BART Uses Heat Delays to Ask for More Funding
Thousands of BART passengers were left delayed and sweating, as the heat lead to train delays and malfunctions Tuesday, and the agency is using the opportunity to call for money to make improvements.
The BART delays occurred when computers that normally control the trains overheated.
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"The trackside equipment overheating is one of the many reasons why we need more funding to be able to air condition these control rooms, which would prevent a lot of the problems that we're seeing happen right now on the system because of the heat," said BART spokesman Linton Johnson.
And it wasn't just the control rooms that were overheated - BART passengers were further inconvenienced as nearly a third of the train fleet experienced problems with air conditioning.
"This is another reason we're trying to sock money away towards our $7.5 billion shortfall," said Johnson.
The malfunctions forced conductors to run the trains manually, which meant slowing 50 mile per hour trains to just 25 miles per hour.
Heat Issues Continue
The heat wave continued to cause problems on BART Wednesday. Johnson tells KCBS that Wednesday's hot weather caused a kink in the rail line near Daly City. Trains in the area had to move slower, meaning delays for passengers going from Pittsburg Bay Point to Daly City.
The heat also caused another round of computer problems, as the agency's track-side computer shut-down slowing down trains in downtown San Francisco.
