The BART contract dispute was resolved this evening, averting a threatened transit strike that would have crippled Monday morning’s commute. The two sides announced that they had reached a tentative contract agreement less than six hours before train…

Bowing to Republican pressure and an uneasy public, President Barack Obama’s administration signaled Sunday it is ready to abandon the idea of giving Americans the option of government-run insurance as part of a new health care system. Facing mounting…

Cathy Herlicy was getting desperate for a way to meet expenses after her hours as a limousine dispatcher were slashed and she couldn’t find other work. “Everything bottomed out for me, and I was having trouble making my home loan payments,” said Herlicy, 59….

An antenna connected to sensors deep within a truck’s tires relays safety information to drivers about the tires and road conditions. A shield for sensitive circuitry is more effective - and cheaper - than its predecessors. A new arrangement of wires improves…

Myanmar freed an ailing American whom it had sentenced to seven years of hard labor and handed him to an influential U.S senator on Sunday, a move that could help persuade Washington to soften its hardline policy against the military regime. Sen. Jim Webb of…

More than 2,000 firefighters had carved containment lines around half of a blaze threatening the Santa Cruz County communities of Bonny Doon and Swanton by this morning, but they were dogged by hot weather and were having trouble attacking the fire’s edge due…

A man plunged 30 feet through a rusted-out metal plate on a New York City sidewalk as he stepped outside an Off-Track Betting Parlor to smoke a cigar. Vincent Riggio was rescued by firefighters with just cuts and bruises Saturday afternoon. The 59-year-old…

A man was shot and killed in West Oakland, police said today. Wayne Griffin, 22, of Oakland was found suffering from numerous gunshot wounds on the 900 block of Willow Street at 5:40 p.m. Saturday, said Officer Jeff Thomason, Oakland police spokesman. Griffin…

Bay Area Rapid Transit union officials and BART managers suspended their talks Saturday evening - with plans to continue negotiations today to try to avert a Monday morning strike that would strand the nearly 340,000 passengers who ride the commuter train…

On a high ridge in the Mayacamas Mountains, a drill slowly bores into the earth to test a new way to generate electricity. The test, by a Bay Area company called AltaRock Energy, could give the world another source of renewable energy, a valuable weapon in…