BART Meltdowns, Fare Hikes, Budget Cuts and Other Bay Area Transit Woes
57:50 Share

Put us in a box. Go ahead. That just gives us something to break out of. Because the next generation 2025 GMC Terrain Elevation is raising the standard of what comes standard. As far as expectations go, why meet them when you can shatter them? What we choose to challenge, we challenge completely. We are professional grade. Visit GMC.com to learn more.

Calling hard seltzer lovers. Searching for the tastiest seltzer? Look no further. Neutral Vodka Seltzer is absolutely delicious. Made with real vodka and real juice, Neutral keeps it tasty with every sip. With flavors like pineapple, watermelon, orange, and lime, there's something for everyone. Neutral. Keep it tasty. Enjoy responsibly. Copyright 2025 Anheuser-Busch. Neutral flavored vodka and carbonation. 4.5% alcohol by volume. St. Louis, Missouri.

From KQED.

From KQED in San Francisco, I'm Alexis Madrigal. Bay Area transit agencies are hurting. The Great Work From Home experiment has cut a lot of commute time out of people's lives, but its direct strike on ridership, especially in and out of downtowns, has also been disastrous. So far, transit agencies have avoided huge service cuts or even worse, but major cuts in state and federal funding are now looming.

We'll talk about how Bart, Muni and others are responding to these difficult times. That's all coming up next, right after this news.

Welcome to Forum. I'm Alexis Madrigal. When it comes to Bay Area transit, the pandemic torched what had been a pretty efficient and effective local situation. Ever since then, with ridership through the floor, I've imagined our situation kind of like the Jaws theme song. From the very first chord, you know the shark is coming. The shark in this case being a funding cliff that could literally destroy Bart, Muni, maybe everyone else. But even

But even though you know the shark is coming, you have to wait through the slow buildup, squirming and cringing in your seat and hoping that somehow, someway there won't be blood. Well, right now, we're months closer to the cliff than the last time we talked about all this, and it's not at all clear that there's a solution yet. Losing Bart would be disastrous, as we all saw when the agency had a couple of huge problems during rush hour over this last month.

We're getting closer to that part in Jaws where it's like, da-na-na-na-na-na-na. So, joining us to talk about this situation, we've got Dan Brekke, editor and reporter with KQED News. Welcome back, Dan. Hey, Alexis. We've got Ted Lamb, associate director for the Center for Law, Energy, and the Environment at UC Berkeley Law School. Welcome, Ted. And we've got Laura Tolkoff, transportation policy director with Spur. Welcome, Laura. Thank you so much.

So, Dan, let's just do a little, you know, scene setting here. How are things going for Bay Area transit agencies? Well, you know, in some ways, there are some good stories to tell. Yeah.

BART ridership is actually ticking upward. And I use the term ticking in its actual sense. It's moving up slowly, not spiking. Right now, the April ridership was weekday ridership was 44%.

of the old norm. That doesn't sound like much, but compared to where BART has been, it's pretty good. And April was one of the best months they've had since March 2020. On the other hand, BART has had two huge meltdowns this month that caused immediate pain and suffering for commuters, and people are very sensitive to that.

And then in the background of all this, I mean, the sort of the day-to-day operation of BART. And, you know, BART gets an outsized amount of attention. You know, our biggest transit agency in the Bay Area is San Francisco's Muni. Muni's ridership is actually much higher. It's in the 70 percent range compared to before the pandemic.

Bart attracts this attention because it touches so much of the Bay Area and it affects so many people in so many different places. But in the background of all this, you alluded to it. We're having a struggle in the state legislature right now to come up with the template for a tax measure that will be on the ballot in November 2026, which is really interesting.

the only hope on the horizon right now for avoiding this fiscal, total fiscal collapse that these transit agencies are facing. Yeah. Laura, let's talk about some of these money issues. Like, how is an agency like BART or Muni, and I know that they're different, so let's just start with BART here. How do they fund their operations?

It's a great question. Every transit agency has a different revenue model. Transit agencies in the Bay Area were hit particularly hard because of the way that the pandemic impacted downtowns and especially downtown San Francisco, which had a high density of jobs in downtown. And so a lot of those jobs are now remote or hybrid jobs where people are coming into their downtown office two or three days a week instead of five.

They're still taking transit, just not every day. And the pandemic especially impacted commuter-oriented transit systems, especially those that were highly successful pre-pandemic and able to depend on fares as opposed to public subsidy for most of their operating revenue. And that includes operators like BART and Caltrain. They were able to use fares to support most of their operating costs.

Another reason that some transit agencies are hurting is because of the lingering macroeconomic impacts that the city is facing. So as Dan mentioned, Muniz ridership is actually rebounding pretty well, but a third of their budget comes from parking revenues.

