Wait, BART has two different trainsets? (BART - Part 5)

[@aidanbernal]

todGOAT

[@todgod]

Simply honored, thank you king

[@WildWuff]

The Embassy Suites near Pleasant Hill/Contra Costa Centre is THE urbanist hotel to stay at in the Bay Area. Shout out to Selig for showing the views from the hotel room in some videos.

[@todgod]

Huh, good to know!

[@TysonIke]

The reason why their is so much parking at some stations is because they are the old terminals. And terminals need parking to “take cars off the road”

[@gillynova]

Love you sense of humor bro LMAO. I’m left watching everything on your channel. Keep it up!

[@TinsujRokChannel]

14:33 I’ve heard that the residents in that neighborhood voted against having an overpass built for easy BART access because they feared that people would park in their neighborhood causing congested streets instead of paying for BART parking. It’s a fair argument but completely defeats the purpose of TOD.

[@Geotpf]

It is very common where there isn't an obvious pedestrian access to a nearby residential area that the reason is due to NIMBYs living in said residential area not wanting such.

[@TohaBgood2]

Another great video! Thank you for your work! I think that you are catching BART at a very interesting time. The YIMBYs, especially the more lefty YIMBYs that want more community-building mixed-affordable development, have just gotten the upper hand and given cities and BART the ability to build real, meaningful TOD. Pretty much all the TOD that you've covered, with a few exceptions, predate this new era. So now the flood gates should finally open, with the NIMBYs largely sidelined. And at this point BART has also had the time to figure out what works and what doesn't for their TOD. They know that they need a nice central walkable plaza right near to the main station entrance, rather than a giant bus bay or other parking-lot like nothingness. They know that they need a grocery store or at least some neighborhood serving retail. They know that they can't get away with just adding housing and that they need at least some type of office development if they want the area to be lively during the day. I see BART doing much better with TOD going forward, although frankly I'm surprised how much they've added already and how much more is already in progress or planning.

[@todgod]

I’m very glad that there is a new wave of YIMBYism taking over for BART. I can’t wait for this video to be redundant in ten years

[@hightyd3]

That was great. Your comments on Antioch station had me hollerin! 😂

[@todgod]

Thank you! 🙏🏽

[@davidyegiazaryan3417]

North Concord has a free express bus going back and forth between Martinez Amtrak and the BART station with a few stops at the industrial park to the north, I guess that's why they've got "Martinez" in the name. The linear park is nice, but it's so annoying being so close yet so far from the industrial park. It would probably have been better if it ran in place of route 242 runs with a station that is easier to access to jobs and the neighborhoods in that area. Also, Walnut Creek has a free downtown bus from BART, but idk how good it is.

[@Unmannedperson]

To be fair to North Concord, the City has been trying to redevelop the adjacent Concord Naval Weapons Station for decades, but things keep going sideways. Some really interesting litigious developer drama sidelined the most recent effort. Hopefully though one day it’ll go through and Concord will at long last have a second BART station with quality urban fabric.

[@todgod]

I hope so too, that location was just an awful spot to pick to begin with in my opinion, although I do agree concord deserves two BART stations

[@ethantlyu]

Great video. Keep up the good work on Bart.

[@todgod]

Thank you! Appreciate it!! Just one more vid

[@arxligion]

The Antioch station would have less parking if they built ebart out towards Oakley and Brentwood. They cant get rid of the parking as it is usually full

[@TohaBgood2]

It's worth mentioning that the version of eBART that ended up getting built is only a fraction of the original plan and that BART really got shafted by the host railroad. They originally pretended like they would play ball and then pulled the rug from under BART to cause maximum pain. In the end the rest of the line that was supposed to be over freight track was cut and the remaining eBART track was kept in the highway median all the way to Antioch. But technically the extension to Brentwood is still on the table and BART still wants to build that as soon as they reach an agreement with the host railroad. So at some point they will extend all the way to Brentwood and maybe even beyond. And then the parking lot won't be as necessary and they can replace it with housing and TOD.

[@todgod]

That’s my point, people actually end up using the service. I’m glad it’s there. Thus it deserves full BART service, I just dislike the land use around it. A series of garages could be a good compromise

[@Geotpf]

It makes sense that the last station on any rail line that extends far into the suburbs has lots of parking and bus connections. Its just how things are. Now, it would be nice to also have TOD there as well, of course.

