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Bay Area riders can now plan and book short Uber trips — ranging from two to seven miles — to and from BART stations directly within the Official BART App. This exciting partnership between BART and Uber Transit is part of BART’s ongoing commitment to enhance the customer experience by expanding and modernizing technology solutions that offer riders more flexible, convenient ways to get where they need to go.  

BART is partnering with Uber Transit to fully integrate seamless end-to-end journey planning and payment all within the BART app. Riders will no longer need to use multiple apps to plan their BART trip and plan and pay for an Uber ride. Everything can be done without leaving the BART app, and the total trip time will be displayed, making things faster and easier for users. 

Uber Transit is focused nationwide on supporting transit agencies to provide low-cost paratransit trips and to solve first/last mile challenges. This new partnership addresses a key challenge within the Bay Area’s transit network: providing reliable connections for people whose starting location or destination is too far to comfortably walk to a station or bus stop or is underserved by frequent bus or rail service. 

Read BART + Uber Integration FAQs here

“Embracing technology to help people leave their cars at home and reduce congestion is a shared value within the Bay Area,” said Bob Powers, BART’s General Manager. “Collaborating with Uber will help attract new riders and will simplify the process for those who take Uber to and from BART stations. This partnership will also expand access options as we build more housing in place of parking lots at stations.” 

“Uber Transit is proud to partner with BART to bridge the crucial first/last mile challenge, helping transit agencies close gaps that too often keep people from getting where they need to go,” said Chris Margaronis, Head of Transit Partnerships at Uber.  “By integrating Uber rides directly into the BART app, we’re simplifying travel, expanding access, and making public transit a more flexible, reliable option for everyone — especially those in underserved areas. Together, we’re reimagining how people move across the Bay Area.”  

“No longer having to use multiple platforms to plan, book, and pay for a trip involving BART and Uber is a game changer for our riders,” said Ravi Misra, BART’s Chief Information Officer. “Providing this simple option on the BART app shows how innovation can improve access to BART and increase ridership.” 

The BART and Uber partnership includes a special, limited time $5 Uber trip discount at the launch of the program for trips starting or ending at the following ten selected BART stations: 

• Antioch 
• Bay Fair 
• Concord 
• Daly City 
• Fruitvale 
• Lake Merritt 
• MacArthur 
• Richmond 
• Walnut Creek 
• West Oakland 

Riders can take advantage of the special $5 discount up to six times over seven calendar days. 

These stations were selected based on locations where people may not live on a bus line and in a way to ensure bus ridership is not significantly impacted. Great care has been taken to ensure sustainable and active modes of transportation remain featured in BART’s Trip Planner.  

In addition to Uber trips, BART’s popular multimodal Trip Planner continues to include walking and biking options as well as other transit, bike-share, and scooter-share options for getting to and from BART stations. Riders can also customize preferences such as walking and biking speeds for planning their trips. To enhance regional transit coordination, BART’s Trip Planner includes the schedules for regional rail service, such as Caltrain, Capitol Corridor, and ACE, as well as buses, ferries, and cable cars. During times when BART is experiencing major service disruptions, transit riders can plan itineraries that don’t include BART as an option to help them get around.   

Michael Cox, a Principal Performance Analyst in BART’s Sustainability Department, grew up gardening with his mom and recycling with his dad in New York.

“My parents were farmers when they were kids, and they always taught me the importance of protecting the environment and being one with your surroundings,” Cox said recently during an interview at BART Headquarters.

When Cox was studying environmental science at Stanford University, he realized he was especially passionate about climate change. Fieldwork wasn’t for him – “I just wasn’t very good at it,” he said – so he decided to “attack the issue using a computer, with data.”

Read more about Cox’s unique role at BART and how he uses data to support the District’s sustainability efforts. And check out the 2022 Sustainability Report here, published today, which highlights BART's efforts to support and enhance sustainability within the BART system and region. Says General Manger Robet Powers: "BART is one of the greenest options for Bay Area residents traveling around the region."

1. How long have you worked for BART?

I have worked at BART for 3.5 years.

