BART Promises Cash and Prizes to Returning Commuters

Photo by Giorgio Trovato on Unsplash

This story is a fiction piece, and it was created from my imagination.

After a gas leak investigation shut down 19th Street BART station on Saturday, March 20, it was time for this fictional news reporter to get involved in this BART action and investigate the future of BART post-COVID-19.

We’ve discovered that Bay Area Rapid Transit, headquartered in Oakland, is creating a wacky new incentive structure to encourage Bay Area commuters to return to their beloved BART.

While some would expect after the year we’ve had with record-low ridership and months and months in the red, BART would consider springing for some new seats and non-disgusting floors, it appears they’ve decided to go another way.

“We want people to come back to BART, whether you’re going to work or Dolores Park or just finding your way back home again,” said BART foreman Barthlolemew Robertson.

The New Incentives

“We considered cash and prizes for riders willing to re-enter the in-person workforce,” said Daisy Bartman, one of BART’s executives in Oakland. “But we were inundated with people who didn’t even have Clipper cards. These people were pretending to ride BART, but really they hardly knew their way to Rockridge station.”

Instead of mere cash and prizes, BART has decided to create an incentive structure to help folks return to commuting.

People who ride BART three or more times per week will fictionally receive whichever book is the #1 New York Times bestseller that week.

Riders who ride BART at least once per week will win a date with Alice Waters.

Riders who take BART across the Bay from Oakland to San Francisco or vice versa at least twice per week win an all-access pass to the next time the Warriors play an in-person basketball game. Wow!

Riders who take BART seven days per week will win a two-week trip to the Sonoma Coast and also to Fiji, whichever they prefer. The last rider who was offered the prize decided to sell the trip and buy lottery tickets. Close enough.

But what about people who used to ride BART but haven’t been on in a year and don’t see why they’d start back up now?

“These are the ones we hope to attract the most,” said Larry Bartfield, executive in charge of casual riders.

“Casual riders, like people who go to the City for parades or to entertain visiting parents and friends actually make up 80% of our cash flow in this fictional version of reality,” he said. “It’s vital we get them back in our greasy, rusty doors.”

Casual riders who take back up their BART hobby will be eligible to receive NFTs from local Bay Area artists as well as a diploma from Mills College. Truly rare finds indeed.

BART Passengers Consider Their Options

Marjorie James isn’t interested in riding BART anymore.

“Honestly, my dad left the country and gave me his car. You know? I just don’t need BART anymore. And I also don’t want to go anywhere regularly, to be honest. Nowhere is perfect for me these days.”

James has decided to opt out of BART, citing a desire to remain disease-free. “We were running big risks taking BART before,” she continued. “It’s surprising I didn’t catch some other pandemic-like disease while riding that thing.

“Remember rush hour? It was literally hell. Forty minutes in someone’s armpit while you’re trying to read a book and the guy next to you is trying to do gymnastics tricks with the hand-rails and bars.”

Tommy Bihaymas has decided to hop on this BART incentive, and has already cashed in on some cool prizes.

“People who don’t win the raffles still get prizes,” he said, showing off his new “I HEART BART” T-shirt featuring a BART train that has been anthropomorphized to look like a Thomas the Tank Engine but gray-er and less friendly.

“I’m going to keep riding,” he said, “and keep hoping the chip they inserted into my skin will allow me to win big.”

In an effort to track customers who are back to using BART, the transit company has invited folks to submit to a small chip insertion to help track their movements near BART.

“Oh, it’s just a small procedure,” said Sally Bartman, BART’s elevator speech consultant and key chip insertion lead. “We make it fun and easy. And everyone gets a T-shirt!”

The Future of BART

With a year of losing massive amounts of revenue and relying heavily on federal and local assistance, our Spidey sense says BART won’t fare well even as folks return to work. We could be wrong, but let's consider:

Is it possible to have a San Francisco Bay Area without BART?

“Honestly, between AC Transit buses like the FS and the J, and casual carpool, a lot of folks really don’t need BART,” said one former rider who opted out of a T-shirt and computer chip.

BART may still be popular for riders coming from Milpitas or Sacramendy, this fictionalized world’s version of Sacramento, also known as Sacarament-Me-No.

BART, with its grungy green seats, its very cold or very hot cars, its busking strangers, its pregnant ladies who can’t get a seat because people are rude, its short ladies hiding in a corner with a book, not knowing one day their future would include writing for News Break, is not the friendliest place in the Bay Area.

Taking a BART train from North Berkeley to Embarcadero will destroy at least a quarter of your life if you do it daily. Is it worth cash and prizes? Probably. The alternative is living in your pajamas and eating greasy takeout food for the rest of your life while building your side hustle empire.

There are worse things. We wish you well, BART, and godspeed as we enter a post-COVID era.

But please, keep wearing your masks. And also, we should’ve been wearing masks on BART the whole time over the last few decades, are we right, or are we right?