It can be hard to make the trek to work on a Monday morning, but for BART riders, the real pain point is Tuesday.
The second day of the work week is by far the busiest, with an average of 179,638 travelers packed into trains, according to The Standard’s analysis of BART ridership data for the last six months. Wednesday is the second busiest day, with an average of 175,598. Monday has the fewest weekday trips: 141,472.
“There’s days when we could for sure use another [train] car,” said Raul Lopez, a software engineer who takes BART five days a week from the East Bay to the Embarcadero.
Lopez tries to leave work at 3 p.m. to beat the evening rush.
“I find it very crowded on the way back home,” he said.
On a recent Tuesday, The Standard witnessed passengers jostling for slivers of space during the morning rush hour. Bodies were crammed uncomfortably close together. Cyclists got the stink eye from other riders for taking up extra space.
“When it does get crowded, there’s no outlet,” said Marek Adamo, 46, a lawyer who commutes by BART Monday through Friday.
According to the data, the commuter crunch lasts through Thursday before plummeting Friday and remaining low through Monday — likely due to hybrid work becoming common since the pandemic.
BART said fluctuations in weekday ridership are not enough to warrant adjusting its schedules.
“The percentage of variance from the busiest weekday to the least busy does not warrant such changes,” said spokesperson Jim Allison.
While the packed platforms and trains on certain days might make it feel like the Before Times, BART hasn’t fully recovered; ridership totals are paltry compared with before the pandemic. In 2019, average ridership for all weekdays was 400,000, according to BART data. Due to the drop in ridership, the transit system reduced the number of train cars in 2023. That means it can be a tight fit for the unlucky passengers who have no choice but to commute to the office.
The evolving conditions for riders come at a time when BART faces a monumental budget deficit. Emergency funds from the state and federal governments have helped the agency stay afloat, but BART has warned that its operating deficit for fiscal year 2027 will be between $375 million and $400 million. On Monday, state senators Scott Wiener and Jesse Arreguín announced a sales tax proposal to fund BART and other regional transit systems.
But ridership is growing, and BART has taken notice. The agency this month lengthened four trains on the Green Line during peak commute hours. As companies and government agencies scale back work-from-home privileges, more workers are making the trip to downtown San Francisco.
“It’s crowded,” said Zarlo Diaz, 26, who rides into SF from Oakland. “There’s not as many seats as there used to be. And there are a lot of delays.”