BART delays rollout of 775 new cars by 1-year due to mechanical issues

SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) -- BART is delaying the rollout of hundreds of its new cars due to mechanical issues.

The rapid transit agency planned to have 775 new cars in service by 2022. But Chief Mechanical Officer Dave Hardt told the San Francisco Chronicle that it will now be the spring of 2023 before those cars come online.

BART Spokesman Christopher Filippi confirmed that information with ABC7 News on Monday.

According to the Chronicle report, BART expected its "D" cars, the ones where the operator sits, to run 6,000 hours before any sort of equipment failure that causes a delay of more than 5 minutes. However, those issues are now popping up at just 1,000 hours of service.

In his statement, Fillippi told ABC-7 news, "BART is very encouraged by the progress being made with the Fleet of the Future." He added, "By February of next year, BART anticipates having enough new cars to lengthen nearly all peak period Transbay trains to 10 cars and to remove the least reliable legacy cars from service."

Check out more stories and videos about BART.