Vista Public Library)

Planning, Design, and Construction

Major construction cuts through the heart of Downtown Oakland.
(Russ Reed, Bay Area News Group archives)

Track-supporting pylons are raised in March 1966.
(Bay Area News Group Archives)

For the BART's larger infrastructure such as tracks and tunnels, great pains were taken to preserve already-existing or recycled alignments with major subway work tracing original right-of-ways. Even the tracks were deliberately raised or buried wherever possible to avoid level crossings, as such a high-speed, high-volume system wanted to avoid any contact with pedestrians or automobiles that may slow the trains down. Plenty of the recycled alignments were from the Sacramento Northern and Western Pacific Railway to Walnut Creek and Concord and between Fruitvale and Niles Canyon, respectively, as well as the Atchison Topeka & Santa Fe's line between Richmond and Berkeley. The oldest part of the line belonged to the San Francisco & San Mateo Railway, the first electric streetcar in the Bay Area, out from the Embarcadero along Market Street. The only railway not utilized (outside of its right-of-way to Daly City) was the Southern Pacific Railway, who instead denied any use of its existing and abandoned railway lines in the East Bay out of the sheer pettiness of not letting the BART compete with its still-operating commuter services. Again, perfectly on-brand for the SP.

President Lyndon B. Johnson speaks to an esteemed crowd of guests and the press as he
formally announces the groundbreaking of the BART test track.
(BART.gov)

A blurry view of a BART test train in Hayward in 1971.
(Joseph D. Korman)

Construction began on the BART on June 19, 1964, with President Lyndon B. "For Bunghole" Johnson attending the groundbreaking for the 4.4 mile Concord-Walnut Creek test track. Years of San Franciscans waiting with bated breath in prototype display cars were now beginning to be satisfied, as construction crews soon found the task of building new subways and elevated railways quite the challenge. Many tunnels, like the Berkeley Hills Tunnel between Berkeley and Orinda, were built through active fault lines and, thus, had to be overengineered in order to survive an earthquake the size of the 1906 Great Earthquake and Fire. Others like the Market Street Subway (which began construction in 1967) were tearing up streets in high-population areas using the cut-and-cover method. It's no wonder that San Mateo County pulled out, as the high costs and the interrupted traffic certainly caused plenty of disarray to the Bay Area.

Streetcar traffic finds itself crowded after a cave-in occured at Market and 12th Streets on March 12, 1971.
The heavy construction in San Francisco left plenty of business out of work due to being cut off.
(SFMTA Photo Archives)

The Transbay Tube

The cathedral-like interior of one of the Transbay Tube's two tunnels.
(SF Gate)

Emperor Joshua Norton I, sage and scammer of San Francisco.
God bless him and his divine necrocracy over the United States.
(San Francisco Chronicle)

The biggest party-piece of the BART, and certainly one that was a long-time-coming, was the 3.6 mile-long immersed tunnel known as the Transbay Tube. By this time, the Bay Bridge's original lower level dedicated to cars and trains was now a one-way eastbound highway, with the rails and overhead wires being used for another electric railway in California. Before ground broke on the Transbay Tube in 1965, plenty of people had their own ideas of how to build an underwater tunnel. The earliest mention of San Francisco's want of a Transbay Tube was actually on May 12, 1872, when Emperor Joshua Norton I of the United States and Protectorate of Mexico proclaimed in "The Pacific Appeal" for an appropriation of money from both San Francisco and Oakland to go towards an underwater railway tunnel. He then proclaimed three months later to arrest both cities' leaders for ignoring his precious proclamation. As you do.

A cross-section of the BART tube's final design.
(oplat-usa.com)

A 1920 edition of the San Francisco Chronicle advertises
Major General Goethals' concept for his own transbay tube.
(San Francisco Chronicle)

More serious designs emerged October, 1920, from Major General George Washington Goethals, the builder of the Panama Canal. His design for a combined automobile-and-rail tube (of which later elements were adapted by the actual builders of the Tube) proposed building it on Bay Mud to soften the seismic effects should another intense earthquake occur, as well as a price-tag of $50 million dollars at the time (or $725.5 million today). Another competing design from J. Vipond Davies and Ralph Modjeski (a bridge designer who worked on the Bay Bridge, Portland's Broadway Bridge, and Pennsylvania/New Jersey's Benjamin Franklin Bridge) in 1921 proposed a combined bridge-and-tunnel that eliminated the ventilation issues with Goethals' design. This also had the effect of empowering later proposals to make the Tube rail-only. The final design was completed by 1960 after numerous seismic studies and boring and testing programs, with a final price tag of $132.72 million (or $1.15 billion today).

