BART to halt S.F.-East Bay service for 5 days of track upgrades

Commuters line up to board a San Francisco train arriving at the Rockridge BART station in Oakland, Calif. on Tuesday, March 24, 2015. Ridership continues to rise on the regional transit system. Commuters line up to board a San Francisco train arriving at the Rockridge BART station in Oakland, Calif. on Tuesday, March 24, 2015. Ridership continues to rise on the regional transit system. Photo: Paul Chinn, The Chronicle Buy photo Photo: Paul Chinn, The Chronicle Image 1 of / 9 Caption Close BART to halt S.F.-East Bay service for 5 days of track upgrades 1 / 9 Back to Gallery

BART is preparing to halt all train service between San Francisco and the East Bay over the upcoming three-day Labor Day weekend — and the first weekend of August as well — for what is being billed as “critical track maintenance” near the entrance to the system’s Transbay Tube.

“We plan to have a substantial ‘bus bridge’ available for BART passengers traveling between Oakland and San Francisco” during the anticipated five days of service disruptions, BART Assistant General Manager Kerry Hamill said in a memo sent to Bay Area transportation agencies.

They are going to need it.

The system carried 98,000 passengers through the Transbay Tube on Aug. 30, 2014 — the first day of the Labor Day weekend. Ridership was almost identical on Aug. 2, 2014, a Saturday.

While the Giants will be out of town on Labor Day weekend — Sept. 5-7 — there is a Billy Joel concert scheduled at AT&T Park for that Saturday night that is expected to draw 30,000 to 40,000 fans.

But BART spokeswoman Alicia Trost said the agency has no choice but to go ahead with the unprecedented scheduled Transbay shutdown, based on safety considerations and “the amount of work that needs to take place and all the crews needed to do the work.”

Trost said that while the dates for the closure aren’t “set in stone,” BART has begun notifying transit agencies throughout the Bay Area in an effort to avoid a repeat of last month’s traffic gridlock when Highway 92 near the San Mateo Bridge was shut down while BART simultaneously halted service near the Oakland Coliseum for track work.

The planned West Oakland BART closure is the latest in a string of planned shutdowns to repair and upgrade tracks and switches across the 108-mile BART system.

The line between the Coliseum and Fruitvale stations is being closed for an unprecedented 11 weekends to replace 1,000 degraded wooden ties and 3,000 feet of worn r ail.

Trost said the West Oakland work is “at a very key spot right outside the Transbay Tube, where we need to have as much flexibility as possible for when there are delays in the tube and in downtown San Francisco.”

Trains using an elevated crossover to switch tracks at that location are being slowed to 10 mph because of safety concerns.

Bottom line, Trost said: “We need to go in and replace it.’’

BART had considered closing the West Oakland Station for a dozen or so Sundays through the remainder of the year to do the work but concluded that concentrating the job over the two late summer weekends — when ridership is lowest — would ultimately pose the least inconvenience to the public.

Privately, some Bay Area transit officials have groused that BART should have had the closure plan together sooner, but few doubt it’s the right call.

“We clearly support the decision of BART to do this,” said Randy Rentschler, a spokesman for the Metropolitan Transportation Commission.

The BART system is 43 years old and most of its tracks are reaching the end of their useful life. BART has budgeted $20 million in the next fiscal year to replace old trackway and plans to spend $30 million every year after that for the next decade.

Hot dogs and housing: No one was more surprised than the San Francisco Giants to see Supervisor Jane Kim come out swinging against the team’s planned development next to AT&T Park. After all, Kim not only voted for the plan’s initial term sheet, she also posed with team officials at its unveiling.

“We were mystified to learn of her last-minute about-face, particularly given that she endorsed and voted for the project not long ago,” said Jack Bair, the Giants’ senior vice president.

Kim said the plan doesn’t have enough affordable housing — an interesting twist because the new plan has even more affordable housing than the initial plan Kim backed.

The question is who gets to build and own the affordable housing. The Giants want to build the units on-site, as part of the overall project. Affordable housing activists, who could help Kim run for state Senate down the line, want the Giants to pay into a fund so that the nonprofits could build the housing on their own sites.

Meanwhile, Local 2 of the restaurant workers union, which could also be helpful in a Senate race, wants a guarantee from the Giants that the union contract for concessionaires at AT&T Park will be extended.

In other words, Kim, who did not return requests for comment, may be playing a bit of a leverage game here — one that mixes housing and hot dogs, with a dash of political relish.

San Francisco Chronicle columnists Phillip Matier and Andrew Ross appear Sundays, Mondays and Wednesdays. Matier can be seen on the KPIX TV morning and evening news. He can also be heard on KCBS radio Monday through Friday at 7:50 a.m. and 5:50 p.m. Got a tip? Call (415) 777-8815, or e-mail matierandross@sfchronicle.com. Twitter: @matierandross