And if fewer people are coming downtown for work or to shop or for, you know, big professional conferences, then parking revenue is going to be much lower than it was pre-pandemic. And so Muni has a lot less money. The same thing is true also with the city's budget. We know about a third of the city's, of Muni's funds come from the city budget and the city is facing a very large deficit at this time. And so that's,

they have a different situation where two thirds or so of their budget is coming from sources that are heavily impacted by these macro economic conditions. And so even if ridership were to return fully, they're still gonna have financial challenges.

So there are a lot of things that need to happen for transit ridership to recover and, you know, ultimately exceed pre-pandemic levels. But as Dan mentioned, really the foundation of that recovery is funding. Yeah.

I can't decide, Laura, if it was a masterstroke or crazy to fund San Francisco public transit with parking revenue. It feels it could go either way, you know? What about down in the South Bay and the East Bay, Dan Brekke? Are there similar kinds of things going on with the sort of largely bus-oriented systems of the East Bay and what's going on in San Jose? You know, AC Transit, starting there, is running about 85% of its old service now.

Its ridership recovery at this point is about 90% of that 85% level. And they're facing deficits smaller than BART and Muni, but still deficits that they have no immediate answer for. VTA, which is really a linchpin of South Bay Transit,

You know, its ridership is depressed sort of on a generational basis. They actually had far more riders in the first years of this century, 2003, than they did in 2019. So they were already tailing off and struggling to find answers. They have been coming back. They're not in as deep budget trouble as the rest of the big agencies in the neighborhood, in the area. Yeah.

You know, Ted Lamb, zooming out, I assume at the Center for Law, Energy and the Environment, there's a there's a sense that we need public transit, not just for to, you know, move people around, but because ultimately we need to drive fewer gasoline powered cars. What do you all make of this sort of decline in transit use at this moment, which feels like it's also a pivotal kind of climate moment as well?

Good question. It is not just, you know, getting people out of gasoline-powered cars, but also fewer miles in those cars when we need them. And so we see this, I think, as a tremendous issue at a tremendously problematic moment because it all ties in with our climate challenge, our air pollution and air quality challenges.

and our quality of life and our housing challenges throughout the state. And a moment where public transit is struggling and is seeing reduced ridership and as a result is potentially looking at cuts is a moment where we're

having a hard case to make for denser neighborhoods, for more transit-oriented development in our cities, and for more movement and more development in those cities, which ultimately is a climate imperative, but also really a public health and a quality of life imperative. Yeah, right. We know that longer commute times make people unhappy, but people still make the decision over and over for a longer commute. It's fascinating.

Laura, lay it on me for real. When we talk about funding cuts, does it mean, for example, me as a near daily BART writer, is it going to be like there'll be one line every once in a while? Or do we mean like the agency is going down?

We are really not talking about minor cuts anymore. We are talking about near total shutdowns at this point in time. As you started off, you know, the death spiral is closer than we think. We've got three more months to secure funding from the state.

or we're really headed towards catastrophe. Right now, BART, for instance, is facing a $380 million deficit starting in fiscal year 2026. What that translates to in terms of service is instead of running 4,200 trains per week, they're going to run 500 trains per week. Instead of having five lines

cutting across the Bay Area, they're going to look at having to eliminate two of those lines entirely. And so we're really talking about pretty drastic cuts. We're going from sort of bus level service to like Amtrak, like that kind of frequency. It's going to be like every half an hour, every hour, every hour, every hour. Yeah. And

Look, there's something else happening. Laura just alluded to what's happening in the legislature. There's a troubling development with Governor Newsom's May revision to his budget, which is that transit spending, which had sort of been locked into the legislature.

greenhouse gas reduction fund has been removed. It's sort of in limbo right now. And that raises the threat of these agencies, BART, Muni, Caltrain, and others, losing cumulatively, and LA Metro. Let's not forget LA Metro, the biggest transit operator in the state, losing hundreds of millions of dollars annually. And that could

This disastrous picture goes from, yes, disastrous to catastrophic if that funding is not restored somehow. Where's Newsom want to park the money?

A lot of it is going to go to CAL FIRE. I mean, this is a solution to more fully fund CAL FIRE. And there's a good argument that that should come from the cap and trade funding that, you know, goes into the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund. But money was promised to transit. And Senator Scott Weiner from San Francisco, among others, is one of those sounding the alarm about this change in the budget. Yeah.

We're talking about Bay Area transit agencies, how they're bracing for major funding cuts. We haven't even talked about what's happening at the national level, but we will in the next segment. We're joined by Dan Brekke, editor and reporter with KQED News, Laura Tolkoff, transportation policy director at Spur, and Ted Lamb, associate director for the Center for Law, Energy, and the Environment at the UC Berkeley Law School. Hi.

