Tens of millions of people ride BART every year -- to dates, to the doctor, to see a friend, to fun. BART Connects is our effort to tell some of their stories.
This new edition features a multitude of riders whose stories span generations, neighborhoods, and walks of life: a Grammy-winning musician who got his start performing outside BART stations, a fisherman who hauls his catch home on the train, a senior who takes BART to see her best friend of more than 70 years.
The series grew out of a call for rider stories in 2023. The initial response made clear that BART is so much more than a way to get around for the people who ride it.
Sehinne Yohannes - The BART Poet
San Leandro Station
"The Bay is my siren. It pulls me in towards murky waters of Lake Merritt and tells me I am a spring. How can I leave the Bay when every good idea I've come up with was made on BART? I jot down one-liners whispered to me upon my train stopping at 19th St."
By the time the train hums into 16th St. Station, recent high school grad Sehinne Yohannes has scribbled some solid one-liners. Nothing's concrete, but she’s got the first rumblings of a concept or idea or phrase that could blossom from a wisp on the page into a poem.
Sehinne wrote these lines on BART. The poem that grew from them was the first to “break the nine barrier” at the 2025 Brave New Voices slam poetry festival, meaning every judge scored Sehinne's piece a nine or above. Sehinne’s group, Team Bay Area, took home first place.
BART takes Sehinne from San Leandro to 16th St. Mission every week for her internship at Youth Speaks, a nonprofit in the Mission that gives young people space to unearth, develop, and amplify their voices. It’s not the destination, it’s the journey, and for Sehinne, the journey is where much of the work happens.
“Transit became something I started writing about when I realized I was always writing on it," she said. "BART has always given me a safe space to write and be inspired and be creative."
In her “BART poem,” Sehinne personifies BART as her “second uncle, twice removed on my city’s side.” He’s reliable, a little eccentric, and always there for her.
“BART was made for people like me who were raised by their city,” she writes. “He shows up late and he shows up loud, but he shows up for me always. And that just might be the most Bay thing about him.”
Now in her last year of high school, Sehinne’s starting to think about life beyond the Bay.
“It being my senior year and all and not really knowing where I’ll end up, whenever I ride BART now it’s really just trying to capture a memory of everything see so I can take it with me everywhere I go,” she said.
Naomi “Nona” Hulme
Glen Park Station
“Seniors like me who have given up driving need BART.”
91-year-old Naomi Hulme doesn’t drive anymore. But that doesn’t mean she’s not out and about.
Naomi, AKA Nona, would never live in a city without public transportation.
“That’s how seniors like me can get around,” she said. Nona knows the scope of her life would narrow if she didn’t have the option to take transit. Many seniors experience social isolation, loss of independence, and declining mental and physical health when they give up driving.
But transit provides seniors with another option.
For decades, Nona's taken BART from Glen Park to Pleasant Hill/Contra Costa Centre to see the same person. That would be her best friend of 72 years, Dee. The old pals from college will shop, dine, and once a month, play Bridge.
Nona said riding transit makes her feel happy and grateful to be active. She likes striking up conversations with people on the train: “Where’re you going? Where’d you come from? How’d you meet?”
It’s not hard to get people to chat.
“Nobody’s gonna turn down talking with an old lady."
Fantastic Negrito - The BART Bard
19th St. Oakland Station
"BART connects me to the first audience I ever had.”
Before the Grammys, there was BART.
Xavier Amin Dphrepaulezz, known by his stage name Fantastic Negrito, went from busking in BART stations to collecting his first, second, and third Grammy for Best Contemporary Blues Album.
He hasn't forgotten where it started -- and he keeps coming back.
In 2014, Fantastic Negrito was busking outside the Lake Merritt and Mission BART stations. He wasn’t getting gigs and felt like the industry had written him off, so he brought his songs to the people.
"When clubs didn't want to book me, when people just didn't think the music I was doing had any future, I came out to the BART station," he said. "That's how I connected with people getting off the train — everyday, ordinary people. It connected me to songwriting. It connected me to stories."
When his first Grammy arrived in the mail, he didn't open it at home. He took it to the corner where he always played -- Lake Merritt Station -- and opened it there, on the street, Grammy on the ground, guitar in hand.
