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Comment by namesbc | Hacker News Reader

I ride public transit everyday. You are way safer on BART than you are in a car on the freeway. Your fear mongering is just not based in reality.

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My public transit experience is mostly DC and New York. The few times I've ridden BART, cleanliness was nonexistent (fabric seats were not the best design choice!) and safety was at best questionable. Some examples from the news:

https://www.kron4.com/news/bay-area/asian-woman-attacked-on-...

https://www.cbsnews.com/sanfrancisco/news/drug-users-san-fra...

https://abc7news.com/bart-robberies-teens-rob-oakland-train-...

The chance of an incident on any given day is low, but palpable. When it happens to somenone else, it happens right in your face with no physical separation. Maybe that's why many choose to drive instead, despite the higher actual risk of accident per mile. That in itself is a tragedy, but people want the perception of safety just as much as safety by-the-numbers. Hygiene and comfort matter too.

>cleanliness was nonexistent (fabric seats were not the best design choice!)

I'm a New Yorker and before you say you think I want to do away with cars, I think the ideal is a combination of mass transit and private vehicle ownership if you need it. That being said, my mind is always amazed at how clean and well maintained the DC Metro seems to remain. The cars have cloth seats! But the trains are always clean! New Yorkers were so surprised in 2020 when city subway stations got regular bleachdowns. It humors me to no end.

I love the DC Metro for all the reasons you list. That's what made its recent missteps all the more frustrating. The Yellow Line which serves Reagan National Airport will shut down for maintenance soon for eight (8!) months, even after it was shut down all summer in 2019. Meanwhile, the new 7000 series cars continue to have serious safety problems, which are not well-understood but may be inherent to their design. They've just recently been brought back into service following a serious derailment last year.

This is to say nothing of the dysfunction and alleged racism in the WMATA union, or public safety on the trains, which while generally still good has lately deteriorated. Masking was never enforced during the height of COVID. Buses are and have always been worse. I hate driving in the DC area, but Metro seems like they're doing their very best to keep me on the road.

"Unsuck DC Metro" used to be my go-to source for Metro reporting. Sadly, the man behind that account passed away last week:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/obituaries/2022/07/19/matt-hi...

The fabric seats on BART were all replaced with vinyl several years ago.

Thank goodness! It was so nasty the last time I rode it in 2016 or so, urine barf soaked seats don't smell too appetizing.

kids are much safer in school than they are in a car or at home, yet parents are incredibly fearful of school shootings.

What makes people afraid is driven by the media, not by statistics.

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