How to Get to BACDS Dances by Public Transit

Berkeley Wednesday Contra / Berkeley Wednesday English / East Bay Friday Contra / Berkeley Saturday English / Berkeley Sunday Ceilidh / Marin Contra / Mountain View/South Bay English / Palo Alto Contra / Palo Alto English / San Francisco Contra / San Francisco English / Carpool

For those who would rather not drive, many of the BACDS dance venues are relatively easy to get to via public transit; once one sorts out some of the intricacies of the area's nine major transit systems (AC Transit, BART, CalTrain, County Connection, Golden Gate Transit, SamTrans, San Francisco Muni, Santa Clara VTA, WestCAT), public transit becomes a realistic option for those tired of gridlock.

Even with so many agencies, obtaining current transit maps and scheduling information is as simple as pointing your web browser at www.transitinfo.org or dialing TravInfo at 511 (a local call from any of the bay area's area codes). The Transitinfo website, supported by the Bay Area Transit Information Project, is an invaluable tool when it comes to sorting out the many transit options available from Stockton to the Pacific and from Santa Cruz to Santa Rosa. In fact, now they offer a special tool that lets you plan your next door-to-door transit trip, the TakeTransit Trip Planner; this tool is the first link off the Transitinfo page.

Folks who use intermodal/interagency transit on a regular basis often take advantage of a number of transit locations. For example, when going from my former place of employment in Milpitas to a NBCDS dance in Santa Rosa or Sonoma, it's not unusual for me to take an AC Transit bus to the Fremont BART station, a San Francisco train from there to the Embarcadero station in downtown San Francisco, and a ferry from the nearby Ferry Terminal to meet a carpool at Larkspur Landing. There are a number of transit hub locations throughout the bay area that are conducive to straightforward transfers. Some of these include:

• Almost every BART station. Fremont, Pleasant Valley, El Cerrito Del Norte, MacArthur, Daly City, and the four downtown San Francisco and three downtown Oakland stations are particularly good places to transfer from bus to BART.
• The Transbay Bus Terminal at Second and Mission in downtown San Francisco is a block away from the Market Street corridor, and serves as the San Francisco terminus for AC Transit, Golden Gate Transit, SamTrans, and Greyhound bus services.
• San Jose Diridon (downtown), Palo Alto, Mountain View, Redwood City, and San Francisco Fourth and King CalTrain stations all serve as excellent places to transfer from local VTA, SamTrans, and/or Muni buses and light rail.

Now that the preliminaries are out of the way, it's on to the dances. Where possible, nearby restaurants and coffeehouses for those hungry for a little something before the dance are included along with the instructions.

San Francisco Contra

BACDS's most popular dance is also one of the easiest to get to via transit; its location at 43rd Avenue and Judah Street is situated right on the Muni N-Judah [Schedule] light rail line, which connects to the downtown San Francisco BART stations and the San Francisco CalTrain station. Plan for a forty-minute journey from Embarcadero BART station, and longer if you choose to detrain at Ninth Avenue and Irving for some pre-dance nosh at one of the area's wonderful restaurants or coffeehouses.

Note that while this line runs all night, BART and CalTrain stop running at midnight. Dancers who use this route from points in the East Bay or Peninsula/South Bay will want to line up carpools back home or leave the dance before the final contra in order to ensure timely transfers, or (in the case of east bay commuters) plan on taking one of AC Transit's post-midnight buses from Transbay Terminal if you absolutely must have dinner at Pasquale's afterwards.

Berkeley Wednesday Contra and English Dances, Saturday English Dances, and Sunday English Ceilidhs

Grace North Church, in the heart of Berkeley's Gourmet Ghetto, is a short six or seven block walk from the downtown Berkeley BART station. Folks who choose this route should walk north (uphill) on Shattuck Avenue to the intersection with Cedar Street, then east (again, uphill) one block to the church. AC Transit aficionados can take the AC Transit 43 Shattuck [Schedule] line north to the corner of Cedar and Shattuck.

Food for almost any taste, ranging from McDonald's and Starbucks to the fine cuisine at Cha 'Am and Chez Panisse Cafe, as well as wonderful takeout salads and entrees at Andronico's and coffeehouses too numerous to mention are available to those who leave a little extra time for dinner.

Second-Friday East Bay Contra, El Cerrito

This dance can be reached by taking BART to the El Cerrito Plaza BART station. From there, locate the bus stop for the AC Transit 72/72M [Schedule] line, and take a northbound 72/72M to the corner of San Pablo Avenue and Moeser Lane. Once you get here, walk up Moeser in the direction of the hills; Avis is roughly ten blocks up, just past Cerrito Vista Park. When you get to Avis, turn right; Prospect Sierra School is on the far side of the park.

Folks looking for food enroute to this dance can find several restaurants within El Cerrito Plaza, at the corner of San Pablo and Fairmount. This shopping center is right across Fairmount from the BART station, and features Chinese, Italian, and other restaurants.

Palo Alto Contra and English Country Dances

The Palo Alto Masonic Temple, just north of the corner of University Avenue and Florence Street and home of the Palo Alto English dance, is a ten-minute walk from the Palo Alto CalTrain station [Schedule]. First United Methodist Church, on Hamilton Avenue (one block SE of University) between Byron and Webster and home of the Palo Alto Contra dance, is also a fifteen- to twenty-minute walk from the same station.

Note that the last San Francisco-bound CalTrain arrives at this station at roughly 10:47p, so either arranging a return carpool or overnight crash space or leaving the hall by 10:30p are a necessity. The last southbound CalTrain train arrives at just before 12a, so carpools are, again, definitely in order.

Note that CalTrain, beginning July 2002 and continuing through approximately May 2004, will not be running weekend rail service. Instead, travelers should arrange a carpool or take the Caltrain RRX Shuttle [Schedule] to Palo Alto CalTrain Station.

There are simply too many wonderful restaurants and coffeehouses located along the seven-and-one-half blocks of University between the CalTrain station and Florence to list here.

San Francisco English Dance

Bethany United Methodist Church is on Clipper near Sanchez Street. This makes it very convenient for riders of the Muni J-Church [Schedule] light rail line, which connects to the four downtown San Francisco BART stations. Take the J-Church to the corner of Church and Clipper, then walk one block east on Clipper.

Located in the no-man's-land between Bernal Heights, Noe Valley, and the lower Mission, there are several restaurants and coffeehouses within a short walk of this dance.

Mountain View/San Jose English Dance

The new Mountain View location of what used to be the San Jose English dance, at the Flex-It dance studio at 425 Evelyn Avenue, is right across Evelyn from the Mountain View CalTrain [Schedule]. /VTA Light Rail [Schedule] Station and the Castro Street culinary district.

Carpooling

While transit is often a wonderful option in terms of getting to BACDS dances, it's often not so great an option in terms of returning home from them; many local transit agencies drop their services down to next to nothing (or nothing at all) after 9p on Saturday nights. One of the great things about the BACDS roster is its breakdown of members by zip code; this makes finding someone who lives in your general vicinity to carpool with relatively straightforward. If you do carpool with others on a regular basis, helping out with fuel or bridge tolls is always appropriate.