The biggest BART fan in Japan flew to the Bay for a day to ride a legacy train one last time

Atsushi inside a BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit) train, surrounded by empty seats and iconic BART interior design, accompanying Japanese text detailing a visit to the 16th St. station.

A photo of a scrapbook showing Atsushi Goto on a BART train in 2001. The text reads, "Me riding the BART subway. The vibe inside the cars reminded me of an office with sofa chairs." Photos courtesy of Atsushi Goto. 

On Friday, April 19, at 3pm, Atsushi Goto’s plane touched down at San Francisco International Airport. He hastily collected his carry on, went through customs, and dashed toward the SFO BART station. A train was waiting for him on the platform.  

The last time Atsushi rode BART, the trains still had yellow carpets and fabric seats. The Fleet of the Future trains were just an idea, and the legacy fleet didn’t have that adjective attached to its name yet. Actually, at the time, the legacy fleet was only a few years older than Atsushi, then a 21-year-old university student in Japan touring the U.S. 

That was 2001. This past April marked 23 years since Atsushi last set foot on a BART train. And the trains that met him at SFO in April were not the ones he knew.  

The 24 hours that followed his touchdown were a whirlwind of a trains, buses, cable cars, and one big party for a bunch of old trains at MacArthur Station – BART’s retirement celebration for the legacy trains. On the night of Saturday, April 20, just over a day after arriving, Atsushi was on a plane again, headed back home to Japan. Atsushi is an automobile designer, and on Monday, he had work. 

Atsushi poses with the nose of a legacy BART train

Atsushi poses with the train cab cutout at the legacy retirement ceremony on Saturday, April, 20, 2024. Photo courtesy of Atsushi Goto. 

“I feared this was my last chance to see these trains. I could not wait any longer,” Atsushi said, speaking on a videocall from Japan. He’d never intended for his return to the Bay Area to take so many years, but between work and his other adult responsibilities, it just happened that way. 

Atsushi had heard rumblings of a BART legacy fleet retirement party and final ride from rail fans online, so every single day, he checked BART’s X account to see if the event information had been posted. He immediately started looking for plane tickets. A few weeks before, it finally appeared on his feed. Just a few days later Atsushi booked his ticket. Due to his work schedule, he could only get away for the weekend.  

He has no regrets. His final ride on the legacy fleet was everything he dreamed it would be.  

“It was unforgettable, a wish come true,” he said.  

On his last ride, Atsushi took tons of photos, celebrated with fellow rail fans, and reflected on the 23-year-long ride that took him from his first spin on an original BART train to his final one that day. Before the train returned to the yard from Fremont Station, Atsushi said, “I touched the train to thank it for its many years of service.”  

Atsushi holding a blue number plate with the number 1275X, smiling, standing against a speckled beige wall.

Atsushi Goto pictured with one of his legacy car number plates back home in Japan. Photo courtesy of Atsushi Goto. 

BART Communications learned about Atsushi and his love of BART from Customer Services Assistant Nathan Nguyen. Nathan’s the kind of guy who’ll go out of his way to help a customer, even if that customer lives in a different time zone halfway around the world.  

Before he learned about the legacy retirement event, Atsushi was desperate to get his hands on some legacy car number plates. There’s no international shipping option on Railgoods.com, where you purchase the quick-to-sellout plates, but Nathan made it happen just for him. The cost of shipping was as much as the plates themselves, but Atsushi wanted them nonetheless.  

“As I got to know Atsushi communicating through email and learning the love he has for BART, I made it my mission to get these plates to him in Japan," said Nathan. "Atsushi is a very genuine guy, and the love he has for BART is overwhelming!” 

An image of a Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) train car and station, featuring a scrapbook page with a photo of a person sitting inside a BART train, and an adjacent photo showing a BART train at the station, accompanied by a BART ticket with instructions in English and Japanese.