[@acnetj]

This generation of BART Board of Directors believes that wide gauge BART should be oriented as an urban subway. It's different from conventional wisdom of building subways way out in the suburbs that relied on parking (same case like all 70s-80s rapid transit projects elsewhere). So eBART is a compromise by still running all the way to the outer suburbs but with shorter, off the shelf, non-electric standard gauge trains. I think it ought to be the way a long time ago.

[@catman422]

For what it’s worth, the parking lot at Antioch is for people coming from the Central Valley to park at to ride BART to the rest of the Bay Area. There should be TOD.

[@todgod]

We can retain the same amount of parking space with a few garages, and then use the rest of the land for mixed-use development

[@catman422]

@@todgod I like that idea a lot!

[@tonywalters7298]

the eBart service should be extended along the UPRR line into Tracy

[@TysonIke]

There should also be an extension. The maintenance facility to the east could easily be connected to some unused UPRR tracks to extend to downtown Brentwood (and maybe eventually Tracy) and they could also use the land adjacent to 160 to connect to the San Juaquins new Oakley station and beyond to Stockton. This would probably require a separate operator from Bart but the connections should be made.

[@pvad02]

To be fair to Antioch station, it is the end of the line, so it makes sense it would have a lot of parking. Maybe not that much parking needed, however, and it definitely could've been constructed in such a way that it doesn't have such a huge footprint around the station (made worse w/ the highway of course). The thing that really doesn't make sense to me is the North Concord station. This station has been the least-used station on the entire main BART system (i.e. excluding Oakland Airport + e-BART) for YEARS now, yet there's barely any change happening at the station to increase ridership. I don't really understand that.

[@todgod]

I don’t understand NC either. There is no area plan for it. I tried researching stuff about it but to no avail.

[@sacamigo1]

Another commented noted the very important point that North Concord/Martinez(until 1996), Pittsburg/Bay point(until 2018) and now Antioch were all the end of the line/terminal points at one point which is slightly reasonable that they were kinda grandfathered into a lot of parking to serve all the end of the line users. Remember they don't just serve east Contra Costa County but people all the way from stockton would drive there. Still inexcusable that its stuck around that long but NIMBY gonna NIMBY and BART has limited energy/resources to fight about it.

[@Marcella_VT]

Been catching up on the videos. This one really hit home since I used to ride this part of BART into San Francisco from Antioch (or bay point if I didn't want to deal with eBART that day) so much the last few years to go to college in the city. You can just tell eBART was done on the cheap. Most people don't realize that eBART was supposed to not be in the median and use the existing track that is next to the highway but the the negotiations to use the tracks fell through. But another thing is if you look at some of the plans a little later the Antioch station was originally not supposed to be the terminus station. They planned to continue it down the highway even more but that was a phase 2 that never happened. It was supposed to connect some shopping centers down the highway. I got used to eBART but always wish it was just normal BART.

[@todgod]

Same here, wish there was regular BART service in former rail rights of way instead of highway medians. Private freight rail companies can definitely be greedy!

[@tonywalters7298]

15:00 seems like a bridge to that neighborhood would be a no-brainer

[@todgod]

Right?!

[@Token_Nerd]

I think the Antioch parking lot is as large as it is because of the hydro power corridor. You can’t really build housing under that.

[@arjunyg4655]

Also as a terminal station, it does need a larger park and ride for people coming from Brentwood/beyond. You can see that the lot is quite full actually. Now of course a garage would be more efficient, but much more expensive.

[@MyNameIsNeutron]

The ends of the Antioch parking lot are further apart than Embarcadero and Montgomery stations, or 19th Street and 12th Street Oakland.

[@todgod]

It sucks, truly

[@combusean]

The cable car to OAK is a third. Plus all the MoW equipment.

[@noodlenomnom6746]

Absolute goated series

[@todgod]

Thank you!!

[@commercialcritic4676]

Cool!

[@TysonIke]

I don’t hate the Orinda design for a few reasons. First off it’s parking used to be a need as their are too many suburban houses and the Caldecott tunnel used to be so much worse

[@jonathanhillyard99]

e-bart down Lone Tree Way in Antioch, please!

