BART Melts Down After Train Hits Tree on Tracks in S.F.
Update, 9:15 p.m.: BART spokeswoman Alicia Trost says that workers have moved the train that struck a fallen tree near San Francisco's Balboa Park Station.
But Trost says that cover boards that shield the third rails for both east- and westbound trains at the site of the incident suffered significant damage and need to be repaired or replaced. She said it could take until nearly 10 p.m. before trains can run through the area again and allow the agency to resume normal systemwide service.
Original post: A BART train hit "a pretty big" tree that had fallen onto the tracks between the Balboa Park and Daly City stations during the Tuesday evening commute, stranding a trainload of passengers for about an hour and triggering major delays systemwide.
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The transit agency managed to get a rescue train to the site of the 5:35 p.m. incident and removed the passengers from the crippled westbound train and get them to Daly City.
But the damaged train itself could not be moved -- reportedly because of damage to the third rail at the crash site. As of 7 p.m., BART service remained shut down between Colma and the 24th/Mission stations, and the agency had no estimate for the resumption of normal service.
The 24th Street platform quickly became jammed with passengers who had been forced to detrain. Twitter was full of images of the crowd trying to make its way out of the station -- with some people walking up the side of an out-of-service escalator to get to the fare-gate level.
One sample of the mood of stranded commuters:
Muni, Caltrain and SamTrans offered mutual aid -- meaning the agencies would give free trips to those who had already paid their BART fares.
But some of those diverted to the other transit agencies complained that bus service was spotty. Some were also unhappy that ride-hailing companies were operating with expensive surge pricing -- standard operating procedure during times of high demands, like bucketing-down rain and massive transit disruptions.
BART had a healthy list of other issues to deal with Tuesday. The 24th/Mission Station suffered a brief power outage earlier in the afternoon. Just before 5 p.m., an unspecified equipment problem at Daly City caused a short pause in service. Just after 7, "police activity" at Embarcadero Station prompted BART to order trains to skip that station and advise Embarcadero-bound passengers to use Montgomery instead; the situation was resolved in about 15 minutes. And finally, the system suffered 10-minute delays most of the day because of heavy rain.