We want to hear from you, too. What questions do you have about transit and traffic in the Bay Area? What would make you use public transit more? I'm curious if those answers are changing for you. You can give us a call. The number is 866-733-6786. What's your experience been like taking public transit in the Bay recently? 866-733-6786.

Forum at kqed.org is the email. You can find us on social media, Blue Sky, Instagram, etc. We're KQED Forum. I'm Alexis Madrigal. Stay tuned for more right after the break. Support for Forum comes from San Francisco Opera. Amidst a terrible storm, Idemeneo promises the god Neptune that he will sacrifice the first person he sees if he and his crew survive the tempestuous waters.

But as he arrives safely to shore, his relief transforms into horror when the first person he lays eyes upon is his own son.

This summer, venture into the storm with Mozart's sublime opera, Idomeneo. June 14-25. Learn more at sfopera.com. Greetings, Boomtown. The Xfinity Wi-Fi is booming! Xfinity combines the power of internet and mobile. So we've all got lightning-fast speeds at home and on the go! That's where our producers got the idea to mash our radio shows together! ♪

Welcome back to Forum. Alexis Madrigal here. We're talking about Bay Area Transit and the agencies that serve us all and are in some trouble.

We're joined by Ted Lamb, Associate Director for the Center for Law, Energy, and the Environment at UC Berkeley Law School. Dan Brekke, of course, our own here at the station. And Laura Tolkoff, who's Transportation Policy Director at Spur. Laura, let's say you're a driver. You never use transit. You have the perfect car for you. What's the argument for everyone to fund transit?

Sure. I think, you know, transit is really a vital part of our economy. It's a vital part of having a livable region. It supports greater housing growth. And it's really this scaffolding for our society.

You know, there are 2 million trips on transit every day. That's 2 million cars, 2 million tailpipes off the road. And that makes a big difference in our climate. And I think we have to remember that, you know,

I'm going to make a little bit of an oversimplified analogy here, but bear with me. Public transit is a lot like public education. Education policy and transit policy are both incredibly complicated.

We all know that educational outcomes like test scores and graduation rates are influenced by things that educators can control and also things that they can't control. You know, a teacher can teach to standards and practice test taking strategies in the classroom. But things that happen outside of their control really matter, too, like making sure that kids have enough sleep and stable housing and engaged parents, etc.

And like those educational outcomes, transit outcomes are heavily influenced by things that aren't in an operator's control, right? The cost of driving and owning a vehicle, economic conditions, and where jobs and housing are located.

And just like education, there are a lot of people who aren't satisfied with the current system and who see a lot of room for improvement. And that's very justified. And a big reason for that is because both are chronically underfunded. But does this mean that we don't need public education in grade schools? No. No one would object to the need for great public education in grade schools. And instead of pushing that out of existence, we work to make them better, right? Yeah.

Public transit is like that, too. So could it be better? Yes, of course. But we still need it. And so, you know, for us, we think about riding as really a really important way to support transit. But ultimately, we have to make decisions not just on what we see today, but what we what we want to see in the future. Mm hmm.

And, you know, Dan Brekke, I mean, people hear numbers, you know, local taxes or, you know, things at the state level going to fund our transit agencies. And it feels like, you know, we even talk about it as a subsidy. How much do we spend on the roads, though, as well, right? Which everybody's also paying for through their taxes. Billions and billions. Yeah.

You asked me this question right before the show, and I put some friends at the MTC onto this, and one of the answers they came up with, over the next 25 years, Bay Area localities are expected to spend $1.8 billion a year just for local streets and roads. That leaves out the state part of it, which is at least that much. So,

This is kind of a hidden thing. I mean, it's weird that it's hidden because streets are so important and prominent and hard to ignore in our lives. But we don't seem to think of the funding mechanism and all the money that's going into them to make them available and drivable. Yeah.

Some really interesting questions about ridership and how these agencies might be able to change. Man, wow, really interesting questions. Here's one.

William writes,

Laura, maybe I'll send this one to you. Is this I don't want to call this a moment of opportunity. You know, it seems just like it's bad. But let's just stipulate that it's bad. Is there anything that could be done with the this deeper level of change at the transit agency level? Like, do these disasters force these agencies closer together?

You know, it's a great question. I'm going to just offer a little bit of perspective on this. In California, there are actually more than 200 different transit operators across the state. So the fragmentation that we see in the Bay Area is a problem, but it's not just a Bay Area problem.