[@readyredpanda127]

Yeah I am also confused about the Antioch station, they could have at least reduced the land space with the parking and make it a garage, freeing up space for TOD. But they for some reason chose to spread the jam all over the toast

[@todgod]

My guess is that BART was very short-sighted

[@teuast]

@@todgod I'd say short on cash, too, but even in Antioch, that amount of land is gonna cost you.

[@arjunyg4655]

cost.

[@stephenspackman5573]

You know, the way to make these highway median stations useful is just to roof them over. Chicago raised its nominal ground level, and we're better at bridging today. Also, I've heard that the original motivation for suburban sprawl was that trams could make it work. Why can't we get trams back, in place of all these uncrossably wide streets? I'd be comfortable with driverless trams in a way I'm not with driverless cars.

[@shubdotclub]

Rockridge is by far the most beautiful views from a station, like on a good morning the view of SF is magnificent. Also I can't wait till they extend eBART to tracy Via discovery bay on the yellow, 100% more likely than bart extension to livermore via the blue line lol

[@banksrail]

W TodGod Upload Also 9:00 W Political Move 😂 BART- “Yeah yeah, we’re planning to put a BART station in your city 😁” City- “Where?” BART- 😀 City- “Where?!” BART- “I’ll tell you what, you don’t worry about that, just sign this paper here.😉”

[@todgod]

Hahahahah true ! Thank you for the view Banks you’re awesome! I see you with your Bay Area content too! 👀

[@lowwastehighmelanin]

The Martinez station is so far away from the Amtrak I tried taking that route to go to Oakland and wound up being on a smelly bus for an hour beyond my original planned travel time. It's embarassing that the Martinez station exists. They fucked up.

[@MikeBrady-js5rq]

Great comments, but I take a little exception to building housing right up against (or even under or in the middle of) the freeway. That's an air quality/toxic air pollutant disaster. More temporary occupancies like commercial would be better if less than a couple hundred feet from the freeway.

[@trigger1557]

I have ridden the yellow line to antioch

[@todgod]

I’m sorry

[@trigger1557]

​​@@todgodlooking at it for myself its painful but there are potentials for this one too😊

[@eechauch5522]

I will say, I don’t hate park&rides at/ towards the end of lines. The Antioch P+R looks giant, but it seems to be used decently well and the adjacent land doesn’t exactly look like anything people want to live near. I’ve read before that the point of eBart was to be able to extend much further out onto conventional tracks and the parking lot suggests there probably would be demand gor this. The problem is, as long as this is a terminal station far away from the city center of the cities it’s serving and adjacent to a 4 lane highway there will always be a sizable need for parking and traffic to and from this parking, which isn’t really the base for a great neighborhood. I honestly think a redesign should be delayed if there is any chance for the terminal to be pushed out once again. At that point the parking can be drastically scaled back and a much nicer neighborhood built.

[@SFDOM415]

orinda is the way it is because of the geography. highway 24 was originally just mt diablo blvd. which ran to the original bore of the caldecott tunnel. highway 24 was built with median space for bart because there is no other place to put bart it's a narrow pass between the hills.

[@chelmrtz]

bay point bart, my beloved Just kidding it is awful but it was also my life for a decade in the 2000s

[@todgod]

Nothing wrong with nostalgia!

[@stealthninja2058]

It’s ironic that North Concord/Martinez is a garbage station AND it’s the lowest used ridership station on BART. 😂

[@todgod]

Seems like there’s a causation here …

[@stealthninja2058]

@@todgod I guess the takeaway is, You build a garbage station, you get terribly low ridership.

[@wta1518]

That's literally the opposite of ironic.

[@trianandacaesaryandasril786]

i like your vlog. You should try riding Whoosh in indonesia, the first high speed train in southeast asia with a speed of 350/KMH. There are still many more trains in indonesia that you can make your youtube video. greetings from indonesia, Keep spirit and keep healty

[@todgod]

Thank you!! 🙏🏽 I would love to go and visit Indonesia one day

[@tomo-tawa-linja]

the ebart rant has arrived wooooooooooo

[@todgod]

Oh yeah!!

