This month, BART and Caltrain are restoring service from pandemic cuts, but the restored service patterns add lag and strangeness to the connection at Millbrae during nights and weekends.

During the peak and mid-day, connections at Millbrae will be no longer than 14 minutes. In weekday evenings, though, wait times will be up to 24 minutes, on Saturday a few connections will have a 26 minute wait, and on Sunday, wait times will range between 17 and 29 minutes.

The awkward connections are partly due to BART going back to running more frequent service than Caltrain offpeak – but also because of BART’s service pattern shifts in the evening, and because of maintenance and construction schedules on both lines that interact badly to cause irregular and longer waits.

During the pandemic, agencies started working together better than before to try and make connections even as service was reduced. But apparently the construction schedules were made in the bad old days before making the connection was seen as a priority.

Both agencies say that they are working to improve the connection. In response to a board meeting comment by your blogger, a report on the connection will be brought in the General Manager’s report at the request of board members. The next scheduled board meeting is 8/26 (the 8/12 meeting is cancelled).

BART returned to nearly pre-pandemic service on August 2 (service still ends early on Sunday night), and Caltrain will bring back even more trains than pre-pandemic, including baby bullets and more mid-day and evening service.

Caltrain has a web page explaining the Millbrae connection during August, when BART has restored frequent service and Caltrain is still running pandemic service, and Caltrain plans to provide more communication for riders about the odd Millbrae pattern.

Communication telling riders what to expect – including signs at the station – will be welcome, but fixing the connection would be better.