Later promotional concept art for the Transbay Tube, showing two handsome high-speed trains.
(Eric Fischer)

A basic route of the longest and deepest immersed-water transit tunnel in the world.
Many sections of the Transbay Tube were slightly curved to account for the profile of
the bay bed below it.
(Roads and Bridges)

A section of the Transbay Tube is constructed at Bethlehem Steel's
Pier 70 shipyard, 1967. It's got a weird binocular shape to it.
(Fran Ortiz, Oakland Tribune)

The design of the tunnel was actually very ingenious for its day: instead of being built on bedrock or mud, the Transbay Tunnel was built in 57 massive 273- to 336-foot sections with a steel shell wrapping around a concrete liner that contained two rail tunnels, a ventilation shaft, and a gallery door. To allow natural flexing of the structure to not stress the concrete, the Tube rested on a gravel foundation 60 feet wide and 2 feet deep. Over the next four years of initial construction, from 1965 to 1969, all 57 sections were constructed at Bethlehem Steel's Pier 70 shipyard and floated out before being ballasted with 500 tons of gravel and sank into place. By 1969, the final section was sunken in and, prior to fitting out for train service, citizens of San Francisco were allowed to walk through a small portion on November 9. Test trains did not begin running in the Transbay Tube until August 10, 1973, due to one small problem that ended up affecting BART as a whole later on.

Automated Audacity

BART's original Operations Control Center.
(Data Center Dynamics)

BART's original Westinghouse
"Master Control" computer in 2002.
(C.D. Allen, ItsCalifornia.org)

As a prototype "Halo" system for the Bay Area and the rest of America, BART's engineers pushed their known philosophies of rapid transit conventions to the limit in terms of design as well as operation. The biggest operational change that stood BART out from its contemporaries was its insistence on automated operations. On paper, this left the operator with only station announcements and door controls to worry about, while also keeping all trains as optimally-spaced as possible to reduce wait times and increase service intervals. In practice, however, this quickly became a problem even in testing. The computer system itself was developed by Westinghouse (who also created, patented, and produced air brake applications for railroads all over the world), who were quickly way out of their depth when it came to designing control systems. 

One of the most persistent problems with the computer system was "ghost trains", where false occupancies showed up on the computer system that forced manual train operation up to 25MPH and caused intense delays as well as vicious mockery from the public and the government. The biggest culprit to this was dew, which shorted out the 0.6-volt train detection connection and gave the system a false positive (normal railroads use 15 volts for train detection). This was only one of the many problems the BART had with its initial automated system, as its next incident proved to be its most enduring and infamous image.

The Fremont Flyer Launches the Railway

October 7, 1972. 

Bill Stokes (left) with President Richard Nixon and First Lady Pat Nixon
on board a BART train on opening day, September 11, 1972.
(BART.gov)

An earlier photo of BART's operations control center.
(BART.gov)

BART's General Manager, B.R. "Bill" Stokes is showing a visiting transit executive their fancy control system in his Oakland headquarters. At the time he was giving his morning presentation, BART was being besieged by the California Society of Professional Engineers, along with three BART engineers (Max Blankensee, Robert Bruder, and Holgar Hjortsvang) about problems with the ATC system previously discovered between 1969 and 1971. Management only stoked up more controversy when they chose to ignore these safety warnings and fired the engineers who spoke up about them. With a potential State Senate investigation brewing in June 1972, Stokes was intent on making sure the day went well as the system operated as normal. "Watch", he said to his transit executive friend as he pointed out a blip on the big map board, "There is a train headed for the Fremont Station." The light blipped towards the Fremont stop, finally reached it, and then... went out.

A very frantic but sheepish call then rang into Oakland Headquarters: 

"I've just landed in the parking lot!"

The infamous picture of the Fremont Flyer that quickly became a meme in mass transit circles.
Thankfully, nobody on board was hurt, but it was both quite embarrassing and not the only time 
this happened to BART, which is the even-weirder part.
(Eric Fischer)

Another rarely-seen angle of the Freemont Flyer crash.
(Lonnie Wilson, Oakland Tribune)

No recording was made of Mr. Stokes' reaction, nor his transit executive friend, but since it occurred one month after the BART opened on September 11, the response was quick and severe. Four people ended up injured in the incident and it led the California State Public Utilities Commission (PUC) to hold BART's hand through the repairs and fixes to their system as they imposed strong oversights and stationed their own inspectors in BART central control. The cause of the runaway train was determined to be the unreliable ATC system, which BART also overspent on. Because of this, the next few months had operators manually call for clearance as the ATC was too fallible to detect a stalled train and stop another from hitting it. 

Several managers also ended up replaced and by March 1974, it was determined that BART "suffered from a lack of direction and control on the part of the board and management." This also had the consequence of delaying the opening of the Transbay Tube by several months, pushing it to September 16, 1974. The fired engineers received ethics awards from the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, while "Bill" Stokes was forced to resign due to the incident. interestingly, Fremont's local hockey team named themselves the "Fremont Flyers" after this.

Esteemed guests walk through a section of the Transbay Tube on
completion of the final section, before tracks and other systems are installed.
(San Francisco Chronicle)

To Never Never Land at the Airport

BART in color, on opening day on September 11, 1972.
(Eric Fischer)

A quite-empty BART station at Powell on opening day.
It's very clean though, I'll give them that.
(Eric Fischer)

Following the disastrous Fremont Flyer, BART was off to a shaky start with both the public and the state regulators. When the BART opened on September 11, 1972 to more than 100,000 customers in the first five days, and with the Market Street Subway opening the next year and the Transbay Tube opening in September 16, 1974, it looked as if the future was now here. However, despite now instantly connecting the entire Bay Area underwater, it still did not stem the 157,000 predicted private car journeys BART promised it would stop as it only diverted 44,000 by 1976. The biggest issue here was the "last mile" problem, wherein passengers found it difficult to reach stations by foot or by bicycle, which were not properly accounted for in ridership models. 