[@bryanCJC2105]

It's no surprise that North Concord is the 2nd least used BART station both in 2019 pre-Covid (1560 passengers/day) and in 2024 (w 603 passengers/day), only Pittsburg Center w 470/day currently is worse. The Antioch station plan you showed did include a potential e-BART station in the proposed town center area east of the station. Of course, it would have made more sense to put the town center next to the existing station. Despite the tracks already being there, I seriously doubt that BART will extend the tracks to build a new station barely 1/2 mile from the existing station. Interestingly, according to KQED, in 2018 the parking a few weeks after opening (avg 7441/day) was totally filled on weekdays w people parking anywhere they could. Current ridership at Antioch of 1618 people/day is 75% less than in 2018. In fact. by 2019 ridership at Antioch was down to 2238/day. As for e-BART, I know why they did it but I'm not sure how I feel about it. They said e-BART was about $1 billon less than full BART (I'm not sure if the $1 billion figure was for the original alignment along the UP) but, how much money did it really save? They had to lay the tracks anyways and build the stations. They had to build a unique transfer station. They had to build a new yard for the DMU's. They had to buy new cars. They had to train and maintain staff, maintenance crews, and parts specifically for the new cars. I don't see how full BART could cost an extra $1 billion.

[@Geotpf]

Any savings on construction costs will eventually be eaten up by diesel vs electricity costs. The whole design is just inefficient and insulting and stupid.

[@bryanCJC2105]

@@Geotpf I agree. In the coming years, if development continues exploding in the area, then e-BART will not be able to handle the passenger load and the full BART extension will need to happen anyways incl full rebuilds and platform extensions of the existing stations. I don't understand how e-BART saved BART $1 billion, but it will eventually cost much more than $1 billion to retrofit the line. BART has even admitted that DMU does not preclude a full BART extension later on if money becomes available. Their decision was extremely short-sighted. (I did change the wording of my original last sentence to clarify my doubt of the original $1 billion cost estimate difference.)

[@Yvonne-Bella]

Please roast Contra Costa County more. Outside of BART (minus Walnut Creek and North Concord and beyond), you CAN'T walk anywhere, _ANYWHERE_ WITHOUT A CAR. And there's nothing to do there. Edit cuz I forgot: TriDelta Transit sucks major @$$. And yes, I'm complaining as someone who lived in East Contra Costa and rode both County Connections and TriDelta-! They only come once an hour. At least with County Connections, they have a larger service. TriDelta leaves you stranded. So if at all BART happens to have a clause saying the bus services MUST BE IMPROVED, well that'd be perfect

[@todgod]

Wow I had no idea the bus headways were hourly, That’s awful!!

[@jarjarbnks340]

Is it feasible to build 500 housing units per acre?

[@TohaBgood2]

Sure, why not?

[@SFDOM415]

a town as small but sprawling as orinda ( homes are way up into the hills on either side) doesn't need a station in the middle of town. and this suburban line is designed overwhelmingly for commuters to get them off the freeway ( the 4 the 242, the 680, and the 24) anyone accessing the orinda and lafayette station is not walking from right in town they are driving from their homes most of which are up in the hills. so walkability is pretty irrelevant. when bart was designed, and i've been riding sine the richmond fremont line opened , it was designed as a hybrid of urban subway and suburban commuter rail. expensive tunneling was reserved for only the most difficult areas ( berkeley was suppose to be elevated but insisted it had to be a subway or no go) elevated , old rail right of way and freeway median were all used as they were available in different sections

[@akhilkarandikar99]

lfg

[@jonathansy4552]

Arguably, BART's high capacity should've stopped at Concord and eBART should've started at North Concord/Martinez...

[@masoncarter88]

Based on how awful Antioch looks it seems like doiny ebart on the cheap was the right way to go 😂

[@todgod]

Yeah but I think an extension eastward warrants a full BART service

[@lowwastehighmelanin]

*stares in Solano County local* NORTH BAY? STOP LYING. Northern East Bay at best. HMPH

[@SFDOM415]

orinda is the way it is because of the geography. highway 24 was originally just mt diablo blvd. which ran to the original bore of the caldecott tunnel. highway 24 was built with median space for bart because there is no other place to put bart it's a narrow pass between the hills.