A photo of the full scrapbook page with photos Atsushi took in 2001 and the BART ticket he used. Courtesy Atsushi Goto. 

Atsushi has a page in an old scrapbook commemorating his first BART ride. There’s a photo of himself at 16th St. Mission Station. He’s 21, and the ends of his hair are bleached like a true 90s kid. Below the photo, Atsushi pasted his first BART ticket. The text reads on the page reads: “I took the BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit). The interior of the train felt like an office sofa. It was luxurious and modern.” 

Atsushi had wanted to visit San Francisco since he was a child. His mother used to read to him from the 1950s-era children’s book “Maybelle the Cable Car” by Virginia Lee Burton, translated into Japanese from the original English.  

Illustration of a whimsical San Francisco scene featuring a cable car with a face, named Maybelle, traveling on the tracks through a bustling street. The city's skyline and the Golden Gate Bridge are depicted in the background. There are people around, possibly waiting or going about their day. Text in the image reads: "Maybelle was a cable car, a San Francisco cable car. Cling clang... Cling clang, Up and down and around she went.

A snapshot of the opening lines of “Maybelle the Cable Car” (Copyright Houghton Mifflin).  

“Maybelle was a cable car / a San Francisco cable car / Cling clang . . . clingety clang / Up and down and around she went,” the the classic story begins.  

“I was really surprised by the angle of that hill,” Atsushi said.  

When he finally made it to the U.S. in 2001, Atsushi felt like he was on a movie set.  

“I really like America because as a child, I’d often see American movies on tv, like “Speed” and “Top Gun” with Tom Cruise,” he said. He’s also a big fan of American hard rock, including Guns N’ Roses and Aerosmith. 

A person sitting in a bus, comfortably sprawled across two seats. They are wearing sunglasses, a red shirt, and are holding onto a bag strapped across their body. The bus interior is visible with empty seats and signs above the windows showing various symbols, including no smoking and a wheelchair access symbol. The bus number "8042" is displayed at the front. The image also includes the date "01 8 11" in the lower right corner.

Atsushi on a Muni bus in 2001. The 8042 bus was retired in 2016. Photo courtesy of Atsushi Goto. 

During his visit, he traveled west to east, stopping in cities along the way, including Los Angeles, Chicago, Detroit, Washington D.C., New York City, and Dallas. The Bay Area was one of his favorite places, and he spent lots of time riding its many forms of transit.  

“The great thing about the Bay Area’s transportation system is that it combines modern and traditional elements and together, they function as a means of daily transportation,” he said. “For example, on the one hand there are advanced systems like BART and Muni, on the other hand, there are cable cars and the Muni F line. It’s fascinating and wonderful.” 

A train parked at a platform in Tokyo, displaying its distinctive teal and green livery and logo.

A Tokyo Metro Series 6000 train. Photo by Atsushi Goto. 

BART’s “sofa-like spacious seats and seamless exterior” made him feel as if he were riding in a vehicle from the future. The cars’ exterior design was quite unlike the trains in Japan, where most of the trains are square and boxy, Atsushi said. He noted that the BART trains influenced the design of the cab on the Tokyo Metro Series 6000 trains, which he used to ride to get to school in Tokyo. He felt a strong sense of familiarity, communion even, with the BART trains off the bat.  

“The legacy train’s design is so simple and iconic a child can easily draw it. With its round headlights and large windows, the design is still fresh even 50 years after its introduction,” he added.  

He also thought the stations were cool thanks to their modern architecture, red electronic display boards, and the hip BART logo and color scheme.  

Atsushi sitting at a seafood stall with multiple crabs on display in front of them, wearing a red Adidas sweatshirt and a black shoulder bag, enjoying a meal from two small bowls. Visible date stamp "01 8 9.

Atsushi eats clam chowder at a stand in San Francisco during his visit in 2001. Photo courtesy Atsushi Goto.

