BART running longer trains as top officials urge transit use during tonight's Giants game
Top transit officials are urging drivers to avoid the packed bridges and roads tonight and instead, take advantage of transit including the longer trains BART is running to accommodate Giants Playoff game fans and those participating in “Try BART Week.” That’s BART’s ridership building effort, which has close to 9,000 people per day getting onto BART trains hoping to win the grand prize - a year of free BART tickets.
"We expect the bridges and roads to be packed with fans headed to and from the game," Metropolitan Transportation Commission spokesman Randy Rentschler said. "Taking BART, Muni a ferry or Caltrain will be the fastest, easiest and certainly cheapest option to beating the backup in and around San Francisco - especially when you consider there's very little parking at AT&T park."
BART Predicts Today’s Ridership Will be at Near Record Levels
BART is predicting by the end of today, between 370,000 and 375,000 riders will have taken its trains. That’s a number nearing the record ridership levels, which customers set in September 2008 when BART averaged about 380,000 riders per day. Since that time, ridership has dropped, largely attributed to the economic slump and high unemployment that followed. But it has stabilized this year at around 350,000 riders per day.
“ Try BART Week” & Giants Lead to 23,000 More Riders than Usual
So far this week, the "Try BART Week" effort and the success of the Giants have led to an increase of 23,000 more riders than expected between Monday and Wednesday of this week BART had been expecting to carry approximately 1,047,100 customers in the first three days of this week, instead, 1,070,300 rode the train, tens of thousands of whom are texting the word of the day found on the overhead electronic platform destination signs to win one of 1300 prizes worth 60,000 in BART's biggest and most intense ridership development effort in history.
BARTtv News: Watch the First Person Win A Year of Free BART Tickets
Learn more about “Try BART Week” and how to enter for the final day of prizes on Friday, including the grand prize – a year of free BART tickets worth $2,500. Watch who won the first grand prize winner of the Years of free BART tickets on BARTtv: www.bart.gov/barttv .