Why Replace the Potrero Yard?
Every day (pre-COVID), 102,000 Muni customers relied on six bus routes (5 Fulton, 5 Fulton Rapid, 6 Haight/Parnassus, 14 Mission, 22 Fillmore, 30 Stockton and 49 Van Ness/Mission) that run out of Potrero Yard.
Due to the building’s age and changes in bus fleet technology, major improvements are needed to ensure the SFMTA maintains its bus fleet as efficiently as possible. Potrero Yard was built in 1915 and sits on 4.4 acres bounded by Bryant, 17th, Hampshire and Mariposa streets. The two-story structure originally operated as a streetcar facility housing 100 streetcars. It has since been expanded to hold 146 40-foot and 60-foot trolley buses.
San Francisco’s fleet of transit vehicles is the greenest in the United States, and the SFMTA is gearing up to transition to battery electric buses by 2035. The current Potrero Yard is too small to accommodate our growing fleet and too old to retrofit for new technologies. A modern bus facility means San Franciscans get better transit service.
As Muni expands service to keep up with increasing ridership, the SFMTA needs more space to park and maintain its growing fleet. Over the last several years, the SFMTA has increased service by 10% – the largest expansion since the 1970s. By 2025, Muni will operate 200 more vehicles than the nearly 1,300 transit vehicles it operates today.
Potrero Yard also does not meet modern seismic safety and maintenance standards. As a result, employees' ability to efficiently conduct their work is compromised. In the maintenance bays, the ceiling is too low to administer roof repairs indoors or lift buses to repair them from below. This slows down maintenance work, making it difficult to get buses out of the Yard and back into service. Fewer buses in service means longer waits and more crowded buses.
Potrero Yard Modernization Project: Planning History