2. What’s your role at BART?

I am a Principal Performance Analyst in the Sustainability Department. I calculate our energy use, greenhouse gas emissions, water use, and waste generation, and I implement programs that can improve our performance in those areas.

3. If you can remember, what is your earliest memory of riding the trains?

My earliest memory of riding BART was during undergrad. I attended Stanford, and I needed to go to Berkeley to do some research at farmers markets. I took Caltrain to Millbrae and then BART to Berkeley. I remember being confused whether BART was an urban subway or commuter train, but now I know it’s kind of like both!

4. What’s something that might surprise us about your job?

I think a lot of times in the sustainability field, you get pushback from folks afraid of change and adjusting their behavior. We’re really lucky in California that people are already pretty aware of the challenges we face in terms of climate change and environmental pollution. It’s nice to have coworkers and members of the public that are really supportive of the work we do and excited by the progress we’re making.

5. Name your favorite BART station or route and tell us why you like it. 

My favorite BART station is Lake Merritt. It was the station closest to me when I lived in Oakland, and I loved how convenient it was to get to downtown Oakland or the lake. There’s a lot of nice scenery in the area.

My favorite line is definitely the Oakland Airport Connector. It’s just nifty to ride on!

6. What do you typically do to pass the time on the train?

Usually, I play games on my phone. I’m playing Wordle or Spelling Bee from the New York Times, or I’m playing Fire Emblem Heroes, which is a strategy role-playing game.

7. What’s on your desk besides your computer?

On my desk at the office, I have a water bottle, lots of pens and pencils – even though I don’t write that much – and I have some art that my mom made. She’s a sculptor so I love having her pieces. I have some other gifts that I received from previous jobs: a framed photo of a Muni bus – I worked at SFMTA before BART – a model BART car, and a stress ball.

8. If you acquired a decommissioned legacy BART car, what would you transform it into?

If I had a bunch of them, I would make an escape room attraction where each BART car is a different task you have to complete.

9. Here’s your chance to brag. What’s something cool about BART you’d like to highlight?

One thing we’re always bragging about is how clean the electricity is that powers our system. In 2022, 100% of the electricity powering the core system came from greenhouse-gas free sources. BART is one of the best ways to reduce your greenhouse gas emissions associated with travel. We’re able to procure our own electricity, and that gives us the ability to negotiate our power purchase agreements to secure renewable and greenhouse gas-free energy.

10. What’s the most important lesson you’ve learned at BART? 

You have to be patient. We work for a public agency and that means we have to get input from a lot of stakeholders before we make decisions, and that’s because we need to ensure we’re using our taxpayer funds appropriately. If you think something is going to take time, add a little more for a buffer and make sure you’re engaging with as many people as you can. It’s much easier to get buy in from different groups on things if they know what’s coming down the pipeline and feel included when decisions are made.

Kassandra Santillan pictured at Daly City Station, where she disembarks to get to her classes at SFSU.

Do you have a favorite BART memory or story to share? Email a short summary to BART Storyteller Michelle Robertson at [email protected], and she may follow up to schedule an interview.    

In August, Kassandra Santillan started her second year at San Francisco State University, her dream college where she studies microbiology, her dream major. If she couldn’t take BART to school, she wouldn’t be able to attend. 

“BART made it happen for me,” she said. “I can’t afford to live near campus, so I’d probably be at a community college instead.”  

Santillan is the first person in her immediate family to attend college. She’s always aspired to study at SFSU because that's where her aunt went, and her aunt was one of the only people she knew who graduated from college.  

Santillan lives in East Oakland, where she grew up. She doesn’t currently have access to a car, so she takes BART twice a day, five days a week to school. Before starting at SFSU, she’d never really used the system. 

“We didn’t travel far away when I was young,” she said. “The only other time I’d use BART was for field trips to San Francisco." 

Growing up, Santillan often “felt really suffocated.” She’d hear stories of people going to Union Square at Christmastime or the mall at Powell Street, but “it wasn’t accessible to me.” 