And the reason why we have so many agencies is actually a function of the funding problem. So if you look at other countries and even other states, you might see one or two major large transit operators. And the state puts a lot of money into those transit operations. They might make up 50 to 80% of that agency's budget. Here in California,

Very little of the funding for transit operations comes from the state. Most of it is raised locally. Pretty much every county in the Bay Area, and certainly those that have transit, you know, have a local option sales tax that is supporting the transit service that they would like to see. And so what that means is if each county is putting in funding,

then they're going to want control over that funding. And then you're going to get a new operator with a new board. And so the fragmentation is really a function of the funding system that we have. Now, if we had additional, you know, much more funding from the state, much more funding that is stable over time, I could definitely see a reason to consider

merging these agencies, but you can see that the funding structures make it very, very complicated to do that.

And so, you know, is it an important moment in time for agencies to start working closely together or consider mergers? I would say, you know, operators have been working much more closely since the pandemic. I think they have done some of the things that we have wished they would do for a long time, including rationalizing some of their fare structures and discounts and improving transfer times and

And all of those things are really good and important ways to get some of the rider outcomes that we want to see without having to do the complicated work of untangling a very challenging funding structure. Thank you for that.

Let's talk a little bit about electric vehicles. And one reason is, you know, on some climate level, you might imagine a system in which all the transit systems break down, but everybody uses electric vehicles and somehow the Bay Area's overall emissions drop. At the same time, though, there's all these moves against electric vehicles that are happening at the national level, right? Yeah.

Yes, in that hypothetical future, still worse than the one where there's a lot of transit going on. That's always the preferable option, I think, in any context from a congestion perspective, quality of life, as we talked about earlier, but also air quality is still preferable to have more people in transit vehicles than electric vehicles individually, pretty much on any basis.

That said, electric vehicles are far preferable to any internal combustion engine gasoline powered option. We know that that's pretty definitive. But you mentioned the national level. So over the course of the Biden administration, the EPA and the administration pulled together an electric vehicle transition plan. And that basically consisted of funding for charging, insurance.

incentives for consumers to take up vehicles themselves, regulations of vehicle emissions to incentivize manufacturers to shift over time, and then grants for battery manufacturing and advanced technology development R&D throughout the country. The Trump administration has sort of gone through each of those four planks and started to reverse them through a mix of legal, semi-legal, totally illegal moves, which we can talk about in detail. But

they are trying to roll back the progress that the Biden administration kicked off. So it's too early to see the impacts of that, but they will slow this transition if those moves stick.

And is that just largely a question of what the courts do, like everything else right now? Largely, yes. It's a mix of some things, as I said, that are actually straightforward and can be done. An example of that is the IRS tax credits for new and used vehicle purchases, for electric vehicle purchases, $7,500 for a new vehicle, $4,000 for a used vehicle. The proposed policy bill, the one big, beautiful bill that's running through the House and the Senate right now, that would...

terminate those credits at the end of next year, that's not a court's question. That would be legal for Congress to do that.

As opposed to what the administration, sorry not the administration, but Congress has done just last week, which is to threaten to eliminate California's vehicle emission standards that are state-based. That's the program Advanced Clean Cars 2 that would, over the course of the next decade, transition all new vehicle sales to zero emissions, electric or hydrogen powered. And the way that the Congress did that is, from what most legal experts think, my team included,

Completely illegal and not something that should stand up in court, but ultimately is a decision that would go to the courts. Let's go to Milo in San Francisco here. Welcome, Milo.

Hi there. The question that I brought up earlier, kind of the point that I brought up is that I was comparing public transportation in San Francisco just to abroad. So I study in Montreal, which has a great system. And it's just when comparing like ridership times, it's

Here, it can take almost three times as long to go somewhere versus driving, you know? And the quality, the buses are inconsistent, all that timing issues, the routes are not great. Like...

Right. Like, why? I mean, thank you for that, Milo. It is a question I think people have anytime they leave the country. Is this Dan Brekke that we just don't have a functioning society here? Is that pretty much what it comes down to? Wow, Alexis. Can we have the Jaws theme again? The funding structure. Funding structure is what I meant to say. Well, yeah. I mean-

It is not a high priority. And one thing we hear a lot, especially in the wake of the pandemic, is that the public transit system we do have is essential to lower income people, people who don't have cars, people who don't have any other choices about transportation. And I feel like one of the things that's happened is whatever service we put on the street is good enough.

And, you know, it's hard to compare, you know, our situation with what you would see. For instance, I just came back from Ireland, great city for transit, especially if you like double-decker buses.

You know, people talk about Paris, they talk about Berlin, they talk about Tokyo. I mean, place that I've been, I haven't been to China, but all these places have put a much higher premium on public transportation. We just don't do that. And I think, you know, while I know that systems like Muni

And Bart and all the rest of them. I mean, one of the things that you're going to see, even in state legislation, is a focus on writer experience. Right. That's that's front and center. And Bart is doing things like installing new Farragate's system because that is perceived as a way of keeping negative.

Ted?

