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BART is going all in on bikes! Beginning January 1, 2024, bikes will be allowed on most of the escalators throughout the BART system to help make it easier for people to bring their bikes on board the train. 

This change was approved by the BART Board of Directors at the request of Director Rebecca Saltzman. The vote authorizes further changes to BART’s bike rules, including allowing bikes on all train cars except the first car (bikes were previously banned from the first three cars during commute times), and allowing bicyclists to secure bikes on the train using the bike lean bar and straps, instead of holding them.  

The bike rules were last changed 10 years ago, when BART ended the ban on bikes on BART during commute hours.  Over the last decade, longer and heavier bicycles, such as e-bikes and cargo bikes, have soared in popularity.

“Carrying bikes up and down stairwells can be difficult and not all bikes fit in our elevators,” said BART Director Rebecca Saltzman. “Updating our rules will make BART easier to use for cyclists and families bringing bikes on the train. Bikes play an important role in getting people out of their cars and on public transit and these updated rules encourage environmentally friendly multimodal travel options.”  

BART encourages riders to use their best judgment when utilizing system escalators and elevators because individual bikes vary in size and weight. 

BART is releasing a new video detailing safety tips for bringing bikes on escalators in the BART system.

See updated Bikes on BART rules here:

*Bikes will remain banned from BART’s ten narrow escalators located at the following three stations: 19th Street Oakland, Antioch and Oakland Airport Connector

Bike + Transit Trips

BART's Trip Planner offers multi-modal, end-to-end itineraries for bike + transit trips. It features customizable bike speed options including an option for e-bikes (select the settings/tool icon to customize your options). BART's Trip Planner includes results for more than 30 transit systems in the Bay Area such as bus service, ferries, cable cars, and regional train systems.

BART's Trip Planner is available on web, mobile, and the official BART app. The BART app also offers station information, including information on secured bike parking.

Elevator Dimension Guide

BART also offers this Elevator Dimension Guide to assist cyclists in navigating BART elevators. It outlines the dimensions of each elevator in the system including measurements of the door, width, length, and diagonal space across the floor. As always, use your best judgment when utilizing system elevators because individual bikes and elevators vary in size. 

2024 was a big year for BART as we continued to enhance the customer experience, improve safety and cleanliness, and invest in the future. 

These are 24 things we're proud of this year. 

1. Thousands joined us at MacArthur Station to mark the end of an era and say farewell to our 51-year-old legacy fleet at the Ride into History, a retirement ceremony and final ride event. Soon thereafter, three legacy cars were delivered to the Western Railway Museum for their forthcoming Rapid Transit History Center.  
2. The Fleet of the Future new train car project came in hundreds of millions of dollars under budget thanks to tight project management, and the final car of the original contract, car #775, was officially certified for passenger service. The project is now entering its second phase.

3. BART broke its post-pandemic ridership record on September 26 with 224,721 exits, the highest ridership day since March of 2020! 
4. Customer satisfaction is now at 83% -- up nearly 10 percentage points compared to the 1st quarter (July to September) of 2023. Customers say train cars are cleaner and the visible safety presence on trains has increased since BART implemented its Safe and Clean Plan.  
5. BART installed Next Generation Fare Gates at 12 stations, with more stations on the way. 
6. The percentage of riders who reported seeing a visible increase in safety presence was between 18% and 20% in 2024 (up from 10% in 2023) as BART Police maintained focus on deploying every available officer to trains and stations. The department also hired more officers than any year since 2019, reducing the January 2024 vacancy total from 29 to 19 as of December 2024. 
7. BART’s limited-income fare discount, Clipper START, increased from 20% to 50% at the beginning of the year, and ridership in the program has more than doubled since 2023. 
8. Bikes are now allowed on nearly all of the escalators in the BART system to make it easier for riders to bring them on trains.  
9. BART completed construction on entrance canopies at Embarcadero, Montgomery St, and Civic Center stations and installed new state-of-the-art street and platform escalators at Embarcadero, Powell, Montgomery St, and Civic Center stations. There are now 14 completed canopies and 16 new escalators at San Francisco stations.  
10. BART replaced three additional miles of worn rail this year, bringing the total amount of replaced rail to 55 miles. Funds for rail replacement come from voter-approved Measure RR, which is being used to rebuild the backbone of the BART system. 
11. BART awarded over half of our contract award dollars to minority- and women-owned businesses this year, and our Office of Civil Rights hosted its first Small Business Summit, which brought over 175 participants to BART Headquarters to connect with opportunities.   

