BART Buses Fill Up Before 7 a.m. in Walnut Creek on Tuesday

by Jim Caroompas and Bay City News

Buses charters by BART to take otherwise-stranded commuters to work were full to capacity by 7 a.m. Tuesday. That left many others wondering how they were going to find their way to the office. 

Meanwhile, Walnut Creek residents are turning to new technologies to help find their way to work. 

Dan Simoes said his neighborhood is using NextDoor, a social media site, to help coordinate rides to work. 

"I gave total strangers from a nearby neighborhood a ride to Oakland Airport," he said on Monday. 
           
But other commuters have looked to the buses BART has provided since trains stopped running Monday morning because of the strike, taking commuters to and from San Francisco. Those buses ran smoothly throughout the morning on Monday, the first day of the strike.

But on Tuesday morning, BART spokesman Jim Allison said buses leaving from the El Cerrito del Norte, Walnut Creek, Dublin/Pleasanton and Fremont stations had reached capacity by 7 a.m. and no more buses would be available. 

Allison said there was still some room on buses at the West Oakland station, ready to take commuters to the Transbay Terminal in San Francisco, but those buses stopped running at 8 a.m. 

If the strike continues on Wednesday, he said, BART will work to increase its bus capacity.

Meanwhile, negotiators for the unions and BART management were scheduled to return to the table on Tuesday.