With record ridership on BART, future looks crowded

Surging demand has BART officials talking about the need to increase its train car fleet from the current 669 to 1000 and expand capacity at its two busiest platforms, Embarcadero and Montgomery. The aim: to avoid future crowding so severe that lots of folks will turn away entirely. BART ridership is at 390,000 a day after a surge that’s three times what officials expected. Some are saying that figure will expand to 500,000 within five years, the Chronicle’s Michael Cabanatuan says.