12. BART and Bay Area transit agencies unveiled a new, uniform look for regional transit maps and signage, including local transit and facility maps, diagrams, and bus stop signs. The new designs will make regional transit easier to navigate by delivering information that is clear, predictable, and familiar across service areas and county lines.  
13. Bay Area transit agencies joined forces to sync schedules in a whole new way with a focus on improving transfers between systems and making schedule changes at the same time. There has been a 250% increase in the number of transit agencies changing their schedule concurrently twice each year, and six of seven major transit providers are syncing their schedule changes at least once a year. 
14. Clipper BayPass, the prepaid unlimited-ride transit pass, entered its second phase, meaning employers are now able to purchase the passes for their workers. Total BayPass trips across all operators was 1.6 million (from Jan. 1 – Nov. 30, 2024). BayPass has already begun generating revenue for our agency by increasing ridership! 

15. The Governor signed into law a bill sponsored by BART to modernize its financial operations by merging all functions under a newly created Chief Financial Officer (CFO) position. BART’s first CFO began in December 2024 and has the authority to streamline BART’s financial forecasting, budgeting, and reporting of financial data. The new structure will create greater accountability to realize long-term cost savings and to better navigate the significant funding challenges ahead.  
16. BART leadership implemented recommendations made by the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) to improve operational efficiencies and enhance contract oversight, ensuring taxpayer money is used appropriately. The OIG also made progress in 2024 on audits aimed at identifying opportunities for BART to control or avoid costs. 
17. Several Transit-Oriented Development (TOD) projects in partnership with BART received major grants, including: 
    1. $25 million for North Berkeley TOD mobility enhancements from the Cycle 7 Transit and Intercity Rail Capital Program. 
    2. $35 million for North Berkeley TOD on BART property from the Affordable Housing and Sustainable Communities (AHSC) program by the California Strategic Council.  
    3. $25 million for El Cerrito Plaza TOD on BART property from AHSC. 
    4. $25 million for an affordable housing near Walnut Creek Station from AHSC.  
18. BART celebrated the groundbreaking of 97 units of affordable TOD housing for seniors on the site of Lake Merritt Station’s old parking lot.  
19. BART secured a $14 million grant from the US Department of Transportation for new electric vehicle charging stations at all BART-managed parking facilities. The charging stations will be available for BART riders as well as community members who live nearby. 
20. BART’s decadeslong Earthquake Safety Program was officially completed following the completion of the internal retrofit of the Transbay Tube – just in time for the iconic bay crossing’s 50th birthday! 
21. BART released the Role in the Region Report, which aims to inform a regional conversation about the future of BART by describing its contributions to the Bay Area. The report was released in tandem with BART Connects, a rider storytelling series that illustrates the different ways BART affects real people’s lives.

22. In 2024, BART hosted a bunch of iconic events, including: 
    1. Project Doneway fashion show, featuring 35 garments constructed out of retired BART paper tickets by fashion students at Oakland School for the Arts, Academy of Art, San Francisco State University, and City College of San Francisco. 
    2. BARTmobile 20th Birthday Party that included face painting, music, carnival games, free cupcakes, and free rides in the BARTmobile (a rare opportunity for the public)! 
    3. BART Night at the Oakland Ballers, a special celebration of community, baseball, and the transit system that takes you to the games! BART partnered with the Ballers on their inaugural season, and the team’s jerseys currently feature our logo. 
    4. Sound Tracks free live music series was held at three different stations and featured three local bands/musicians. 
    5. Ride Into History, a retirement party for BART's legacy train cars that saw thousands celebrate at MacArthur Station and take a final ride on the historic trains.  
    6. BART x Yifang boba cuplseeves collab, which culminated in a popup event at Colma Yifang. 
23. Plus, we hosted some awesome engagement programs: 
    1. BART Lines Teen Poetry Contest, which resulted in 31 winning poems about BART and the Bay Area that you can read in our story dispensers at Balboa Park, Downtown Berkeley, Fruitvale, and Pleasant Hill stations.  
    2. The Autism Transit Project, a national program that invites youth on the spectrum to record station announcements for Autism Acceptance Month. Twenty local young people recorded announcements that played at 35 BART stations. 
    3. Bach in the Subways, a worldwide celebration of Johann Sebastian Bach. More than ten local musicians played Bach at various BART stations. 
24. Last but not least, we launched a Fun Stuff webpage that compiles all the fun stuff we’re doing at BART in one place, including upcoming events and a special section for Rider Guides, which describe how to take transit to local venues in a visual, easy-to-read format.

