BART has technical problems, insane lines on day of Warriors parade in San Francisco

Photo of Amy Graff

Golden State Warriors fans line up along the Market Street route before the team's victory parade on June 20, 2022 in San Francisco.

Golden State Warriors fans line up along the Market Street route before the team’s victory parade on June 20, 2022 in San Francisco.

Charles Russo/SFGATE

An onslaught of people took BART on Monday to get to San Francisco for the Warriors parade, resulting in long lines at ticket kiosks and limited cell service at stations.

The transit agency encouraged people taking the train to avoid long ticket lines by adding the Clipper card app to their phones and immediately adding funds. BART also advised people to download the app in areas far away from stations for better cell service. 

“The Clipper app is experiencing some issues with payment and purchasing,” a tweet from Bay Area Clipper said. “We recommend loading your Clipper card before entering @SFBART or walking away from stations for better cell service. We have an internal team currently investigating and apologize for the inconvenience.”

BART posted an image on Twitter showing a long line of people at the Dublin station waiting to buy Clipper cards.

This is the line to buy Clipper at Dublin station right now. We have a table selling Clipper cards at the station and we are encouraging people to add a digital card onto their phone and add funds immediately. But this is a good glimpse of how busy it will be today. pic.twitter.com/Lxsu0zwYqb

— BART (@SFBART) June 20, 2022

BART officials said service on the Richmond line to San Francisco resumed at 9 a.m. Monday after the transit agency canceled service over the weekend, running only orange line trains. The news came on a day when hundreds of thousands of people are expect to pour into San Francisco for the Warriors parade

On Monday, riders coming to and from the Richmond line can expect trains to arrive every 15 minutes in both directions until 8 p.m., when trains will run every 30 minutes. 

“Some trains will be Orange line (Richmond to Berryessa) trains and some trains will be Red line trains (Richmond-Millbrae+SFO),” BART said.

BART added: “Transbay riders without direct service can expect a timed transfer between an Orange Line (Berryessa) train and a Yellow Line (SF/SFO) train going into San Francisco at MacArthur Station and a timed transfer between an Yellow Line (Antioch) train and a Orange Line (Richmond) train coming from San Francisco at 19th St. Oakland Station. A shuttle train will be provided between Millbrae and SFO to connect to Yellow line (Antioch-SFO) service.”

Commuters arrive to the Embarcadero BART station, just prior to the start of the Warrriors victory parade along Market Street, on Monday June 20, 2022. 

Commuters arrive to the Embarcadero BART station, just prior to the start of the Warrriors victory parade along Market Street, on Monday June 20, 2022. 

Charles Russo/SFGATE

BART first experienced problems on the red line on Friday due to a power cable failure. Over the weekend, the red line was canceled entirely and only orange line (Richmond to Berryessa) trains were running.

It’s not clear when direct service between Richmond and San Francisco will resume; the Warriors parade is scheduled to begin at 11:20 a.m.

BART said crews are working to identify the location of the cable failure and, after this is complete, they will replace the cable. While the issue is similar to what caused train cancelations in March 2022, the fault is on a different location along Richmond line, BART said.

“BART has been working to replace all aged cable along the 10-mile Richmond line and unfortunately these problems have happened before full replacement was achieved,” BART said.

Read More