BART reopened restrooms at its Powell Street Station in downtown San Francisco February 2. The restrooms at all of BART's underground stations have been closed since shortly after the 9/11 terrorist attacks in 2001. From left, lesbian BART President Rebecca Saltzman, BART Director John McPartland, gay state Senator Scott Wiener, BART General Manager Bob Powers, gay BART Director Bevan Dufty, and queer BART Vice President Janice Li marked the event with toilet paper ribbon cutting. (Gay activist Michael Petrelis was also on hand. Dufty said that Petrelis attended because he campaigned on reopening the restrooms when he ran against Dufty in 2016 and 2020. Petrelis was positioned away from Wiener, whom he took a photo of in a City Hall restroom back in 2012 without his permission. Petrelis pleaded no contest to a misdemeanor and was temporarily ordered to stay away from Wiener, who was then on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors.)
In a tweet, Saltzman wrote that the restrooms at Oakland's 19th Street Station will reopen February 25, followed by those at the Lake Merritt Station in Oakland and Montgomery Station in San Francisco later this year. Restrooms at Embarcadero are slated to reopen in 2023.
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