The damage done to Train No. 111 in the 1979 BART Transbay Tube fire.
(SFGATE)

Worse still, the entire system was now over-budget as the entire cost of the system by 1976 came to $1.586 billion (or $9.81 billion today), which gave critics ammo to call it long-gestating and too-expensive. An electrical fire that stranded a six-car train in the Transbay Tube on January 17, 1979 further angered mass transit and city planning critics as they criticised BART for "failing to relinquish control of the emergency situation to the fire departments". Thankfully, all 1000 of the passengers were able to escape, but the incident left retiring Oakland firefighter Lt. William Elliot dead from smoke inhalation injuries and a black eye on BART and closed the Transbay Tube until April that year.

BART's new Embarcadero station, six months after opening.
(Leroy W. Demery, Jr.)

This November 1973 system map shows how separated the
San Francisco-Daly City service was from the rest of the BART
prior to the Transbay Tube opening.
(Public Domain)

With the system now open, it was time for BART to think about expansion. The only other station to open at this time was the Embarcadero Station at the Northern end of Market Street, just a short walk from the Ferry Building. Due to it not being part of the original plans and the increasing development in lower Market Street, the basic structure was added to the Market Street Subway but added much later. The most obvious choice was reaching into San Mateo County, which was originally accounted for in 1961 but shelved following the county's departure from the BART project. It seemed, now, there was a change of heart as in 1984, efforts began expanding the system down to San Francisco International Airport (SFO) through Daly City. To entice San Mateo County to allow the BART through to SFO, a $200 million ($340 million today) "contribution" was dealt to allow the county to "buy-into" BART without actually joining the transit district. San Mateo's leaders agreed and the Daly City Tailtrack Project was now expanded into SFO. However, before ground could be broken, something just had to happen to complicate everything again.

EARTHQUAKE!

October 17, 1989. 

It's all fun and games until Atlas shakes the world series.
(Found SF)

A collapsed apartment building in San Francisco
following the Loma Prieta Quake.
(The Mercury News)

It's the third game 1989 World Series and by some miraculous circumstance, both teams competing for the championship are from the Bay Area. Immortalized as the "Bay Bridge Series" or "BART Series" due to the close proximity of the two teams, the Oakland Athletics have the San Francisco Giants by the short-and-friskies going into Game 3, winning the first two games at the Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum. Now, Game 3 was set to take place in the Giants' home territory, Candlestick Park, and both ferry boats and the BART were packed to the gills taking East Bay Residents west to watch the game. However, as the crowd was winding up for its 5:35PM ball game, the not-impossible-but-unexpected happened: A magnitude-6.9 earthquake began ripping its way across the Bay Area again, bringing back comparisons and flashbacks to the 1906 quake. 

Candlestick Park is in disarray as fans in the bleachers stand
and move to the field for more safe, open ground.
(SFGATE)

A section of the Bay Bridge lies destroyed and cut off
road traffic for a good month. This was the impetus to replace
the Eastern section with a newer bridge.
(KQED)

For 15 seconds, buildings were shaken, a section of the Bay Bridge collapsed and severed cross-bay road traffic for a month, and aftershocks continued to rock the Bay for many months afterward. Due to the early off-works committed by almost everyone to go see the game, plus the fact that rapid transit and the roads were clear due to everyone commuting before rush hour, the loss of life was minimal compared to the structural damage. This was BART's finest hour, as unlike the Bay Bridge, the Transbay Tube held strong and allowed them to haul stranded freeway drivers and commuters alike a mere five hours after the earthquake struck. Full service resumed the very next day at 5AM and for the next two months, it ran on a 24 Hour schedule with no delays or breakdowns, pressing the Westinghouse computer to its limit. If there's any credit to be given for the BART that day, it's that it helped the Bay Area keep moving in a time of crisis. And that, dear friends, is absolutely admirable.

A BART train passes by a destroyed section of freeway in Oakland.
(Curbed SF)

Thank you for reading today's Trolley post, and watch your step as you alight on the platform. My resources today included an SF Chronicle article on the futuristic debut of the BART, BART's own history page, and the image copyright holders (including the archives of the San Francisco Chronicle) that made this report possible. I'd also like to credit readers like you that keep me writing this. The trolley gifs in our posts are made by myself and can be found under “Motorman Reymond’s Railroad Gif Carhouse”, while the BART gifs were made by Alex Stroshane and can be found at his website here. On Tuesday, we return to the BART to look at the modern history of this misunderstood futurism. For now, you can follow myself or my editor on Twitter, buy a shirt or sticker from our Redbubble stand, or purchase my editor's self-developed board game! It's like Ticket to Ride, but cooler! (and you get to support him through it!) Until next time, ride safe!