And you mentioned the functioning society point. It does go a level deeper, though, I think, which is that we've not built here in mostly in a lot of this country, but here in California in particular, we've not built cities and communities that are designed to be served by transit. And so we don't have the density of residential areas outside of certain pockets of Oakland and San Francisco, density of residential and then the density of mixed use and commercial opportunities, jobs and destinations, restaurants, parks, etc.

in those and around those residential areas to make transit the most compelling option. In cities, like, you know, that Dan was listing, where the transit systems are highly functioning,

clean, smooth, fast, efficient. Those are places that are much better designed to be supported by those transit systems. Whereas here, the car option is often the preferable option for a lot of trips, which is very unfortunate, but it's a major, you know, decades-long development issue that we built. Yeah, Michael in Walnut Creek would like to talk about this, I think. Michael, welcome. Hi, thanks for taking my call.

um yeah i was uh i was thinking specifically about growing up as a kid in livermore and while we were revamping uh the downtown there and there was such a nimbyism and adamant backlash against having a bart station downtown they were happy to have one on greenville road where you know where people couldn't come into the downtown but they didn't want rick raff from oakland coming into downtown and as a direct result you know uh

both my partner and I work in the Tri-Valley now, but we live in Walnut Creek. And there's no... We couldn't possibly commute into work from there. We couldn't possibly commute to the city from Livermore. You know, you have to get on 580 into that mess. Whereas...

Walnut Creek. We live downtown and are able to get on the BART train and be in San Francisco in 30 minutes. So I'm curious as to if that is borne out in the numbers of ridership, if there were more stations in the Tri-Valley and other places, would we have enough riders to make a difference? And what other roles that this NIMBYism has played in our transit system? I'll take my response off air. Thank you. Hey, thanks, Michael. You were talking about this. Go ahead.

I mean, you can see it in the way that the commuter rail systems, which is kind of the equivalent to this part of the BART network in the Northeast function and the Metro North and Long Island Railroad systems in New York function.

Those are, largely speaking, stations that were delivered in and around downtowns of sort of the satellite suburbs there. And those systems have high ridership. They struggle with funding, too, but they're not looking at the same types of ridership challenges that we are here because they're designed to serve communities much more than our system is. Yeah. Go ahead, Dan. Well, you know, I was going to say it's an excellent point about the Tri-Valley. You know, BART wound up killing that project

for a variety of reasons, one of which was the

the destination that the caller talked about was going to be out along Interstate 580 there at Greenville Road instead of going into the downtown. And BART also had to make a decision based on did it have the money to really effectively serve a new extension while its core system was suffering and near collapse. So, you know, it...

Eventually, there is yet another agency, just like Laura Tolkoff talked about. There's another agency that's been formed to actually bring rail to the Tri-Valley. We'll see how soon that happens. That's what we need. You know, I was just thinking, you know, I bet you know what's going to solve this problem? Another agency. Well, you're going to get it.

We've got some people writing in with different suggestions here or just their own views of what's going on. Rick writes,

that we go, we used to go to UCSF downtown Fisherman's Wharf or Mission Bay. Deanne writes, we need more people to get out of their cars. For some reason, driving is necessary. For many, it's a long ingrained habit, part of our identity. I know this from my own transition from driver to transit rider. More transit riders equals less harm to the environment. Taking BART is so much less hassle than driving and dealing with parking. There are BART police and others monitoring the cars just about every time I ride. Just do it.

And another listener writes, I would use public transit more if I felt safer as a woman traveling alone, especially at night, does not feel that safe. I think likely the reality is it is fairly safe, but with less riders and people.

people around that contributes to that feeling. We'll get into some more of those issues when we come back. We're joined by Dan Brekke, editor and reporter with KQED News, covers transit for us. Ted Lamb, associate director for the Center for Law, Energy, and the Environment at UC Berkeley Law School. And Laura Tolkoff, transportation policy director at SPUR. I was going to take more of your calls and comments. The number is 866-733-6786. The email is form at kqed.org.

Go to Discord, Blue Sky, Instagram, or KQED Forum. I'm Alexis Madrigal. Stay tuned for more right after the break. Support for Forum comes from San Francisco Opera. Amidst a terrible storm, Idemeneo promises the god Neptune that he will sacrifice the first person he sees if he and his crew survive the tempestuous waters. But as he arrives safely to shore, his relief transforms into horror when the first person he lays eyes upon is his own son.

This summer, venture into the storm with Mozart's sublime opera, Idomeneo. June 14-25. Learn more at sfopera.com. Support for Forum comes from Broadway SF, presenting Parade, the musical revival based on a true story. From three-time Tony-winning composer Jason Robert Brown comes the story of Leo and Lucille Frank, a newlywed Jewish couple struggling to make a life in Georgia.