He still comes back to BART sometimes to work out new songs. Some people walk past with AirPods in. He plays anyway.
"BART connects me to the first audience I ever had,” he said. "If I don't come back here, something's wrong with me.”
Tommy Jung - The BART Fisherman
Embarcadero Station
"BART is the cornerstone of what makes my life in the Bay Area unique."
He stands on the platform watching trains come and go, the way sailors once watched the tides, and waits for the shining vessel that will deliver him to sea.
His voyage does not take place on open water, but the Red Line. In place of a skiff, he has a Clipper BayPass card and a seat near the door.
Tommy Jung takes BART fishing.
Crappies, jacksmelt, surfperch – Tommy's caught them ‘all and taken them home on the train. If he doesn't eat them, Tommy uses the vertebrates for gyotaku, the traditional Japanese art of fish printing.
The UC Berkeley law student wouldn’t fish if it weren’t for BART. He doesn’t own a car, and he doesn’t want to own one.
“BART is the cornerstone of what makes my life in the Bay Area unique,” said Tommy, who takes the train to everything – internships, Valkyrie games, museums. He estimates he’s ridden BART to see the San Francisco Symphony more than twenty times.
So if you spot a man with a yellow-lidded bait bucket on BART, ask him to open it up to show you the day’s catch. Or follow him to Torpedo Wharf or the Embarcadero and watch him angle.
Enzo Wu and Apardeep Singh - The BART Stans
Dublin/Pleasanton Station
“Knowing how to ride public transit is a big step in growing up.”
Tri-Valley teenagers Enzo Wu and Apardeep Singh have a message to parents: Get your kids on transit!
The high school senior and sophomore want people their age to understand that public transportation is an important tool. You don’t have to have a license, and you don’t have to beg your parents for rides. Seeking independence? Transit is the answer.
"Taking transit builds social confidence, which so many kids lack these days,” said Enzo. “Knowing how to ride public transit is a big step in growing up.”
To give his peers a leg up, Enzo founded the Dougherty Valley High School Public Transit and Infrastructure Club. He serves as president and Apardeep is the head of PR and social media. More than thirty students regularly show up to meetings, and it’s been an effective venue for educating their peers about urbanism and the role public infrastructure plays in their lives.
“Some of my friends won’t necessarily take transit everywhere like I do, but just getting the idea in their heads is a big step,” Enzo said. “Building transit skills now will come in handy many years down the line when you need to get to college, to work. That’s why I ride transit, and that’s why I’m advocating for kids my age to do the same."
Mariah Santiago - The BART Influencer
North Concord/Martinez
“BART girl math: I can maximize sleep by doing my makeup on the train and still sneak in a nap each way.”
Being a “BART princess” requires girl math sometimes.
Mariah Santiago commutes a long distance from North Concord/Martinez to San Francisco. But she makes the most of that time, often filming “get ready with me” videos during her rides that document her makeup routine and daily ‘fits.
“I do my makeup in less than three stops – lashes and all – before the heavier flow of riders,” she said. “This is my BART girl math: I can maximize sleep by doing my makeup on the train and still sneak in a nap each way.”
People often make a face when they hear the amount of time Mariah spends commuting. She gets it, but that’s exactly why the self-proclaimed BART princess makes the most of it.
“My BART ride is my soft launch into the day – my own version of main character energy before the city wakes up,” she said. “I don’t want to sit in traffic. I just want to vibe. BART lets me do exactly that.”
Isaac Abid - The Downtown Developer
19th St. Oakland Station
“BART is integral to the long-term success of Bay Area downtowns.”
BART stations are conduits of social, cultural, and economic energy, says real estate investor and lifelong BART rider Isaac Abid.
Isaac is the founder and managing partner of Lakeside Group, an Oakland-based commercial real estate firm working to activate the city’s public spaces and improve urban infrastructure.
BART is critical to this work, bringing people to and from Oakland to work, shop, eat, and explore art and culture.
“Downtown Oakland’s unique connectivity to BART is what’s going to help it succeed in the future,” he said.
Downtowns shape and define culture, Isaac continued. When they flourish, so too do the people who live in the region.
“BART enables people across the community to access these hubs of culture, and that is integral to the ongoing prosperity of the Bay Area,” he said. “BART democratizes access.”