“I never really got out much before,” she said. “BART opened the Bay to me. I had no idea it was so easy to get to all these great places.” Now, she takes BART pretty much everywhere. In addition to school, she’ll ride the train to the mall in Milpitas or the Embarcadero, where she walks the waterfront to Pier 39 and back.  

Santillan treasures her time on the train. She’ll do some drawing, finish up assignments, and sometimes just chill out.  

“Every day is so hectic as a college student,” she said. “Commuting is my time to unwind.”  

When she graduates, Santillan wants to be a clinical lab scientist. She’s wanted to be a scientist since meeting one in elementary school during career day.  

“I remember at the end of the day they asked everyone what they wanted to be when they grew up. Most of them said teacher or a doctor,” she said. “I was one of the few who wanted to be a scientist.”  

“It’s pretty crazy to be studying in the field now,” she said. “It feels unreal sometimes. I know a lot of people who don’t get this opportunity.”  

Sometimes, she has to remind herself: “I’m really here, and I’m really doing this thing I’ve been trying to do all my life.”  

About the BART Connects Storytelling Series

The BART Connects storytelling series was launched in 2023 to showcase the real people who ride and rely on BART and illustrate the manifold ways the system affects their lives. You can follow the ongoing series at bart.gov/news. 

The series grew out of BART's Role in the Region Study, which demonstrates BART’s importance to the Bay Area’s mobility, cultural diversity, environmental and economic sustainability. We conducted a call for stories to hear from our riders and understand what BART means to them. The call was publicized on our website, social media, email blasts, and flyering at stations. More than 300 riders responded, and a selection of respondents who opted-in were interviewed for the BART Connects series. 

Do you have a favorite BART memory or story to share? Email a short summary to BART Storyteller Michelle Robertson at [email protected], and she may follow up to schedule an interview.  

Elvis Presley loved his bubblegum pink Cadillac. Elvis Herselvis prefers a blue-and-white ride. Her vehicle is roomier than that Fleetwood Sixty Special, boasts twice as many wheels, and unlike that old gas guzzler, it runs on electricity.  

We’ll toss her the mic so she can say it herselvis: “My life would suck without BART.”  

For thirty years, Elvis Herselvis, the drag king persona of legendary drag performer, artist, and musician Leigh Crow, has taken BART to rehearsals, performances, bars, brunches, and her brother’s house in Richmond.  

Unlike Mr. Presley, Crow doesn’t drive, so without BART she’s not totally sure what she’d do. Spend a lot on rideshares, probably, but that’s a cruddy option when you’re regularly traveling back and forth between San Francisco, where she typically performs, and Oakland, where she lives. About a decade ago, Crow moved to Oakland after being priced out of San Francisco. She came to the Bay Area from suburban Phoenix as a young lesbian looking for performing opportunities.  

“Public transportation was one of the very attractive things about moving to San Francisco,” Crow said. “Where I grew up, you had to have a car. In the Bay, you can get where you need to go almost entirely on transit.” 

Crow got her start in drag in the late 80s at the lesbian club Female Trouble in the Haight. The club’s producer needed a small act to fill a hole in the schedule between Christmas and New Years. The girls said, “Let’s do a drag show!”  

“Some were doing Bowie, Guns and Roses, that type of thing,” Crow said. “But when it came time for the performance, I was the only one left on the billing.” She performed as Elvis Herselvis, and the crowd loved her.  

“They got to play the part of being screaming teeny boppers, which many of them had never gotten a chance to do,” she said.  

Women were highly involved in the Bay Area drag scene back then, but there weren’t as many drag kings performing, and when they were, you didn’t hear about them as often as the queens.  

Crow had a hand in changing that when she started performing as Elvis Herselvis. She’s considered the world’s first female Elvis impersonator, and she was one of the first out lesbian performers to tour the southern U.S., said Ruby Vixen, Crow’s partner in life and performance. The two regularly perform together with their country western band Velvetta. 

Ruby Vixen (left) and Leigh Crow (right) perform at the Hubba Hubba Revue. Photo: Sylvie Barak

“She toured the South in the late 80s and 90s, long before ‘Drag Race’ and the visibility that came with it,” Vixen said. One of Crow’s tours brought her to the Second International Elvis Presley Conference held at the University of Mississippi in 1996. Crow gained national notoriety when the organization running Graceland pulled their support for the conference due to Crow’s participation.  

