@Yuchenj_UW SF used to have later cafes and very late food, but as the city's been more tech focused, it seems like those options have dried up.
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Nextransit
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Nextransit
@Nextransit
We're envisioning, researching, planning, and building tools for a better urban future.
San Francisco . Paris . Boston Присоединился Şubat 2011
210 Подписки471 Подписчики
Guys, SF is a magical city.
Today, a beautiful Wednesday, I had a 4:30pm meeting with a friend at a café… it was closed.
We walked 10 blocks, every café was closed. Finally found Blue Bottle, it closed at 5:30.
Can some YC company please build what SF people actually want?
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@Onargiix @brezina @schneider As i've explained, transit agencies don't really automate for labor cost. Automation of taxis makes sense because labor costs are high per passenger. But a train can carry thousands of people. Automation would save only 10% of BART's budget & cost 50 years worth of labor build.
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@Nextransit @brezina @schneider Most public transit is going automated but American unions pushing for less automation. I’m a pro union man myself but Bart won’t survive with Union drivers
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One of the dumbest transit takes I’ve seen.
Is there fat to cut in BART’s operations? Sure.
Should we shut BART down and give out free Waymo rides?
That’s a geometry problem — the Bay Area would become gridlocked.
Cars simply take up too much space per person transported.
Peter Kazanjy@Kazanjy
BART exists to employ BART employees, regardless of service delivery. Shut it down, hand out Waymo vouchers.
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@Nextransit @brezina @schneider The difference is also Paris heavily relies on public transit and Bay Area does not. If we automated the trains it can at least stay longer in service but in the end bart will fail because not even a tax increase can save it
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@Onargiix @brezina @schneider Paris could not push the # of trains through the tunnel they needed to without automating them. It was a strategic investment in capacity.
BART should automate for many reasons, incl throughput, but it won't get us anywhere w/ budget today—and BART would need a lot MORE capital
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@Onargiix @brezina @schneider Cost savings are NOT the primary reason transit systems automate. BART drivers are roughly 10% of BART budget, or ~ $90-100 mil. At $5 bil capital cost, that's 50 yrs of labor! And where does that money come from today?
Automation is normally about throughput (eg more trains).
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@brezina @schneider The problem with BART isn't that its labor costs are extraordinary, it's that it over-relied on peak commute trips to fund its service. Unique ridership is *UP* vs pre-pandemic, but each rider takes it 2-3 days/wk vs 5 days/wk. Decreasing service in response would drop ridership.
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@brezina @schneider Sure, but their labor costs are not particularly high. I realize everyone is trying to reduce labor costs & BART can as well, but unlike smaller transportation like cabs or even buses, per passenger-mile labor costs on BART is orders of magnitude lower.
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@NoCyclopathTO @Waymo BART has an op budget of $883 million/yr.
Waymo's is somewhere ~ $2-6 billion/yr.
BART is "FAILING" w/ 2.5 million riders.
Waymo has "HUGE RIDERSHIP" w/ 876,000 riders.
🤔
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In San Francisco, the failing, druggie filled subway is hemorrhaging money and suffering from rock bottom ridership.
On the other hand @Waymo is swimming in money with its highest ridership to date.
Proving again that even folks who don’t own cars prefer to travel in cars.
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@brezina @schneider BART has not meaningfully hired new staff since pre-pandemic, the only increase in staff is security & increased capital (eg new fare gates & entrances).
Automation is good, but most agencies use it to increase throughput, not cost savings. There's a HUGE capital cost required.
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@brezina @schneider Sure, but we fawn over Waymo, even though their per passenger mile costs are potentially 2 orders of magnitude higher.
You can argue BART needs change, but it has one of the lowest pax-mile $ in the US. Labor cost increases are similar to private sector over same period + CPI.
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@dbsb3233 @bilal_akh When everyone lives spread out, everything takes forever — transit can't get close enough, freeways can't handle the capacity, and city streets lose vibrancy. The price you pay for everyone wanting a house is spending 4 hrs/day getting around & paying $$$ for the privilege.
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Now pick start and end points that aren't next to stations. Or require a transfer.
That's like saying flying from San Diego to LA is faster... if going from airport to airport. But if going from our home in Chula Vista to UCLA, it's a whole different matter. You have to factor in the actual start and end points.
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@dbsb3233 @bryanculbertson @bilal_akh Bay Area has 9.75 million different transit agencies and counties and joint powers. BART taxes the counties it serves. Muni taxes San Francisco city only. It's not what you're describing.
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Paywalled link.
Again, that's probably not the whole metro area, but just the core city. The transit systems rarely (if ever) tax just the core city. They usually tax the whole metro area, and throw a few token routes from the suburbs into the core city trying to justify taking their money too.
If you're gonna make them pay for it, you have to count that whole population in the stats.
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@brezina @schneider BART has an op budget of $883 million/yr. Waymo's is somewhere ~ $2-6 billion/yr. BART carries 2.5 million. Waymo carries 876,000. I see nobody calling for Waymo to shut down with a fiscal hammer.
BART can get better, but it has one of the lowest pax-mile costs in the US.
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I don’t think BART will make the necessary changes (autonomous trains, passenger safety from drug addicts/violent/mentally ill) unless they are forced to by fiscal hammer
The system is treated as a high paid public sector union jobs program.
We should have automated trains, and customer service/janitorial and police walking train all day long
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@kane @SFBART @SFBARTalert For reference, 0.00018% of airline passengers overdose per year. Similar ballpark as BART! Guess we should shut down the planes too.
But wait! 0.0027% of Americans overdose every month. That's 10x higher than BART percentages! BART is 10x safer for overdoses than daily life.
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@kane @SFBART @SFBARTalert 2.5 million people ride BART monthly. While 16 overdoses is too high, that means 0.0002% of riders overdosed.
That "crack den" sucks at its name--it's basically a transit system that occasionally has a drug user.
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Fun facts about how poorly @SFBART is run. SF Bay Area deserves good public transit:
16 overdoses in one quarter is crazytown.
Daily delays at @SFBARTalert when well-run systems avg of 0 delays per week.
We’re basically paying taxes for crack dens that move sometimes.
Grok@grok
BART Q4 FY2025: trains on-time 85.2% daily (81.3% peak), with 3,759 delays that quarter—mostly wayside (82%), social/misc passenger (28-44%). HK MTR: 99.9% punctuality (latest Jul-Sep 2025 data), delays >8 min extremely rare (roughly 1 per millions of km). Taipei MRT: >99% punctuality (99.48% in 2024 comparisons), historically <30 delays >5 min per year. Drug use: BART had 16 Narcan overdose interventions in that quarter alone, plus related policing for open use/homeless issues. HK MTR and Taipei MRT report virtually none on-system, thanks to zero-tolerance enforcement. BART's funding model was once called gold standard, but these metrics show clear gaps in reliability and environment vs these peers.
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@mariadavidson If you think we have a spending problem, which of those are you hoping to trim back, out of curiosity?
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@mariadavidson You must be well-off? In the last 10yrs:
+100% in Medi-Cal (covering ~40% of Californians)
+180% in homeless housing and beds
-40% drop in child poverty
+63% in PFL benefits
+60% in CalFresh
+500% wildfire $$
+500% in solar, +1k% storage
+300% in EITC
+Universal TK
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California has a spending problem.
State spending per capita grew 54% in the last 10 years, adjusted for inflation.
Don't know many people who would say state services got 54% better.
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Nextransit ретвитнул
@nypost In reality, BART is the most efficient heavy rail agency in the nation and has more unique riders now than in 2019
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