When Leo is accused of an unspeakable crime, it propels them into an unimaginable test of faith, humanity, justice, and devotion. The riveting and gloriously hopeful parade plays the Orpheum Theatre for three weeks only, May 20th through June 8th. Tickets on sale now at broadwaysf.com.

Welcome back to Forum. I'm Alexis Madrigal. We're talking about the kind of brutal situation faced by Bay Area transit agencies as they brace for major funding cuts and struggle with ridership in these post-pandemic times. We're joined by Dan Brekke, editor and reporter at KQED News, Laura Tolkoff, transportation policy director with SPUR, and Ted Lamb, associate director for the Center for Law, Energy, and the Environment at UC Berkeley Law School. And we're joined by Dan Brekke, editor and reporter at KQED News, Laura Tolkoff, transportation policy director with SPUR, and Ted Lamb, associate director for the Center for Law, Energy, and the Environment at UC Berkeley Law School.

Sarah writes in, and Laura, I'm going to bring this one over to you. Sarah writes in to say, there's been a lot of privatization of public transportation with the tech buses subsidized by Google, Meta, and other companies. We also see a major investment in car tech companies. Can you comment on the tech influence on Bay Area transportation? Sure. I think studies have recently, so recent studies have shown that I think

There is competition in places where transit and autonomous vehicles or TNCs coexist that it does create more congestion to have those circling. And that also impacts transit service, right? As a caller said, it makes travel slower. It makes it less reliable, right?

And it's really frustrating to be on a bus and stuck behind a car. Right. And so you also have you have a tendency where, you know, transit is a big problem.

part of the market to see more competition with those types of vehicles. Do they, does private, you know, do private TNCs or autonomous vehicles have a place in society? I mean, yes, I think they'd be great in really suburban and rural areas where transit is never going to be economical or to run. You mean exactly the places where they aren't right now? Yeah.

Right, right. I mean, I think they can provide a real mobility and access benefit to people who need it, particularly seniors, which are our fastest growing part of the population. And, you know, I think what we have to think about when we think about private mobility, I mean, we already have private mobility in the form of personal, in terms of our personal vehicles.

But, you know, we can take a page out of our history book and look at what happened, you know, 100 years ago in Los Angeles or even in Oakland, where we learned, you know, when the transit operations were private, right? They were all privately owned and then they went bankrupt. Right.

And so we have to think about, you know, what is at risk if we wholly outsource our mobility and our access to the private sector? And what might it cost us both now and in the future, right? You know, a ride between Berkeley and San Francisco on a Lyft or an Uber is about 10 times more expensive than it is on BART.

Right. So there's those everyday costs that we have to consider and also need to consider, you know, we're paying so much more to rebuild systems that in Los Angeles, for instance, that we lost 100 years ago. And all of that is to say, you know, and bring it back to the point that it is very, very important that we continue the public investment in these systems, in these transit systems. You know, they're really important.

the backbone of our mobility system. And it doesn't mean that other things can't be part of it, but it really is a really critical part of our transportation system. - So interesting. There's so many places to go here, but let's go to Sunil in Livermore. Welcome. - Thank you. I am stuck in traffic driving from Livermore to Cupertino.

And it sometimes takes me two hours one way, 35 miles. My question is, and I would love to have some public transport. The only way for me is the ACE, which drops me to the Great America Parkway, and then there is public transport. So why hasn't the strategy changed dramatically?

to the new areas of employment such as Cupertino, the biggest Apple and Amazon and other high technology. I think currently it is focused to San Francisco and Oakland, but I don't think there is a commuter terminal to the southeast portion such as Cupertino, Los Gatos, those areas.

from the East Bay. And I see the pain every day. A lot of people from Tracy, Mountain View, the East Bay, all going to the South Bay and beyond. Yeah.

Our core listeners, we feel your pain. Thank you, Sunil. I mean, Dan, this is a really excellent point, though, right? I mean, there was a lot of talk, I feel like, in planning circles about sort of edge cities and places like Atlanta that didn't really have this downtown core. We maintained ours and then suddenly dropped into an edge city world, it feels like, through the pandemic. Yeah, and I have to say, I think...

The lack of resources committed to solving a problem like that is really the basic reason why Sunil isn't seeing...

like a more logical progression of transit down there. And just as an example, the Dumbarton Bridge has been the focus of a lot of attention, a lot of planning attention for a long time about maybe reconstructing the old railroad bridge, right, so that you could have a rail across that crossing there. You can see that when you're crossing the car bridge.

And and perhaps starting something on an interim basis of a of a rapid bus service between the BART station on the east side of the bay running over to Silicon Valley on the other side. The funding hasn't been there to make that happen.

