An untold number of transit passengers in the East Bay have been hit with extra fees due to a glitch in the Clipper card system that was not noticed by regional officials for a month.
AC Transit passengers who make bus transfers are only charged 25 cents for their second leg, even if they split up that journey with a trip on BART. However, for a two-month stretch earlier this year, Clipper card readers were not recognizing that first trip, leading to overcharges.
Read More
Concerns that not enough manufacturing jobs would be based in America did not stop BART’s board of directors on Thursday from approving a landmark contract to replace aging train cars.
Bombardier, a Canadian firm, was awarded a $1.5 billion deal to build 775 new trains for the oldest transit fleet in the country. With administrative, contingency and inflationary costs, the total price tag of the project — deemed by the agency as one of the most important in its history — will be $2.5 billion.
Read More
Drunken driving charges were thrown at Raiders wide receiver Darrius Heyward-Bey on Thursday after the football player was intercepted by police last month speeding and weaving on the Bay Bridge, law enforcement officials said.
Heyward-Bey, 25, was pulled over by the California Highway Patrol about 2 a.m. April 7 while driving his 2012 Range Rover, Officer Tony Tam said.
Read More
Johannes Mehserle, the disgraced BART police officer who was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter for fatally shooting an unarmed Oscar Grant III in Oakland on New Year’s Day in 2009, is appealing the involuntary manslaughter conviction so that he might one day carry a gun and badge again.
Attorney Dylan Schaffer argued at a 45-minute hearing at the state 1st District Court of Appeals in San Francisco on Wednesday that while Mehserle made a “tragic and horrible error,” he didn’t act with the level of recklessness that legally defines involuntary manslaughter.
Read More
BART officials are considering launching bicycle sharing, improving bike access at stations and designing new trains to accommodate more riders as ways to double the rate of cyclists using the system over the next decade.
Today, slightly more than 4 percent of passengers use bikes to get to BART. By 2022, the agency hopes to increase that total to 8 percent. The agency released a draft report Monday detailing initiatives to achieve that goal.
Read More
Service increases, more hiring, cleaner interiors and investment in its train-replacement project are all part of BART’s upcoming budget plans.
Unlike other transit operators across the country, which are struggling with their finances, BART is actually projecting a budget surplus of $30 million to $35 million for next fiscal year, which starts July 1, spokesman Jim Allison said. The agency has proposed using that money to invest in underfunded areas.
Read More
A dramatically scaled-down America’s Cup lease deal with The City will be decided Tuesday by the Board of Supervisors amid more uncertainty over the yacht race’s overall vitality.Since announcing The City as the venue for the international event 16 months ago, race officials have faced a number of hurdles, including a sluggish market for sponsors and a long list of required approvals from city, state and federal agencies — not the least of which has been San Francisco itself.
Read More
A stunning crowbar attack in front of a bustling Peet’s coffee shop in Belmont earlier this month stemmed from a jailhouse spat between rival bikers, prosecutors said Monday.Orlando Rodriguez, 40, who prosecutors said is a member of the so-called Wanted motorcycle club, faces multiple charges in connection with the March 6 brawl that broke out while the El Camino coffee shop was buzzing with customers about 11:35 a.m.
Read More
New York City could get a taste of America’s Cup yacht action, race organizers say, after a broadcast deal with NBC prompted some possible scheduling changes.Some August racing dates could occur in New York instead of San Francisco, although race officials also tentatively scheduled an additional series of events to coincide with Fleet Week in early October here in The City.
Read More
A catastrophic earthquake strikes the Bay Area, and Oakland’s emergency responders can’t communicate with their San Francisco peers. Firefighters are called to a burning apartment building, but can’t see flames approaching across the complex. A child or Alzheimer’s sufferer is missing, but police in other cities lack a photo. City officials hope to prevent such scenarios by implementing a $100 million regional broadband network that might eventually link all Bay Area first responders with smartphones or computers that can send photos, texts and streaming videos.
Read More
URL: http://www.sfexaminer.com/archive/17511?page=2
