BART halted some of its Red Line service again midday Monday as a precaution following a weekend fire in the East Bay, that BART says was touched off by a ground fault in an underground electrical equipment room in downtown Oakland.
Smoke from the fire, which began at 5:20 p.m. Saturday inside BART’s traction power substation area at 11th and Broadway, was spotted by crews responding to a nearby medical emergency, said Oakland fire spokesman Michael Hunt. No one was injured as 50 firefighters assisted evacuating some 300 passengers from two trains.
On Monday, BART temporarily halted Red Line service between Richmond and Millbrae as a “precaution,” said Anna Duckworth, BART spokesperson. Passengers had to transfer at MacArthur station to board another train to get to San Francisco and Millbrae, she said.
The weekend fire occurred as BART was doing work to replace the 34,500-volt electrical cable that feeds the system in the Oakland area. That cable has been in service for more than five decades and BART says the upgrade – paid for by Measure RR bond funds – will preserve safety and allow for system expansion.
But BART officials have yet to say whether the fire was connected to the ongoing work, which is being done on weekends and nights and is expected to continue until next year.
BART has had a history of problems with its traction power substations. The stations rely on transformers to convert 34,500-volt alternating current from PG&E to the 1,000 volt direct current its trains operate on.
In 2017, a fire at the Walnut Creek traction power station caused massive damage to the station and one of the transformers.
A portable system is still handling the transformer function at Walnut Creek as work has just started on a permanent traction power system at the site. The hope is to shift the portable transformer in service there to other locations as substations are upgraded across BART’s system.
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