Negotiations will resume at 10 a.m. Union representatives said elected BART board members are actively involved in negotiations and BART's general manager is expected to sit down at the bargaining table today. Last night, BART management said they had a new proposal, but union leaders weren't ready for it yet.
If there is a strike, 200,000 people who normally use BART will be left in the lurch. BART will be running buses 5-8 a.m. from nine East Bay stations: El Cerrito, Concord, Walnut Creek, Lafayette, West Oakland, San Leandro, Hayward, Dublin-Pleasanton and Fremont. Return service from San Francisco will be from 3-7 p.m., but riders will need a round trip ticket.
There is also the San Francisco Bay Ferry. On any given weekday, they transport about 6,000 passengers. During the last BART strike in July, nearly 20,000 people used their services.
"We believe we can do that again," spokesperson Ernest Sanchez said. "We have 12 vessels in service if there is a BART strike, two of them are on loan from Golden Gate Ferry Service, so we think we can serve the same number of people we did last time."
Ridesharing services like Lyft and Sidecar are also expecting to see an increase in riders in the event of a strike.
The last strike lasted four and a half days and cost the Bay Area an estimated $73 million in lost productivity, according to the Bay Area Council. But that was during a holiday week when many people were out of town or taking time off.
ABC7 News reporters Nick Smith, Matt Keller, Heather Ishimaru, Laura Anthony and Jonathan Bloom contributed to this report.
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