THE BAY AREA RAPID TRANSIT SYSTEM - CURRENT STATUS AND IMPACTS

The report reviews the history of the BART system, describes the kind of service the system provides, discusses the difficulties of impact measurement, reports the early findings about BART's effects on travel, and describes how BART is seen by residents and policy-makers of the area. The Bay Area Rapid Transit system has only been in operation on all of its lines since September 1974. The inherent design of the system as a long-distance, commuter rail facility means that BART by itself could not possibly live up to some of the inflated expectations held for it, nor produce some of the dramatic impacts which had been predicted. As BART solves its operational problems, it will become a key element in the total regional transportation system of the Bay Area, and is likely to prove to have been worth its cost.