BART Says Aging Infrastructure to Blame for Substation Fire, Days of Delays
A BART substation fire that snarled commutes and disrupted airport service and travel across the Bay Area this week was caused by aging infrastructure that had been previously shortlisted for repairs, agency officials said Thursday.
The fire is one of several equipment issues the agency has faced since Tuesday, resulting in major setbacks for riders and the periodic suspension of service on multiple lines.
“I want to apologize to our riders, who’ve had some really terrible experiences over the last 48 hours,” BART Board of Directors Vice President Edward Wright said at a board meeting on Thursday. “I’ve certainly heard from a lot of folks who missed flights, who missed appointments, who were late to work.”
BART Assistant General Manager Sylvia Lamb told board members that crews assessing damage from Tuesday’s fire found a faulty cable on an aerial structure which caused a main breaker to short, sparking a fire in a piece of electrical equipment in the substation near the agency’s Daly City station.
Because all but one of the agency’s five lines converge at Daly City station, Lamb said it’s “impactful” when service is interrupted in that area specifically.
Lamb said both the substation where the fire occurred and the faulty cable that failed were “original” to when the agency’s “W Line” was put in — making the substation at least 40 years old and the cable at least 30, according to Alicia Trost, a BART spokesperson.
Lamb said the substation was previously identified as one of the “top five” to be replaced, out of the system’s 74 substations, 70% of which are original.
“ This is a very clear failure that is due to aging equipment,” Lamb said.
In the midst of a three-day heat wave, riders were forced to alter their commute early Thursday morning when the agency announced it had suspended service on its Green line, providing service between Daly City and Berryessa stations, as crews worked to repair train control equipment damaged by the fire.
The fire and fallout were just some of the problems BART faced since Tuesday night. Lamb said an HVAC failure in a train control room, likely caused by the current regional heat wave, also caused delays in the Daly City area earlier on Tuesday, and that the fire and the HVAC failure did not appear to be related. Lamb said the agency had placed a 2-ton portable air conditioning unit in the room while it waited for repairs in the meantime.
The agency also halted all train service between San Bruno and Colma stations for several hours on Thursday morning — impacting service to San Francisco International Airport — due to a “train control issue.”
The substation fire led BART’s Board of Directors to question how the agency prioritizes replacing its aging infrastructure. Lamb said substation repairs cost between $3 million and $5 million, and replacing one costs $60 million. She said the agency currently has funding to replace only one, but that the fire has led her team to put the Daly City substation next on the list.
“ What will not be done in response to us putting this at the top of the list? What other risks are we now creating that we were previously able to address?” Wright said.
Lamb said the agency constantly prioritizes what infrastructure to replace based on risk analyses, and that it would seek additional funding and grants to do that.