And I'll just throw in that there are some wealthy companies down in that corner of the bay. You know, Cupertino is home to one of them. And, you know, I would think that it would be in their interest to sort of step up and help with this issue. Yeah. Talking about another bridge crossing here, Ted, there for a long time, right, there have been EVs could go over a certain era of EVs could go over the Bay Bridge bridge.

in the HOV lane, the carpool lane, that's now also going away, is that right? - Yes, so for a long time, EVs and their predecessors, hybrid electric vehicles, lower emission vehicles, one incentive that the state offered to purchasers of those vehicles was an HOV access sticker. And typically that would last for three, four, five years after the purchase, and it was really designed to just incentivize those purchases.

The Air Resources Board, which sort of manages that program, has over the course of, it's been a long plan, but over the course of this year has been phasing it down for a couple of reasons. One is that the incentive is simply no longer needed because these vehicles are so popular. 25% of all vehicles purchased in the state last year were electrified. That the state has determined that it's not an incentive that's necessary to convince people to make the switch.

which is good news. And the other is that because so many of these vehicles are now on the roads, it is not exactly an HOV lane sort of practice to have a huge amount of access for single drivers in a ton of electric vehicles clogging up that lane. And so they're actually kind of returning those lanes to their original use, which is for- Do you think it'll have a net effect on traffic at all, or will it just kind of redistribute the traffic? I don't know. What do you think?

I think it's going to have an edge effect for a handful of EV drivers, myself previously included, who are able to zoom through and skip some traffic. I don't think it's going to deliver a huge number of vehicles back into the congestion. And anybody who's driven in those lanes can also see there's a fair amount of untoward use by high occupancy non-EV drivers anyway. Indeed. Let's bring in Paul in San Francisco. Welcome, Paul.

Yes. Excuse me. I'm a retired Muni operator, and I think the Munis theme song should be Anything Goes, the Cole Porter song, because seldom are any rules enforced in any Muni vehicles. And people don't feel safe with the

quality of life is, the quality of the ride is diminished significantly. Also, people don't feel safe in the Muni metro stations. They don't feel safe at bus stops. We need a dedicated Muni security service, and the Muni has never taken public safety or the quality of the ride seriously. And I have direct experience of being an operator for 33 years. Yeah.

Hey, Paul, appreciate that perspective as well. You know, I think in my experience of this, it feels like these problems peaked a few years ago, and it's been...

Better in most of the public transit situations that I've been in. But obviously, as you know, Paul's indicating, a longtime problem, too. Yeah, Dan. Yeah, it's a longtime problem. I mean, one of the things that was very visible, especially in the early, say, the first two years of the pandemic, was there was a lot more confrontation of bus operators. Right. They had a lot more trouble with passengers, passengers.

who just wouldn't take no for an answer, whatever behavior they wanted to engage in. And AC Transit, I know, actually, I believe, had the highest number or rate of assaults of operators.

you know, as a result of that. That didn't start with the pandemic. It's still an issue. And you'll see the agencies like AC Transit actually hardening the operators' space on the bus so that they're less vulnerable to physical attack. As to the rest of it, you know, I'll just point out in terms of Muni or any other transit agency having a dedicated security program,

that these problems do not disappear when you have a police force. BART is a good example of that. You know, they're making lots of arrests and yet crimes still happen at a lower rate right now than, say, a year ago or two years ago. But they're still happening. And I think New York is another good example. So maybe the answers are out there. I don't know what they are. Yeah.

A couple other perspectives coming in. Listener writes, I would love to hear more about the opportunity that bus lanes would offer, especially in the South Bay. I think we sometimes fetishize trail, rail, train and rail transit and minimize what better bus service can offer, especially in a society that clearly prioritizes road transit. Laura, do you have anything to say about that?

Yes, I love this question and it really makes me think of the previous caller who said he is in traffic for two hours just to go 35 miles. And, you know, a big reason why we have that, you know, it takes a really long time to build rail and it's very expensive to do so where there is a lot of opportunity.

is in bus lanes. And, you know, we do not really have a long distance intercity bus service that can operate on highways, right? There is no real benefit to taking a bus long distance, whether that's on the 80 or the 580, it's still going to be stuck in traffic. And so, you know, that's a really important role for the state, particularly for buses that operate on highways to make them

have dedicated right of way at least some of the time so that they can move quickly and that there's a real competitive edge to taking transit. The same thing applies on our local streets. In San Francisco, we've had a transit priority policy for more than 50 years.

But really, it was in the last five years when the city really doubled down on rolling out their transit priority improvements. Some of those include full bus lanes with the red paint. And sometimes it's just signal upgrades that allow a bus to communicate with the signal and, you know,

hold the light, right? Until, until, so that they could go through. And all of those make a really big difference in the rider experience. They make travel more reliable. They make it faster. They make it less expensive to operate actually. And so there's a real win-win when it comes to transit priority. And you see that show up in the ridership numbers from uni. So where they have had the fastest recovery and the highest recovery

is really on the roots where they have implemented transit priority improvements. So we know that, you know, these are solutions that work. They're quite cost effective. They can be done locally and they can be done long distance. And so it would be really great to see more of those.