In July, BART released the Role in the Region Report, a comprehensive study of BART's impact on the Bay Area illustrated by new analyses, data visualizations, and powerful personal narratives. Over the coming weeks, we'll be sharing some of the key insights from the report in a series of Role in the Region articles here on bart.gov. Read the first article here. We encourage you to read the full report - click here - and visit the project webpage at bart.gov/roleintheregion. 

Today's post examines BART's impact on the regional economy. See the full report for methodology.

Fueled by unparalleled venture capital funding, a resilient technology sector, and a growing cluster of artificial intelligence (AI) companies, the Bay Area economy remains hot. BART provides access to a region at the leading edge of technological innovation and economic investment. Since 2021, the Bay Area has regularly attracted at least 50 percent of the total venture capital investment in innovative sectors such as information technology. 

San Francisco and the Peninsula

San Francisco continues to be a haven for innovative technology-focused businesses, and many firms cluster in BART-adjacent neighborhoods like South of Market and Hayes Valley.

Proximity to BART is a must-have for San Francisco’s downtown office market. Historically, office buildings near BART have outperformed non-BART accessible buildings based on market rents. Downtown San Francisco also has multiple “trophy” office buildings, which are commanding Downtown San Francisco’s highest rents and have the lowest vacancy rates. These buildings are all within a 15-minute walk of a BART station.

Top 15 San Francisco Office Buildings by Monthly Rent

Along the Peninsula, mutual growth in development and BART ridership is expected. At Millbrae Station, the newly opened Gateway Transit Oriented Development has over 157,000 square feet of office space, ground floor retail, a 164-room hotel, and 400 residential units. At San Bruno Station, the Southline project is slated for occupancy by the end of 2024 and is made up of 2.8 million square feet of office and research and development space. The existing Tanforan Mall is also in the process of planning to transform into a transit-oriented mixed-use village with 2 million square feet of life science, 1,014 housing units, and 86,000 square feet of retail space.

The East Bay

The East Bay’s economy continues to uniquely leverage BART. Employment centers in the East Bay, which has the highest concentration of BART stations in the system, represent tremendous regional growth potential.

Emerging industries are choosing to locate in BART-served parts of the East Bay. These emerging industries include creative technology and design— like software publishing, data processing, and advanced manufacturing. In addition, there are emerging industry-specific job hubs for manufacturing in Fremont and wholesale trade in Union City. While most AI investment has gone to companies in San Francisco or the Peninsula, the East Bay has its own innovation industries, including biomedical device manufacturing, computer technology, food innovation, and clean tech. These industries and others have driven demand for almost one million square feet of R&D and manufacturing space in the last ten years and attracted $5.5 billion in venture capital in 2021.

East Bay Office Space Rent per Square Foot

Many East Bay cities are responding to changing economic trends by adding jobs and housing. East Bay cities are leveraging access to BART to help shift market momentum towards their downtowns and prime infill locations. Demand and rents for East Bay commercial and industrial space remain high. Figure 2.9 shows that BART-served cities like Fremont and Walnut Creek continue to see increased rent for office space, and East Bay office rents have increased 59 percent overall since 2013. The East Bay industrial market continues to see high demand for warehouse and manufacturing space, with 11 consecutive quarters of net positive square footage leased as of 2023’s first quarter, with brokers and developers reporting an increased interest in transit accessibility for industrial tenants.

What BART Riders Say

When starting his own business, Raja Singh (pictured below with his son, Tyler) realized that transit would serve his employees’ well-being and morale. It also, as an added bonus, would serve his own interests and priorities as the head honcho. 

"People perceive going into the office as somewhat of a burden, and I thought it was important to make it as easy as possible for folks,” he said. “It’s more relaxing to get on BART and zone out or work than it is to navigate a tunnel and bridge then find parking downtown.” Raja would know – he's been commuting by BART for well over a decade. 

Raja also cited the recruitment benefits of headquartering his company by transit. They can enter the office, at 44 Montgomery Street, directly from the station, without having to step foot outside. Raja said nine of his employees live in the Bay Area and all of them commute by transit – seven take BART and two travel by Muni from their homes in the city. 

“Because we’re located at a transit hub, we can recruit from the East Bay, the South Bay, the Peninsula, and the city all at once, and it’s equally easy to get there,” he said “There's nowhere else in the Bay where you can say that. It gives you the broadest recruiting reach.” 

Read more about Raja here.