A month after San Francisco’s Fourth of July crowds overwhelmed streets and transit near the Presidio, Outside Lands presented another test: moving 75,000 people a day through the city.

This one went considerably better.

Muni recorded more than 1.3 million passenger trips from Friday through Sunday, about 80,000 more than during an average summer weekend, according to figures provided by the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency.

Outside Lands draws 75,000 a day, announces 2027 return to San Francisco

The three routes most heavily used by Outside Lands attendees – the 5 Fulton, 5R Fulton Rapid and N Judah – carried roughly 160,400 passenger trips over the weekend, up 13% from about 142,000 during the 2025 festival.

More than 30,000 trips were taken on special service added specifically for Outside Lands.

Mayor Daniel Lurie declared the weekend a success Monday, Aug. 10, saying the festival operated at full capacity with 75,000 attendees each day and experienced “no major disruptions.”

The comparison with July Fourth is imperfect. Outside Lands has been held in Golden Gate Park for years, giving transportation agencies and festival organizers a well-established playbook.

The park is also served by several major Muni lines and can be approached from multiple directions, unlike the much more constrained Presidio area that drew more than 100,000 people for the fireworks show.

Still, the city made several deliberate changes after the July Fourth breakdown.

Muni increased N Judah service and staged extra buses after the concerts, while festival wristbands doubled as Muni passes throughout the weekend.

The city also imposed additional traffic restrictions and created zones limiting where autonomous vehicles could pick up and drop off passengers near Golden Gate Park during the busiest hours.

At least some festivalgoers noticed the difference.

One attendee writing in the Outside Lands Reddit community said they arrived Saturday on a packed but steadily moving N Judah and left around 9:45 p.m. through the North Gate.

“They had a dedicated queue to get on the 5/5R, a line of empty buses ready to go,” the poster wrote, adding that Muni employees were managing the crowds and preventing riders from rushing already full buses.

Another attendee said they saw roughly 20 buses staged and waiting Saturday night.

Experiences were not universally smooth. One person reported waiting about an hour for a 29-Sunset bus before giving up, while others described crowded N Judah trains and heavy post-concert demand.

Several commenters said their experience improved dramatically by walking farther from the park before boarding.

Waymo also said its Outside Lands operations went more smoothly than during the fireworks event.

The company told the Chronicle that it provided thousands of rides to and from the festival at designated pickup and drop-off locations without any festival-related strandings or roadside assistance recoveries.

Waymo said it used a congestion-management capability developed after July Fourth to reduce pickups and drop-offs in the busiest areas without shutting down service to the festival entirely.

There was just one reported hitch.

Waymo said an SFMTA incident commander contacted the company Friday after two vehicles were routed through 25th Avenue and Fulton Street after 8 p.m. The streets were open, and the vehicles did not impede traffic, according to Waymo, but the company said it adjusted its routing afterward and received no further escalations.

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This article originally published at After the July Fourth transit mess, did San Francisco’s Outside Lands plan work?.