BART real-time departure screens coming

Regular BART riders know the scenario all too well: You're hustling to catch a train and hear the roar of something pulling into the station. You race down the escalator, gently elbowing people out of the way only to get to the platform and find out that it's another train; yours is running 10 minutes late.

At most BART stations, there's no video monitor or electronic sign alerting you to the next arriving trains until you reach the platform. The lone exception is the Embarcadero Station, where a handy video screen installed as an experiment two years ago displays real-time arrival messages for BART and Muni Metro trains leaving the station as well as Muni buses and streetcars departing nearby.

But at least 13 more BART stations are scheduled to get real-time train departure screens as part of an effort to overhaul signage at some of the transit system's busiest stations. And congressional funding announced last week will allow BART to outfit all of its downtown San Francisco stations with the monitors, spokeswoman Luna Salaver said.