During this year's Labor Day weekend the Bay Bridge is scheduled to close Thursday August 3rd through Tuesday August 8th 2009. During the closure a section of the Bay Bridge east of the Yerba Buena Island Tunnel will be connected to the bridge as a temporary detour. The San Francisco Municpal Transportation Agency has been diligently working with Caltrans to increase public awareness through the distribution on Muni customer information cards, advertising on radio and television, posting electronic signage throughout the city and sending email notices to over 25,000 addresses and websites.
Although the closure will affect vehicle traffic traveling to and from the East Bay there are many alternate driving routes and extended BART schedules during the closure. Drivers can alternate their route by using the Golden Gate Bridge, Richmond-San Rafael Bridge, San Mateo-Hayward Bridge or the Dumbarton Bridge. BART service will be extended to special hourly overnight schedules to 14 stations as well as adding more trains to most of the routes. The Muni Owl service will continue to run from 1:00 until 5:00 am at 30 minute intervals on most transit lines. Along with the extended service of BART and Muni the Bay Area ferries and AC Transit will also be extending operation hours and adjusting the frequency of routes to compensate for the large amount of people expected to travel using public transit this weekend.
Labor Day weekend is a popular tourist weekend in San Francisco and although the Bay Bridge closure is expected to affect vehicle traffic most tourists are still planning on traveling to the city. Tour companies such as Extranomical Adventures will operate all Bay Area tours as usual throughout the holiday weekend. Due to the bridge closure Extranomical Adventures won't be picking up in Oakland and encourage the utilization of BART into San Francisco for pick up instead. For more information regarding the Bay Bridge closure please visit www.511.org or www.baybridgeinfo.org.
