BART claims it wants to be transparent about public safety.

But have you tried to look at BART’s crime reports? First, you have to find them — and that’s no easy task online.

Or at least, it wasn’t easy until now, thanks to BART rider Ben Friedland.

While riding BART, Friedland built a simple website to track crimes that happen on BART. And, appropriately, the address is bartcrimes.com.

The reports are pulled directly from public information provided by BART — the same public information that’s challenging for the public to access. Because Friedland feels BART intentionally makes it inconvenient to access crime logs, he wrote software that removes all barriers to the information.

“I don’t think people need to be shielded from information in order to shape their opinion,” Friedland told me. “It’s better to have the information than to hide it.”

BART officials say crime rates remain low. But according to data requested by The Chronicle after a mob robbery in April, figures showed a 45 percent increase in robberies aboard BART trains in its stations during the first quarter of the year.

I’ve spoken to BART riders in recent weeks who say they’ve feared for their safety. They have a right to know what’s happening on trains and around BART stations.

Knowledge is power.

That’s why the June decision by BART Police Chief Carlos Rojas to eliminate a daily police log that detailed criminal incidents was baffling. The replacement was a website that offered users information on the type of crime, date, time and location. It was time-consuming to use and not the best way to get the info to the public.

After weeks of criticism, the daily crime log was reinstated in July. Of course the problem with the crime log is that many people don’t know how to find it. That’s because you have to subscribe to it — and BART doesn’t make it easy to sign up for the subscription.

Friedland’s software scrapes BART’s crime log, which is emailed to subscribers, and publishes the information on the website. That means anytime BART adds to its crime log, which sometimes happens more than once a day, the report is automatically uploaded to bartcrimes.com. And you don’t have to be a subscriber to get access to the information.

To see how hard it was to get on the email list, I scoured BART’s website for a registration link. When I didn’t find one, I sent a text to BART spokeswoman Alicia Trost for help. In less than two minutes, she sent me a link. And two minutes later, an email from BART confirmed my subscription.

And less than an hour later, I received my first update: A 56-year-old male acting suspiciously at the San Leandro BART Station had an outstanding felony warrant issued by the Napa County Sheriff's Office. The man was arrested by BART police and taken to the Santa Rita Jail.

Of course not everyone can simply text a BART spokesperson for help. Friedland, 38, told me he got his link on Reddit, a hub for online communities.

Friedland, a software developer at NerdWallet, a personal finance website, lives in Fremont with his wife and four dogs. It took him four BART rides — two round-trip commutes from the Fremont BART Station to Civic Center Station — to code the website.

Bartcrimes.com launched July 18, and it’s become an arresting, daily read for me.

I wasn’t surprised to see that BART parking lots remain playgrounds for smash-and-grab thieves. But I was surprised to see how many fare cheats BART catches each week. People who hop turnstiles cost the system up to $25 million per year. And when caught, it turns out that many have outstanding warrants.

Yes, certain crimes like robberies have increased, but Friedland’s website reveals that for a system that has 400,000 daily riders, there’s only a handful of daily police incidents.

Friedland told me he wants to start a dialogue about BART safety, and he hopes that by posting the crime logs, he will prompt people who ride BART to engage in the comments section.

“I just want somewhere where people can share their opinions,” he said. “I think that the more that we do that, the better luck we’re going to have. It’s kind of a fight we all have to fight together.”

San Francisco Chronicle columnist Otis R. Taylor Jr. appears Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. Email: otaylor@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @otisrtaylorjr