SFist: Pardon Me Boy, Was that the Palo Alto Station?

sugam

Sun, 09 Jul 2006 13:23:38 -0800

Can you fix the link for "Yesterday's debate?" It seems to be linking ot another article, and I am curious what you're talking about

Jamison Wieser

Sat, 08 Jul 2006 16:19:44 -0800

Being dyslexic, I heavily depend on spell check. I often make these kind of mistakes because when it gives me the correction options I pick the one that looks right instead of spending the time to sound out every option (the only way I could real catch it). It's sometimes embarasing but at least it was good for a laugh. Back to Caltrain... Last year a coworker tried to get me to sign a petition to keep Atherton station open. When I told her no, she got upset and started on a little rant that baby bullet riders should have to pay more for faster service (yes, the riders who are cheaper to cart around and save money should have to pay to local service to a station that had only something like 100 daily boardings) A few weeks later she had changed her view when she found out driving to Redwood City meant she'd be in the next fare zone and save money. The California High Speed Rail project would bring European style intercity rail to the Bay Area, and extend Caltrain to downtown SF as a bonus, but support in the legislature is shakey at best.

David

Fri, 07 Jul 2006 18:36:01 -0800

Jamison - I assume its a typo and you meant "obvious" - this is a 10 on the unintentional comedy scale: "Local bus service is the oblivious way." And yes, some of those stations seem unnecesary if they are located in exurban areas that are not close to anything. I assume most of the riders at those stations are driving to those stations, parking their cars and commuting to SF??? In which case, they can just drive to another station. What about high-speed intercity rail, like they have in Japan or Europe? Why do we have a train that takes an hour from SF to San Jose - why can't we have a real bullet train that makes that run in half an hour? P.S. Hope I didn't offend with my "Guardianistas" crack. Its just how I roll.

Jamison

Fri, 07 Jul 2006 16:17:34 -0800

What Mike said! Seriously. The final destination is not a trains station, and those massive commuter trains are not the ideal way to provide local bus service. Local bus service is the oblivious way. Having them run as circulators between stations or to and from, whatever the ridership need is.

KWillets

Fri, 07 Jul 2006 15:59:47 -0800

I'm surprised they didn't put up a fight when the express service was introduced. It's obvious that Mountain View is going to prosper while Sunnyvale languishes -- the shopping mall there is closed, the downtown is dead, etc.

Mike

Fri, 07 Jul 2006 15:05:14 -0800

I do sympathize with those who don't use one of the major stations served by Baby Bullets. However, the Baby Bullet has saved my sanity. I am very lucky in that I ride from SF to Mountain View, so I have 5 baby bullets each direction plus 2 express trains that are almost as fast as the Baby Bullets to get me to and from work. Unfortunately for those not near a Baby Bullet station, SamTrans or VTA rarely provides a fast method of getting to where you need to go. Bicycling can certainly give one more options as to which stations to use, but it is not a solution for everyone. As one example, I know people who work for Intel have a shuttle available at Lawrence station, but very few trains stop there now and there is essentially no way to take Caltrian to Sunnyvale or Santa Clara and get back to Lawrence or to the Intel campus in a reasonable amount of time. Many Intel people have returned to driving. I actually think Caltrain was built with too many stations in the first place. (3 stations in San Mateo alone?) When the trains stop everywhere it takes 96 minutes to get from San Francisco to San Jose, and that is without any wheelchairs, signaling problems, etc. Add in the lovely Muni ride to the "conveniently" located Caltrain station and you are at 2 hours plus each way. Baby Bullet service has that down to a little over 90 minutes...significant savings of an hour a day round trip for people like me. I don't think the answer is to make Caltrain go back to mostly local service. Perhaps with some restructuring, SamTrans and VTA could provide reasonable ways of getting from the Bullet stations to the major employment centers. Maybe some of the shuttles need to serve other stations instead of the closest one.

jwb

Fri, 07 Jul 2006 14:24:00 -0800

Tip: Taking your own bicycle on the train makes Caltrain rather more useful. Many of these smaller stations make no sense. When you get out at Belmont, you are in an exurban development in walking distance of nothing. It's not like the Palo Alto or 4th & King stations where you could reasonably get off the train and walk to something of interest. And Atherton? Give me a break. That station is like 300 yards from Menlo Park, and the only reason the Atherton people can give for it is that they don't want their kids to have to walk to Menlo Park where there are "gangs", by which I assume they mean more than one Black or Latino person. Seriously.