And I was just going to say, Oakland has a great example of this, too. AC Transit has this one-tempo line that goes from downtown out to San Leandro Bard along International Boulevard. It's by far the most popular route on AC Transit. There have been some problems with it. The way it was designed has created other street safety problems, but they're trying to get their arms around that. But that's a really good example of doing something that makes a dent. Mm-hmm.

A couple of listeners writing in. Here you go. We're discussing the lack of funding for transportation agencies, but it's just as important to talk about how efficiently current funds are being used. Many government-run programs operate with significant inefficiencies and simply adding more funding won't solve the deeper problem. A real solution must include both better funding, serious improvements...

and how those funds are managed and spent. David writes, despite billions of dollars in state and federal support and bond measures, BART has proven to be incompetent at maintaining and operating the system. Any part of the system can burst into fire at any time. I'm not sure that's true. But now BART is facing an existential threat

What do you think, Dan Brackey? I think transit agency can do both. I think BART has focused on this...

transit-oriented development in a pretty effective way. There are some great examples of, you know, projects that they've done or participated in. Fruitvale in Oakland, Millbrae on the peninsula. Now, one of the criticisms might be the housing can't arrive fast enough.

There are two stations in Berkeley, Ashby and North Berkeley, that are targets for transit-oriented development. And the development has been delayed in North Berkeley just because of market conditions that are unfavorable to the developers right now. But I think both things are needed. Yeah.

You know, Laura, once upon a time we had, at least according to the lore, the busiest ferry crossing in the world between, you know, Oakland and San Francisco. I mean, if everything collapses, is that what happens? We just get a whole bunch more ferries? Like what actually happens if this, if BART, Muni and other systems collapse?

You know, ultimately, I mean, on the topic of ferries, ferries are lovely. However, they are not mass transit. The ridership on bar is far, far greater than what our ferries carry. And so we really have to think about how are we going to move a lot of people in a very efficient way.

But right now, you know, we are talking about financial problems compounding, right? First, we have the issue of lower revenues coming out of the pandemic. We have the issue of higher costs, you know, higher cost of living and inflation and now tariffs. We have the federal cutbacks and federal uncertainty, particularly for anything that's a grant and not a formula program. And we have several projects that

that were looking for federal funding. And then from the state, the obvious place to look for help was the state. Unfortunately, Governor Newsom's budget really threw an unexpected curve ball into an already difficult situation. And now we're looking at about $3 billion of transit funding at risk that had really already been committed to our transit agencies.

So we have these very big compounding financial situations and, you know,

There's really no way to kind of get to a balanced budget simply by trimming some fat, right? Or minor service cuts. So Bart is talking about, you know, scaling back service 50 to 90%. And what that starts to look like is, you know, if they cut back 50% of the service, they're looking at upwards of six more hours of congestion for just four round trips per week. Oh my gosh. 19 hours of congestion. Wow.

if they shut down entirely. So, you know, that's not only possible, but actually likely. Well, grim, everyone here. It's a tough situation. We've been joined by Laura Tolkoff, Transportation Policy Director at Spur, Ted Lam, Associate Director for the Center for Law, Energy and the Environment at UC Berkeley Law School, and Dan Brekke, editor and reporter with KQED News. As you heard, it is dire. Pay attention. I'm Alexis Madrigal. Stay tuned for another hour of Forum Ahead with Mina Kim.

Funds for the production of Forum are provided by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, the Generosity Foundation, and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. Support for Forum comes from San Francisco Opera. Amidst a terrible storm, Ida Mineo promises the god Neptune that he will sacrifice the first person he sees if he and his crew survive the tempestuous waters.

But as he arrives safely to shore, his relief transforms into horror when the first person he lays eyes upon is his own son.

This summer, venture into the storm with Mozart's sublime opera, Idomeneo. June 14-25. Learn more at sfopera.com. Greetings, Boomtown. The Xfinity Wi-Fi is booming! Xfinity combines the power of internet and mobile. So we've all got lightning-fast speeds at home and on the go! That's where our producers got the idea to mash our radio shows together! Xfinity!

Most of our media are owned by a handful of tech billionaires. But there's one place that still operates like the internet was never invented.

On the new season of The Divided Dial from On the Media, we're exploring shortwave radio, where prayer and propaganda coexist with news and conspiracy theories. And where an existential battle for the public airwaves is playing out right now. Listen to On the Media wherever you get your podcasts.