B.A.R.T, San Francisco

4 more images

The BART is one of those many world wide subway systems that does not run all night. This is always the one thing that upsets me most when I travel. But it is a decent system that they do try to expand. I don't know the latest but I can tell you that there were/are plans to complete the loop. You can travel all the way out to Danville or down to the Milpitas area. Both airports are now connected. And most lines will get you into and out of the city.

Why pay 40USD or 50USD to get to San Francisco by taxi when it will cost you much less by taking B.A.R.T or the Bay Area Rapid Transit system. You'll get there in less than half an hour and don't worry because the trains are spacious enough for your luggage. Trains do run frequently so there is no issue there. B.A.R.T travels all over the Bay area and can get you to wherever you are going.
Take the air train from whichever terminal you arrive in to the B.A.R.T station. You'll have to buy your ticket from a machine (there are no clerks you can buy your ticket from). There are price listings with the station names that show you what to pay above the machine. I paid 8.10USD per person from SFO to the Powell St. station. A return ticket cost me 16.20USD per person
You must stamp your tickets both when entering and leaving the B.A.R.T station.

3 more images

San Francisco was not as much of a pain in the you know what to drive around as most big cities but it was bad enough. Fortunately, there is a great alternative. the Bay Area Rapid Transit System (B.A.R.T.) is clean, fast and coinvenient (even though they had a breakdown on one of our trips). We rode it several times including with three young kids. They had a ball and so did I. Much less stressful than driving, cheap enough, and there was a BART Stop near our motel. I even met a nice cute girl (who was way too young for me) on one ride.

If you only plan to be in San Francisco proper then use the public transportation. The subway system is convenient when you consider that you have B.A.R.T. and Muni combined. Better than a car rental but don't expect this to be a cheap way to go.

B.A.R.T. has just enough depots. The bummer is that it doesn't loop around the whole San Francisco Bay Area. You can use CalTrain via a transfer.

Be ready to see or be approached by a number of homeless individuals. Most of them have the common sense to respect peoples' personal space. There are some that won't. Just keep on walking if you have any issues. You'll be fine.

Avoid the traffic. Use B.A.R.T. and walk a little bit too.

2 more images

As my corny title page implies, we did indeed leave (and arrive) by BART. This light rail system is by far your quickest and most economical way between downtown and San Francisco International. Depending on what terminal you arrive at, the station is just a few minutes walk or a short ride on AirTrain, the airport's free shuttle system. Here is a map with SFO BART station location:

http://www.flysfo.com/web/page/atsfo/non-flash/

Traveling from the airport, buy your ticket with cash or credit card from an automated machine at the station for (at time of this writing) $8.10 pp, one way, to stations in downtown area. Once you have your ticket, insert it in a turnstyle to access the platform and retrieve your ticket when it pops it out again - you'll need this again to exit the station at your desired location! Find the platform for the Pittsburg/Baypoint inbound line or one labeled "To San Francisco" - it should be clearly marked or ask one of the helpful people at a station kiosk. The platforms serve multiple lines so listen for audio announcements for when your specific train will be arriving. There should be others waiting for the same train so again, ask if you're not sure you have the right one.

Trains run every 15-20 minutes and it'll take about 30-35 minutes to reach one of several stations in the downtown area. When arriving at your station, exit through the turnstyles by inserting your ticket (it'll keep it this time) and take elevator, stairs or escalator to street level. If going to SFO airport from downtown, reverse the above process using Pittsburg/Baypoint/SFO outbound line. You can also access the Oakland airport via BART.

Station lists, timetables, fare finder to all BART locations in the bay area and other info can be found on BART website (below).

Still confused? Here's a nice article describing more detail on using BART (note: fares are outdated):

http://www.sftravel.com/sfo-airport-transit-bart.html

One little negative: trains do not run 24/7 so if you have a very early or very late flight, you'll need to use a different form of transportation.

San Francisco in 20km north of the SFO airport. Here’s your options:
1)take a taxi and pay a fortune
2)rent a car, get mad with the traffic and pay a fortune for a parking
3)use the shuttle bus
4)Take the BART train, which is the best option. The station is near the international terminal or take the free AirTrain first which connect all the terminals till you reach BART and take the 30’ ride to SF downtown.

BART(Bay Area Rapid Transit) is actually the subway of San Francisco but it won’t help you much inside the city. There are four different lines and most of the stations are located at the east side of the Bay. We used the yellow line from the airport to reach San Francisco downtown (an easy 30’ ride) and that’s what most of the travelers do. There are 4 train per hour (.09, .24, .39, .54), the first train departs from SFO at 4.09am and the last one 11.54pm. The first train from Powel Station to the Airport is at 6.34am and the last one 12.33am.
I didn’t see anyone selling tickets in a booth at the airport so we used the vending machine. Getting our ticket was kind of confusing but the staff at the station explained everything. Ticket fee depends of the mileage, you just select your starting and ending points, you put the money (check first the BART Fare Chart next to the screen, the fee for the central stations in SF is about $8.20 one way) and the ticket which is a card will come out. Validate your ticket and keep it till you exit the final station.
The train seemed a bit old and noisy but who really cares. From Powel station or any other central station (depending the address of your hotel) you can take the Muni buses or a cablecar.

Since there was a BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit) station just down the street from our hotel, we used it to travel from the San Francisco airport to downtown San Francisco. It was very easy to find the BART station at the airport by following the signs, and the trip to the Powell St. station (near Union Square) took about 30 minutes. Trains run roughly every 20 minutes between 6:00 am and 1:00 am. Tickets cost $8.10 each way, which is by far the cheapest option for traveling to downtown SF from the airport.

BART is San Francisco's subway, it's not as useful for getting around the city as buses, but it is an inexpensive way to get from the airport (SFO) to the city, we used it both directions. The cost for us was $8.10 each way, no savings for a round trip. The ride to the Powell Street station in Union Square was about a 1/2 hour, the airport station is reasonably well marked, you will have to take an airport transit train to get to the station.

The ticket machine was a little confusing, you need to get a ticket for $8.10 to go to the four central stations, Powell Street, Civic Center, Montgomery Street or Embarcadero, which is clearly marked on the machines but it's not a ticket option, you start at $10 and adjust to get to $8.10. Each person needs their own ticket, you can buy multiple tickets on one transaction and you can use credit, debit or cash. I didn't see any manned ticket booths at the airport but we were fine using the machines.

The train was a little grungy but we felt perfectly safe riding it in the early evening and in the afternoon when we returned.

The website below is very useful in planning your journey, you can check the station by address and then it also helps map your route from the station to your destination and also check the fare. The trains run every 15-20 minutes and shuts down at around midnight for a few hours before starting up again.