On his second visit to the Bay Area so many years later, Atsushi said his heart leapt when he came face to face with a BART train at SFO Station. He said his first ride on the new trains was “very comfortable,” and he appreciated the “sloping cross section and color scheme of the cars," which reminded him of the original cars. He also liked how the colors of the train “really match the beautiful Bay Area scenery.” 

After dropping his bag at his hotel in downtown San Francisco, Atsushi hopped on a cable car on Market Street and rode it to Fisherman’s Wharf. After dining on some clam chowder on the waterfront, Atsushi rode back to his hotel on the F Market and Wharves Line, a heritage streetcar service that uses legacy equipment from retired fleets from San Francisco and abroad.  

Interior of a legacy train with passengers seated and standing, holding onto overhead handles. Windows show buildings outside.

Scenes from the legacy train retirement event on Saturday, April 20, 2024. Photo by Atsushi Goto.

Saturday morning, he rode BART to Fruitvale Station because he got a tip that the legacy trains would be passing through the station on their way to MacArthur for the ceremony. He met another rail fan waiting for the train, too, and so they hung out and chatted while they waited.  

Then, at last, he rode to MacArthur and basked in the atmosphere generated by thousands of rail fans celebrating BART and its historic trains.  

A legacy BART train on the track with green hills behind it

A legacy train on the tracks during the legacy train retirement event on Saturday, April 20, 2024. Photo by Atsushi Goto.

On the train, he said the scene on the train was very lively and fun.  

“It was a wonderful experience to sit in a spacious seat and ride while looking out at the Bay Area,” he added.  

After the train pulled into its final stop – Fremont Station – Atsushi waited on the platform with dozens of other rail fans to see the trains off to the yard.  

Once the train sailed away, Atsushi had one more rail system to ride. His rail fan friend at Fruitvale told him about Caltrain’s Nippon Sharyo cars, which are being retired. So, Atsushi dashed back to San Francisco, caught one of the double-decker, Japanese-made beauties, and rode it a few stops. Then, it was back on BART to SFO and a long plane ride back home.  

Atsushi said he won’t let so much time pass between now and his next visit to the Bay. He admits he should have come back sooner, but when he started working after graduation, it became difficult to take long holidays.  

“I would definitely like to visit again,” he said. But he’s going to wait until the Western Railway Museum opens it BART museum with its three legacy train cars.  

Atsushi sits on a concrete ledge with a panoramic view of the San Francisco skyline and bay in the background, on a sunny day.

 

A Timeline of Atsushi’s Whirlwind Visit to the Bay Area 

9pm JST, Friday, April 19: Atsushi Goto’s plane departs Narita Airport in Tokyo. 

3pm PDT, Friday, April 19: Atsushi touches down at San Francisco International Airport.  

5pm PDT, Friday, April 19: Atsushi takes BART from SFO to Downtown San Francisco and walks to his hotel by Civic Center/ UN Plaza. 

7pm PDT, Friday, April 19: Atsushi catches the cable car on Market Street to Fisherman’s Wharf.  

9pm PDT, Friday, April 19: Atsushi rides the Muni F train back to downtown. 

11am PDT, Saturday, April 20: Atsushi photographs a legacy train passing through Fruitvale Station as it heads to MacArthur for the celebration. 

1pm PDT, Saturday, April 20: Atsushi attends the legacy train retirement ceremony at MacArthur Station and queues to board the last train. 

2pm PDT, Saturday, April 20: Atsushi rides the last legacy train to depart MacArthur, then sees it off as it returns to the yard.  

7pm PDT, Saturday, April 20: Atsushi arrives at Caltrain station and boards the Nippon Sharyo double-decker train. 

 9pm PDT, Saturday, April 20: Atsushi takes BART from Civic Center to SFO.  

1am PDT, Sunday, April 22: Atsushi’s flight to Tokyo departs San Francisco. 

5am JST, Sunday, April 22: Atsushi’s flight lands at Tokyo Haneda International Airport.