7 ms·

< 15 minutes to downtown SF on BART, nearly the same drive if you're going off-peak.

tingletech 13y ago
It is actually faster to get to downtown SF from downtown OAK on BART than it is to get to downtown SF from the Sunset, Richmond, or even lower Haight on Muni.
- zaidos 13y ago
  This is very true. I live in inland east bay (Walnut Creek) and my BART commute is still a few minutes shorter than my MUNI commute from when I was living in the Outer Richmond district.
  - codex_irl 13y ago
    I cannot figure out why more startups are not based in Walnut Creek - lots of office space, a great downtown & there are two BART stations within 5 mins + the contra costa transit center.
- radley 13y ago
  During non-peak hours. In contrast, it will take an hour or longer to drive over on a weekend afternoons.
  - tingletech 13y ago
    I said BART. BART is even faster from Oakland during peak hours because there is less time between trains. I gave away my car when I lived in lower Haight because I had no place to park.
graue 13y ago
However I hear that because BART shuts down early every night, you can't go to a nightclub, or even out to dinner, or work late(!) on the other bay, because once BART's closed, you're out of luck. No bike or pedestrian access on the bridges. Is this true in practice? How big of a hassle is it if you don't have a car (and don't want to spring for an expensive taxi/Uber ride)? (This reputation is a big reason why I don't want to ever move to the Bay Area. I currently live in Brooklyn, and can easily get home from Manhattan in 20 minutes... at 3am if I want to. In Cambridge/Boston the T shuts down, but not until around midnight and you can still bike or walk.) (Edit: I was misinformed. I'd heard the BART shuts down at around 10pm, but it seems it's actually more like midnight, similar to the Boston area, and I didn't know there were all-night buses providing service between SF and Oakland when BART is closed.)
- fourstar 13y ago
  You could absolutely work late (not sure why you'd want to be at the office past 12, but whatever), The new eastern span of the bridge that went up put a pedestrian/bike lane on one side of the bridge, although it only goes to Treasure Island. The long term plan (apparently, which is a surprise to the taxpayers) is to put a connecting version of it on the western span, but it'll be about 500 million bucks and who knows how long. I've been to Brooklyn. It's what I liked most about visiting my sister in NYC, to be honest. It's the total beta city and Manhattan is the alpha. Oakland is the beta here, and obviously the alpha is SF. You could take the all nighter AC transit bus (get a clipper card) http://transit.511.org/accessible/schedules/routeinfo.aspx?cid=AD&rted=800 http://transit.511.org/accessible/schedules/routeinfo.aspx?c... which runs from SF to the east bay.
  - graue 13y ago
    Nice. It looks like I was misinformed, and I now have much less reason to avoid the Bay Area. Thanks for clarifying. Though biking a 5 mile long bridge with no bike lane on half of it sounds terrifying, so I'd probably consider it still not bikeable for now.
- wildgift 13y ago
  There's a thing called a bus. Who the hell wants to bike across the Bay Bridge?
  - steveklabnik 13y ago
    There are actually bike tour rental things expressly for biking across the bridge, its their advertising.
    - satyap 13y ago
      That's the Golden Gate Bridge, which is shorter and has ped/bike lanes (separate from traffic, IIRC). The Bay Bridge's western span has no such thing.
- 13y ago

It is actually faster to get to downtown SF from downtown OAK on BART than it is to get to downtown SF from the Sunset, Richmond, or even lower Haight on Muni.

zaidos 13y ago
This is very true. I live in inland east bay (Walnut Creek) and my BART commute is still a few minutes shorter than my MUNI commute from when I was living in the Outer Richmond district.
- codex_irl 13y ago
  I cannot figure out why more startups are not based in Walnut Creek - lots of office space, a great downtown & there are two BART stations within 5 mins + the contra costa transit center.
radley 13y ago
During non-peak hours. In contrast, it will take an hour or longer to drive over on a weekend afternoons.
- tingletech 13y ago
  I said BART. BART is even faster from Oakland during peak hours because there is less time between trains. I gave away my car when I lived in lower Haight because I had no place to park.

graue 13y ago

However I hear that because BART shuts down early every night, you can't go to a nightclub, or even out to dinner, or work late(!) on the other bay, because once BART's closed, you're out of luck. No bike or pedestrian access on the bridges. Is this true in practice? How big of a hassle is it if you don't have a car (and don't want to spring for an expensive taxi/Uber ride)? (This reputation is a big reason why I don't want to ever move to the Bay Area. I currently live in Brooklyn, and can easily get home from Manhattan in 20 minutes... at 3am if I want to. In Cambridge/Boston the T shuts down, but not until around midnight and you can still bike or walk.) (Edit: I was misinformed. I'd heard the BART shuts down at around 10pm, but it seems it's actually more like midnight, similar to the Boston area, and I didn't know there were all-night buses providing service between SF and Oakland when BART is closed.)

fourstar 13y ago
You could absolutely work late (not sure why you'd want to be at the office past 12, but whatever), The new eastern span of the bridge that went up put a pedestrian/bike lane on one side of the bridge, although it only goes to Treasure Island. The long term plan (apparently, which is a surprise to the taxpayers) is to put a connecting version of it on the western span, but it'll be about 500 million bucks and who knows how long. I've been to Brooklyn. It's what I liked most about visiting my sister in NYC, to be honest. It's the total beta city and Manhattan is the alpha. Oakland is the beta here, and obviously the alpha is SF. You could take the all nighter AC transit bus (get a clipper card) http://transit.511.org/accessible/schedules/routeinfo.aspx?cid=AD&rted=800 http://transit.511.org/accessible/schedules/routeinfo.aspx?c... which runs from SF to the east bay.
- graue 13y ago
  Nice. It looks like I was misinformed, and I now have much less reason to avoid the Bay Area. Thanks for clarifying. Though biking a 5 mile long bridge with no bike lane on half of it sounds terrifying, so I'd probably consider it still not bikeable for now.
wildgift 13y ago
There's a thing called a bus. Who the hell wants to bike across the Bay Bridge?
- steveklabnik 13y ago
  There are actually bike tour rental things expressly for biking across the bridge, its their advertising.
  - satyap 13y ago
    That's the Golden Gate Bridge, which is shorter and has ped/bike lanes (separate from traffic, IIRC). The Bay Bridge's western span has no such thing.
13y ago