Getting around the San Francisco Bay Area can be a challenge to anyone, recently arrived or native son. If you’ve got somewhere to go that’s too far to walk, but too expensive to take a cab (and I personally am saving my cab fare for beer money…), then public transit is your last best option. If you want to get where you’re going with the least hassle, read on.

A few basics to get you rolling:

The San Francisco Bay Area is made up of 9 counties, and all nine of them have their own public transit authorities who do a more or less competent job of administering a mass transit system.

They are:

San Francisco: MUNI

San Mateo: SamTrans

Santa Clara: VTA

Alameda: AC Transit

Contra Costa: The County Connection (and other municipal options…)

Napa: VINE (and other municipal options…)

Sonoma: Sonoma County Transit

Marin: Golden Gate Transit and Marin County Transit (and other municipal options…)

Overarching and sometimes but not always connecting these disparate systems are two commuter light rail systems, BART and Caltrain.

San Francisco is the hub of the Bay Area’s public transit network, but that doesn’t mean that every local transit system makes a direct connection with The City. Sometimes you’ll have to take a train or bus to a station somewhere else to find a local bus or light rail option that will take you to your final destination. Usually, Caltrain or BART will make up one leg of such a trip.

Despite the overwhelming number of transit agencies operating in the Bay Area, there is one very convenient location to plan your trip even if you don’t know which transit agency serves the areas you are going to and from. It’s called 511.org.

About Signs

With so much going on in Bay Area Transit, consistent signage is a bit of a pipe dream. For example, system maps each have their own special language.

The one thing that is consistent is transit authorities insistence that you pay for your ride (or else…). This leads to some creative signage. You might see this on San Francisco’s MUNI, for example:

Which of course leads us to how you pay for public transit in the Bay Area.

Buying a ride

How you pay for a ride is slightly different on each of the Bay Area’s transit services. For instance, MUNI, Caltrain, and AC Transit are all what are called “Proof of Payment” systems. That is, you can use any open door to get on (in most places), but you better have proof that you paid for your ticket, or you can be issued a fine if you are caught. Other systems, most notably BART, require a payment card in order to enter stations at all, and you must have enough credit on the card to cover your ride in order to leave again at your destination. Two common examples:

To pay for a ride on a San Francisco MUNI bus, or a streetcar stopping at an above ground station,

• Get on at the front door of the vehicle.
• Locate the fare box next to the driver.
• Insert cash or coin to the exact amount of the fare (for adults, currently $2). You won’t get any change if you insert too much.
• Take a “transfer” for proof of payment. This transfer is good for unlimited additional rides on MUNI within 90 minutes of when you first got on. Just show it to the driver of the next vehicle you want to use.

To pay for a ride on BART:

• Enter a BART Station and locate the “BART Ticket” or “Add Value” machines.

• Each BART trip has a specific price depending on the starting and ending BART stations. To find out what that price is, find the sign that says “BART Fares” usually located on the BART Tickets machine. Its in the upper right corner of this machine, but its not always right there; you may even have to find another machine that has one on it.
• You can pay a very specific price (in increments of 5 cents) for a single ride, or you can load a BART ticket with an unlimited amount of money, though much over $60 is probably unnecessary, since everyone in your group needs to have their own ticket in order to get into and out of the station platforms.
• Pay with a credit card or cash. BART Ticket machines will issue change up to $20, but beware, it always comes in coins.
• Insert the ticket into the turnstile to enter the station platform. Take your ticket back from the turnstile again to enter.
• Insert the ticket again at your destination to exit. If you had exact fare on your ticket, the turnstile keeps it. If you have additional value remaining, your card will pop out again. Take it to open the turnstile gates and exit.

How To Ride in the Bay Area

Some quick do’s and don’ts to serve as general rules of thumb when making Bay Area public transit decisions.

• Within San Francisco, Don’t take MUNI when BART will get you there. This will always save you 25 cents, and will most likely save you time.
• Don’t get stranded late at night. Most, but not all, public transit agencies have late night, or “Owl” service, which follow different routes and have very irregular schedules, than normal operation. Late night service usually begins sometime between midnight and 1 am. Plan accordingly.
• Do ask questions of bus drivers, station operators, transit police officers, and your fellow passengers if you have questions. Most people are happy to help, but unwilling to interrupt just because you’re staring blankly at the system map.
• Do use public transit to get to things like sporting events, festivals, concerts, and other crowd-attracting happenings. Parking is difficult everywhere in the Bay Area, and public transit agencies usually increase service frequency to accommodate more riders during special events.
• Don’t expect to pay the regular fare for most special event public transit service. Special 49er game express busses, for example, require a $10 roundtrip fare purchase.

Public Transit Etiquette

It is here, in the social details, where Bay Area transit systems gain a common identity. Unlike many other transit systems around the world, where the best policy is to keep your head down, avoid eye contact at all costs, and tuck your valuables into your underpants, San Francisco Bay Area transit riders generally treat each other like human beings. Some do’s and don’ts in case you’ve forgotten what that means.

• Do audibly use courtesies like “hello” and “excuse me,” rather than muttering them under your breath in fear.
• Do vacate seats near the doors when someone who could use the seat more than you gets on. This includes mothers carrying two small children, elderly people, the guy carrying all his groceries in reusable canvas bags, and the disabled.
• Do offer your seat to that woman, or man, who looks like she’s been on her feet all day.
• Do be friendly, make eye contact, and carefully strike up conversations as you might do in any other semi-awkward social situation in which you come into very close proximity with near strangers. Remember, you’ve got something in common: you’re both stuck on the bus.
• Don’t talk loudly about your latest lab results, drug habits, party plans, or anything else really, on your cell phone. A quick, quiet conversation is never frowned upon though, and texting is basically required.