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Comment by chroma | Hacker News Reader

Taking public transportation in the bay area is incredibly stressful. I've had people try to fight me. I've had people threaten to stab me. I've had people smoke meth on the same car as me. Hell, last year one of my friends was robbed at gunpoint on bart. If these services were run by a private company, they would be shut down for safety violations.

I much prefer cars because it means I don't have to worry about vagrants, crazy people, and generally annoying assholes (such as those who play their music out of speakers instead of using headphones).

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40,000 people die every year in the USA, but you had some people try to fight you?

Over 2 million are injured of disabled by cars, but you had someone threaten you?

A million people every year are killed by car pollution, buy you had someone smoke meth on the same bus?

You issues, while valid, just seem a lot smaller than the problems with cars.

As a counterpoint: I choose to live within walking distance of where I need to be every day. Or an electric rideable or bicycle of some sort.

I did buy a motorcycle recently which does improve on some of that, but most of the improvement has been eaten up by the extra time it takes to gear up and park.

Commuting is probably the single worst thing you can do to your quality of life.

PS: yes I know this is a position of privilege. We’re on hacker news and I believe most of us share similar privileges

I wish I could afford to live close to work, but being in the vicinity of Salesforce Tower is pretty goddamn expensive.

Taking public transportation in the bay area is incredibly stressful.

Counterpoint: all of the shootings up and down the I-80 corridor, wrong way drivers, sideshows, and road rage.

https://www.sfgate.com/news/bayarea/article/Update-4-Killed-...

https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2018/06/25/traffic-stop-in-rich...

https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2019/05/05/chp-seeks-weekend-i-...

https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2019/09/14/shooting-in-vallejo-...

https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2018/07/10/video-police-release...

https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2019/08/27/fremont-police-inves...

https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/Shooting-on-I-880-in-O...

https://patch.com/california/sanleandro/shooting-i-880-chp-s...

https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/Bay-Area-Police-Crack-...

https://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2019/06/03/oakland-weekend...

https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2018/05/09/mother-of-four-kille...

None of which are things I've encountered while driving. I bet if you ran the stats, you would be far more likely to be a victim of crime on bart than while driving in the bay area. There's a reason all of the women at my workplace drive instead of taking bart. They've tried bart and found it incredibly unsafe.

The only disadvantages of driving are traffic and parking.

Edit: You've edited your comment to add links, and they're all discussing crimes in east bay. I don't think most of the articles you linked to happened in places served by bart.

I bet if you ran the stats, you would be far more likely to be a victim of crime on bart than while driving in the bay area.

Then run the numbers instead of wildly waving your hands. If you'd like anecdotes I've never been robbed at gunpoint on BART, nor have I ever had anyone threaten to stab me on BART.

The only disadvantages of driving are traffic and parking.

And air pollution, risk of a crash or injury, cost of ownership, parking, pedestrian deaths and injuries, etc., etc.

Edit: You've edited your comment to add links, and they're all discussing crimes in east bay. I don't think most of the articles you linked to happened in places served by bart.

If you check a map I think you'll find that BART serves San Francisco, Oakland, and Fremont.

Is it uncommon to be threatened on BART? I thought that was just normal.

It's very frustrating to discuss this topic with you because you keep editing your comments after I've replied to them. This makes it appear as though I've ignored points you made, when in fact they simply weren't in the version of the comment that I read.

Of all the links you added, most are criminals shooting each other or cops shooting criminals. Neither of those are likely to affect me, as I don't rob places or brandish firearms. Also, you had to go back 5 years to find some of those results. In that same time BART had thousands of thefts, around a thousand robberies, hundreds of violent assaults, and around a half dozen homicides. Considering how much lower the ridership of BART is compared to all commuters in the bay area, those aren't great odds.

Again, this is obvious to anyone who rides BART and isn't a fit male. If you're old, or a woman, or just a small/weak guy, people on BART will fuck with you. The problem has gotten much worse in the past few years.[1] It's caused ridership and approval ratings to decrease.[2]

1. https://www.sfchronicle.com/crime/article/Violent-crime-on-B...

2. https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/BART-s-approval-...

Also, you had to go back 5 years to find some of those results.

Last I checked this is 2019 which means I went back 1 year to 2018 and barely scratched the surface. In fact that one wreck with the taxi happened this week. Everyone died.

In that same time BART had thousands of thefts, around a thousand robberies, hundreds of violent assaults, and around a half dozen homicides.

And how many fender benders, DUIs, random Tesla mishaps, overturned big rigs, etc. have there been in that time? How many pedestrians have been injured or killed? How many cars have been broken into or vandalized (I know property crime isn't much of an issue in San Francisco)?

Considering how much lower the ridership of BART is compared to all commuters in the bay area, those aren't great odds.

BART is the second most used transit system behind Muni. Somewhere around 500,000 daily riders versus 750,000 for Muni. That's not a particularly small proportion of commuters.

Meanwhile the Bay Area has just about the worst traffic in the nation, and somehow you want me to believe that being stuck in traffic isn't stressful? Okay then.

https://abc7news.com/traffic/bay-area-leads-nation-in-commut...

https://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2019/08/22/bay-area-commut...

Edit: Oh gosh I forgot about this

https://www.mercurynews.com/2019/07/24/daly-city-police-sear...

Or if you want to go all the way back to 2017 (5 carjackings in 2 days):

https://patch.com/california/san-francisco/5-carjackings-2-d...

And this one:

https://sfist.com/2019/09/19/carjacking-suspect-caught-richm...

But if YOU'VE never encountered this it must not happen, right?

So how many people were killed on BART today?

https://www.sfgate.com/news/bayarea/article/One-Dead-Two-Hur...

https://www.sfgate.com/news/bayarea/article/All-Sb-Lanes-Of-...

And, yes, BART serves both San Francisco and Millbrae.

I already mentioned it, but there is the concept of relative risk. There is also the concept of reference classes. Because of the way I drive and the vehicle I use, I am much less likely to die than the average bay area driver. Also, the number of people who take BART each day is much lower than the number of people who drive each day.

There are so many better counterarguments you could have put forward. Please consider that you may be mistaken. I certainly have done so. I wish that public transportation were superior, but I've discovered (and experienced) that it's not the case… at least not in the bay area.

There are people I know who will not take BART alone. I agree that the perceived safety definitely effects ridership. I can't believe this is not taken more seriously by those who wish to encourage more people to take transit! After all, subways are normally considered better than buses which really is what could be implemented more easily!

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