BART problems 2 days in a row

Your numbers are far from accurate. You are only talking about the five big delays that hit the news and I don't think you even took into account this week's two significant delays. There have been tons and tons of delays in service due to mechanical malfunctions on the trains.

And such is the art of spin...

"Major delays"? As someone else mentioned, does that include only the delays that are covered in the media? What about the myriad other delays that occur frequently on the system?

A train goes out of service (like from a door being stuck) = delay. Debris on the track = delay. Third rail powers down = delay. Medical emergency = delay. Police action = delay. Bomb threat = delay. Computer problem = delay. "Wayside track problems" = 30-45 minute delay (like RIGHT NOW in San Francisco!), which meant I spent 20 minutes sitting in the transbay tube. And the list could go on.

I ride BART 5 days a week, during the morning and evening commutes. Those types of delays listed above? I have experienced EVERY ONE OF THEM at least once, since the beginning of this year (as well as other types). Some of them multiple times. Of all the delays _I_ have personally experienced in the last 140 days, there have been FAR more than "5." Some of these delays only held me up by about 5 minutes. Some were longer -- 10-20 minutes. Some even more than that. Some meant I had to offboard a train at another station, and wait for a new train. Some meant standing on a platform for quite a while, waiting. Some meant my train never even arrived. All were delays that got me to my destination late. All meant BART was not on time. All significantly WORSEN your "96% of the time BART is reliable."

And considering I do not ride BART throughout its entire operational hours, there are plenty of delays I do not encounter, which other passengers have to endure. Some of these I hear about through others, some I don't. It doesn't mean they don't happen. And they certainly still contribute to BART not being on time or "reliable."

We can play a game of semantics, and we can throw around numbers and statistics like they're going out of style. We can spin the "facts" to make it sound like anything we want. But, the truth is, BART frequently has issues and delays. And those delays get passengers to work, or appointments, or home, or wherever (it doesn't really matter) late. Sometimes very late. For individual passengers, those delays can be significant -- particularly when it means you miss your bus and have to wait another 15-20 minutes for the next one, or you look bad for your job interview because you're tardy and flustered, or you're charged $100 for showing up late to a doctor's appointment, or CPS is called by your daycare provider because you are 10 minutes late picking up your kid (this one is no joke, I've heard many stories of this happening when a parent got stuck at work or in traffic).

The fact of the matter is that your numbers are off -- way off. They do not take into consideration all the so-called "minor" delays (some of which are not very minor at all), which happen with alarming frequency. Maybe not every day -- but, hey, I don't constantly ride the system, so maybe they do. But, enough to where I find myself being personally affected at least once every couple of weeks, and sometimes much more frequently (there was one week, a few months back, where I experienced delays 4 days out of a 5 day work week).

I'd consider revising your statement that "96% of the time BART is reliable, efficient, and problem free." It's just not true. You can't take 5 "major" instances, divide that by 133 days, and say the other 128 have suffered NO delays or problems at all. It would be an outright lie -- or just plain ignorance and stupidity. Your choice.

Where did YOU learn to read and comprehend? There is absolutely nothing in my comments that would
imply jealously at not being a BART employee.

BART gives nothing back to its riders, not a single thing. Criticism about something you're paying
for is always valid; if you choose to think of it as whining and complaining I'll just use your argument and call it a STATEMENT OF FACT.

Thanks for rising to the bait. "He who excuses himself accuses himself" was always one of my father's
favorite quotes.

Ronald Regan had it right, even though people made fun of him....trickle down economics...you pay me, so I can pay him, so he can pay her, so she can pay them so they can pay you........

In your haste to justify your comments and opinions you failed to consider that as a BART employee your job is part of the PUBLIC sector. Your employer can't go out of business regardless of how your riders/customers feel about the quality of the service they receive, and they can't go somewhere else because for many of us there is simply no alternative to public transportation.

In the PRIVATE sector if I submit my customers to the kind of abuses I experience on BART I will shortly be out of work. There is nothing tired or ignorant about knowing that my financial well-being depends on the satisfaction of my customers. The fact that you don't think that's particularly important speaks volumes about you and your attitude towards your job.

You must take great comfort in knowing you can't go out of business simply beacause of lousy performance and bad attitude.

Let me give you an idea of what working for BART was like. I say WAS because I couldn't stand it anymore and quit.

I worked in I.T. with 15 years of previous experience, plus five years at BART, and made about $90K. Not great money for I.T. but not bad money either. Remember, there were no bonuses, stocks, etc. There wasn't even coffee or, for that matter, a Christmas party (except for the employees who decided to go out after work on their own dime and pay for it themselves). Raises were zero or two percent, not even keeping up with inflation.

The first thing I noticed when I went there was how outdated all of the computer equipment was. The computers were all 3-4 generations old, except for the managers, executives, and Board of Directors, all who had nice powerful machines, many of them with nice powerful laptops that they took home for "business use" . Software wasn't replaced until it was out of warranty. If software was on Version 10, BART was still debating whether to install version 7.

At BART, consultants rule the roost. They're brought in for almost everything and paid very well--$150 an hour or more, sometimes contracts totalling millions of dollars--vs. the $40 or so an hour the employees made. Employees were never considered a source of knowledge, just consultants. Consultants decided BART should buy PeopleSoft and pay $20+ million to customize it. Consultants had to do this, because only they could get in done in 10 months. It would take the employees years to learn how to do it themselves. Of course, the 10 months promised by the consultants stretched out into 2+ years but at least it was a fixed bid contract (though there were many additional soft costs).

As anyone in I.T. knows, it's very unpredictable. There were plenty of days I had to work straight through without a meal break, running from one crisis to another. That's the nature of the beast. Since consultants didn't work at all on Fridays, I'd leave 10-15 minutes early on Friday as a consolation prize.

Of course, the reward for this was that management decided to put all the professional staff on a timeclock (at the recommendation of a consultant who was paid $3 million), punching in and out. If you were even 10 seconds late, your pay was docked. Of course, if you came in early and started working, you were expected to "eat" the time. The same with working through lunch, etc. The result of this was that if you were even five minutes late, regardless of whether you stayed extra or not, you lost pay. Unless you called in sick. But there was too much work for that. The timeclocks meant managers could "work from home" .

For that "privilege" BART employees get to hear management and the public berate them once every four years for daring to ask for a raise equal to the cost of living.

The attitude people have toward public servants amazes me. Everyone acts as if no other companies have bad employees. If you want to see what privitization can bring, read about States that have sold off their toll roads. The tolls tripled (at minimum), not went down. The infrastructure can fall apart for all I care now. I'm now in a much better job, making much better money and I can actually come in 10 minutes late once a month without being docked pay, and nobody gripes if I get a 4, 5, or 6 percent raise.