> There's no way you can lose 60% of your customers and not have major problems.
There is a way, but (with how much they used to crow that (unlike those other big, fat, LOSER mass-transit companies in the area) 80->95% of their budget came from rider fares) the BART management pretty clearly really hates to do it: Make up the shortfall with government money.
Are they actually building housing near the new bart stations?
South Bay is doing everything it can to make sure no new houses are serviced by existing train route. They even tore out the line that ran through most of the residential areas decades ago.
That line serviced Cupertino, Saratoga, Los Gatos, the San Lorenzo Valley and Santa Cruz. It ran all the way to SF, so it must have serviced many other cities on the peninsula.
The Purple line has evolved into a financial disaster. It will be the most expensive train line ever constructed, $10 billion for a 16 mile segment.
BART ridership is 40% of what it was in 2019. There's no way you can lose 60% of your customers and not have major problems.