Spare the Air only during commute?
From SFGATE
The highly touted "Spare the Air" days spelled financial relief for thousands of Bay Area commuters and help for the environment -- but for BART, this summer's experiment with six days of free rides also brought so much grief that the system's police chief is calling for the program to be limited to just commuters in the future.
The free rides brought an extra 20,000 to 30,000 patrons to the already-taxed system during each Spare the Air Day, an increase of 8 to 10 percent over normal.
There were packed cars, blaring boom boxes, food and drink containers (which are banned) being tossed everywhere -- even reports of homeless people flocking in to beat the heat.
BART police reported that the additional complaints mostly involved teenagers fighting with each other, intimidating passengers and generally behaving badly.
In one instance Friday, two teenage girls got into a rumble at a BART station in Berkeley that ended with one of them in the hospital with stab wounds. It was among more than 400 calls to BART police that day -- more than twice the number reported on the same day a year earlier.
On one Spare the Air Day, said BART police Chief Gary Gee, "we had a train car taken over by 10 young males in white T-shirts and baggy pants, and they were holding the door open and acting like they were on the playground.
"In certain trains, people were pretty terrified by their rides," he said.
Enough so that Gee wants BART to drop its all-day Spare the Air rides in the future, and make free trips available only during the morning commute.
The capper for the BART cops was when two young men from San Francisco were arrested July 17 just moments after they allegedly broke into a car in the parking lot of the Castro Valley station. An investigation linked the pair to as many as 10 burglaries at the Castro Valley, Dublin/Pleasanton and San Leandro stations, Gee said.
When police asked them where they had parked their own car, the two said they hadn't driven to the East Bay. They had taken BART for free.
Great idea. Because of last
Great idea. Because of last Friday's Spare the Air Day, I told myself that I would drive my car instead of taking BART.
Yup. That's why I drive on
Yup. That's why I drive on Spare the Air days, so I can Spare the headache of having to ride with people like that.
me too. I drive in on spare
me too. I drive in on spare the air days after a few bad encounters
Besides that article being
Besides that article being in today's SF Chronicle, Phil Matier was on KGO talk radio at 7:45 am, talking about it. He said that in the future, for spare the air days that Bart may let commuters from 5am - 10am ride free and then give those commuters a token to ride home for free. Just one of the suggestions that Bart has come up to prevent all the disruption caused the last spare the air days with excessive Bart police calls, homeless riding Bart all day to get out of the heat and excessive garbage on trains and stations.
That timeframe and token
That timeframe and token thing is a great idea. I really don't even have a problem with the homeless unless they are smelly or disrespectful. As for the rowdy kids and car thieves, there is one answer: Taser 'Em. Taser the heck out of them. No long term tissue damage and it is a fun show for everyone on that car.
That's a great idea! Maybe
That's a great idea! Maybe they'll let people turns. That would be sweet.
Oh boy do Station Agents
Oh boy do Station Agents hate Spare the Air Days. They are days from Hell. All of the homeless, thugs, and Riff Raff have to be out and about on the trains. We really do feel sorry for the regular passengers who have to witness and experience the dredges of society at work.
We also become targets for the regular fare evaders who we have dealt with in the past and repeatedly told "NO you can't ride free you need to pay like everybody else" walk throught the gates and give us dirty looks and call us names. Then come back on a non Spare the Air Day and ask why aint today free and here we go again with an unnecessary confrontation. Well I hope they go back to the way it was done last year just during the commute.