A woman trying to dodge the fare at a San Francisco BART station ended up trapped beneath one of the transit system’s new fare gates in a bizarre scene caught on video that has since gone viral.
The clip, shared by the Instagram account @bartactivities, shows the woman lying face down on the floor after apparently becoming wedged beneath the newly installed gate, unable to free herself.
“This is terrible,” the person filming, who appears to be a BART employee, says in the video.
“We can’t even open it without harming you now,” the employee adds as the woman remains pinned beneath the barrier.
Another BART agent can also be heard telling the woman, “You could have just asked us,” suggesting that staff may have allowed her through had she been unable to pay the fare, rather than trying to evade it.
The incident appears to have occurred at either Powell Street or Montgomery Street Station, according to the SFist.
“I hope she wasn’t hurt and I hope she received a nice ticket to pay for fare evasion,” BART Director Liz Ames told NBC.
Ames said BART’s new fare gates have helped increase revenue while dramatically reducing fare evasion and crime.
She added that revenue is up by about $10 million, meaning the agency’s $90 million investment in the gates could pay for itself in less than a decade if that trend continues.
Former BART director Debora Allen also praised the project: “I think it’s great. I think it’s the best thing we’ve done at BART in many, probably decades,” she said.
The full-height gates are part of BART’s four-year, $90 million effort to make fare evasion significantly more difficult after years of riders jumping or slipping through older barriers.
While some fare evaders are still testing their luck, the viral video is a reminder for anyone tempted to slip past the toll.
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