In San Francisco, things were different. The drag circuit was a punk-rock scene, “very riot grrrl,” Crow said.  

“Drag was a lot weirder and less homogenized then,” she continued. “People played all sorts of characters. They were scrappy." 

Public transportation enabled Crow and many of her friends and fellow performers to get to and from their performances, including at historic venues like the legendary lesbian bar White Horse Inn. 

“I am just so grateful to have an alternative option to driving,” Crow said. “I also feel good that I’m not having an impact on the environment like I would if I were driving. There are little things you can do, and that’s one of them." 

Crow can regularly be scene on BART in “various states of drag.” People aren’t fazed by it much – it's the Bay Area after all – and most reactions are positive.  

Crow said she's proud to wear her gender-bending costumes onboard. “It’s a signal boost that encourages everyone of every gender that drag is viable, and that you should feel safe and welcome to do it.”  

Ruby Vixen (left) and Leigh Crow (right) at MacArthur Station.

Added Vixen: “Public transit serves young and lower-income communities, which often contribute to the most outrageous, diverse, and innovative drag in the Bay. And it’s always been that way.” 

Without BART, the underground performance scenes of San Francisco past and present would look different, including venues like OASIS, where Crow performs in the ‘Star Trek’ show as Captain Kirk. She’ll revive the role in August.  

During her photoshoot with BART, Elvis Herselvis turned heads every which way she went. Some passersby took pics on their phones as she strutted about MacArthur Station in her custom silver suit, sparkling cowboy hat, and hefty belt buckle. The suit was custom made by Vixen, a costume and clothing designer who owns Dandy and Vixen with Crow. 

“We chose the fabric because it looks great under stage lights,” Crow said. We also discovered the fabric looks sumptuous in front of the silver steel of a passing BART train. In the sun, the two materials bounced off one another like they were dancing.  

Crow will have an equally eye-catching outfit for San Francisco Pride celebrations this weekend. Pride Month is naturally her and Vixen’s busiest season of the year. The couple plan to take BART into the city for Pride, including the San Francisco Dyke March on Saturday in the Mission District.  

Crow especially looks forward to the ride home on BART after Pride, when “everyone’s tired and sunburned and happy and feeling the freedom and the love.”  

BART, she pointed out, is also the safest option if you’re planning to imbibe. 

“You can go out and get wasted in San Francisco then take BART home and be safe,” she said. Just remember to be safe, respectful of your fellow passengers, and follow BART’s Code of Conduct.  

This weekend, look for Elvis Herselvis and Ruby Vixen on BART and enjoy what will certainly be a festive and celebratory ride.

About BART Connects

The BART Connects storytelling series was launched in 2023 to showcase the real people who ride and rely on BART and illustrate the manifold ways the system affects their lives. The subjects of BART Connects will be featured in videos as well as a forthcoming marketing campaign that is slated to run across the Bay Area. Find all the stories at bart.gov/bartconnects. 

The series grew out of BART's Role in the Region Study, which demonstrates BART’s importance to the Bay Area’s mobility, cultural diversity, environmental and economic sustainability. We conducted a call for stories to hear from our riders and understand what BART means to them. More than 300 riders responded, and a selection of respondents were interviewed for the BART Connects series. 

Follow our rider guide below and learn more about our special Pride service here.

Leigh Crow and Ruby Vixen’s upcoming BARTable events:  

• Saturday and Sunday, July 1 and 2: Leigh and Ruby will be vending their Dandy and Vixen wearables at Mosswood Meltdown in Mossword Park. To get to Mosswood, take BART to MacArthur Station and walk about 13 minutes to 3612 Webster St., Oakland.  

• August 8 through 31: D’arcy Drollinger presents Star Trek LIVE!, featuring Leigh as Captain Kirk, at Oasis. Take BART to Civic Center Station or 16th St Mission Station and walk about 16 minutes to 298 11th St., San Francisco.