With a tentative deal reached in the BART strike, everyone took a collective sigh of relief – but not for long.
Once BART service resumed service on Tuesday, Oct. 22 they learned the service between Lafayette and Pleasant Hill stations would be closed for several hours while the NTSB continued an accident investigation on this section of BART tracks. With less than 24 hours notice County Connection developed a plan to shuttle BART passengers between Lafayette and Pleasant Hill BART stations. At the peak, County Connection had 15 buses shuttling passengers between Lafayette, Walnut Creek and Pleasant Hill BART stations transferring up to 500 passengers every 15 minutes.
Within just a couple hours of the successful completion of this mission BART called upon County Connection to assist with another bus bridge between Orinda and Lafayette BART stations, when a fire broke out on the tracks and suspended service at the Orinda station.
“County Connection has maintained a strong working relationship with BART for many years providing bus bridges in times of need, and they know they can call on us when emergency situations such as this arise,” said Bill Churchill, County Connection’s Director of Transportation. “While these types of events usually occur without much notice, we are able to work with BART to quickly get service up and running in a smooth manner.”