My daughter and her husband drove up from Los Angeles to spend Thanksgiving with me in Moraga. For our Black Friday outing to San Francisco we decided to take BART from Orinda to avoid a smash and grab incident in San Francisco. When we returned to the Orinda BART station parking lot their car had a smashed window and had been broken into, in broad daylight. The BART police came and thought perhaps they were trying to steal the car, because there was nothing inside the car before the break-in. This model of Hyundai cannot be hot-wired.
The cars in the Orinda BART parking lot are sitting ducks for this crime because no cameras are installed in the lot, probably the parking lots as well.
Our holiday ended with a bitter taste for all, especially when my daughter said they don't want to come back for Christmas. The irony is that we tried to avoid the disappointment and cost of a smashed window by taking BART.
If BART wants to increase ridership they will have to make the parking lots safer with security cameras and increased patrolling.
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