A proposed development so massive that Caltrain seems afraid to show people, just yet, how big the buildings would be, gets a few more renderings this week, as the transit agency submits its application for the 20-acre Railyards redevelopment project.

The roots of the project already date back almost two decades, when SPUR presented a think piece about the potential for developing on top of the massive Caltrain railyards that sit between SoMa and Mission Bay into housing — something late Mayor Ed Lee would also float during his tenure. Developer Prologis, which owned the railyards property then and still does, has now submitted an application to the city imagining a development timeline of 15 to 20 years, as the Chronicle reports.

The first phase of the development would include a "world-class" transit station at 4th and King streets with an 850-square-foot tower above it, according to published plans. Several other towers stepping down in height would later join it, and the Chronicle notes that one tower of unclear height would be at 7th and King streets.

A component of the eventual development would be moving Caltrain's tracks underground — and with that comes a connection to the still unfunded Portal project, formerly DTX or the downtown underground extension of the tracks that will ultimately bring them, and the still hypothetical high-speed rail, under Second Street and into Salesforce Transit Center, where an underground concrete box awaits their arrival.

But, Prologis says, the Railyards project can get underway with or without the Portal, because that can just be added on later. (Though it would seem like doing all that digging at once would make more sense? Suffice it to say, for anyone who lives in the area, things are going to be getting dug up for a very long time once all this starts.)

Renderings like those below show the happy streetscape but don't actually show the scale of the buildings, which seems strategic. All we have is the far-away rendering seen above, showing the comparative heights of the development with the nearby Transbay district and the "Hub" at Van Ness and Market, which should be rising sooner.

Plans call for 8 million square feet, with around 2,500 housing units, and an unknown mix of retail, office, and possibly hotel mixed in. The first phase would include about 2.5 million square feet of development, with the residential and commercial mix to be decided later based on market conditions.

There are also plans for a public park being referred to as the Sixth Street Park, which would sit on top of the new overpass where the train tunnels begin.

"The SF Railyards project application comes at a pivotal moment for transit in the Bay Area. Caltrain and our fellow transit agencies are navigating real near-term financial challenges — but this project points toward a different future,” says Michelle Bouchard, executive director of Caltrain, in a statement to the Chronicle. "This visionary, multi-phased project is a bold bet on San Francisco and on the long-term value of connecting people, housing, and jobs through great transit."

And Mayor Daniel Lurie said in a statement, "This project will continue that momentum up into SoMa, leading with public space and transit access. The team behind this project has a bold vision for the neighborhood, and I appreciate their dedication to our city’s comeback."

Rideshares and public transit can get Super Bowl and World Cup fans from San Francisco to Santa Clara for as little as $10 each way, or as much as $200 each way. Here’s how to navigate all of the available options.

Super Bowl 60 is at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, but San Francisco is where they’re having all of the big parties like the Sting concert, the Benson Boone and Shaboozey show, Shaq’s Fun House, the Chris Stapleton concert, and more. And San Francisco is 45 miles away from Santa Clara and Levi's Stadium, so it’s not exactly walking distance.  

If you're visiting for the Super Bowl or World Cup, regardless of whether you’re staying in SF or Santa Clara, you will probably need to get between these two cities at some point. And you may not have a car. But there are a number of different methods to get back and forth between Santa Clara and San Francisco even if you don’t have a car.

There are the well-known public transportation options like the rapid transit system BART and the commuter rail Caltrain, both of which will also require a brief trip on the Santa Clara light-rail train known as VTA (Valley Transportation Authority) to get to and from Levi’s Stadium itself. These options will cost between $11-$13 each way ($22-$26 round trip), and they’ll get you between SF and Santa Clara in about 90 minutes.

There are also the rideshares Uber and Lyft, and the famous self-driving robotaxis of Waymo. These will cost substantially more, and they may or may not get you there more quickly. After all, game-day and event-night traffic is notoriously bad around Levi’s Stadium.

Here's a rundown of your best options to get between San Francisco and Santa Clara if you don’t have a car.

Uber and Lyft (At Least $65 Each Way, At Least One Hour and Ten Minutes Each Way)

You are surely already familiar with how to use Lyft and Uber. If you’re taking Lyft or Uber between San Francisco and Santa Clara, it’s about a one-hour and fifteen-minute trip at a cost of $65-$70 (before tip) under normal circumstances. But the Super Bowl and the nights of large Super Bowl events are not normal circumstances.

We found Lyft to be more affordable for the same trip. A Lyft trip came in at $65 between Santa Clara and San Francisco, and the trip was just under one hour and 15 minutes. But be aware that surge pricing will likely be in effect during large events, as will the potential for lengthy traffic jams.

Uber was slightly pricier for the same trip as of today. Uber clocked in with the trip at one hour and 11 minutes, with a minimum price of around $70. But again, you may be looking at surge pricing and traffic jams depending on when you travel.

Waymo (Possibly $200 Each Way, Might Not Even Be Available)

You may be keen to ride in the famed self-driving robotaxis of Waymo, and those robot-driven cars do indeed go between San Francisco and Santa Clara. Sometimes.

Using the required Waymo app, we were only able to successfully hail a Waymo between SF and Santa Clara one time out of several attempts. And that ride cost an astonishing $172, and was assessed as taking three hours and eight minutes, because Waymos cannot yet use the freeway for the entire route between the two cities.

And that was the one occasion we could actually hail a Waymo for that trip. Most of our attempts to hail a Waymo between SF and Santa Clara produced a message saying "Pickup Unreachable.” That may be because of Waymo’s relatively small fleet, as NBC Bay Area reported this week that Waymo will only have “about 1,000 Bay Area-based cars” for the weekend, and will not be adding to the fleet size. That said, you might find Waymo to be very trusty for a simple ride to the airport.

An you might also find public transit to be a quicker and more efficient option.  

Caltrain ($11 Each Way, Exactly 90 Minutes)

Caltrain is an electric commuter rail train that goes between San Francisco and San Jose. If you’re heading back and forth between SF and Levi’s Stadium, you’ll want to get on and off at the Mountain View station (not the Santa Clara station!), though your Santa Clara hotel or Airbnb may be closer to the Santa Clara station. The San Francisco station for entering or exiting at Fourth and King streets, though check the Caltrain station map for your best entry and exit points.

Caltrain’s Mountain View station is in the system’s Zone 3, and traveling between three zones costs $8.50 for a one-way trip. For a same-day round trip, you’ll save a couple of dollars buying a Day Pass for $17.

Caltrain won’t take you all the way to Levi’s Stadium, but the VTA Orange Line (located right at the Mountain View Caltrain station) will take you right to the Levi’s Stadium doorstep. That VTA pass will cost $2.50 for the trip. VTA trains synch their schedule with Caltrain, so head right to the VTA stop once you exit the Caltrain. Your Caltrain ride will be one hour long, and the trip between Mountain View VTA and Levi’s Stadium takes about 30 minutes.

Caltrain takes about 12 minutes longer than your other public transit option BART. But we prefer Caltrain, because of its nicer seats, clean restrooms on the train, and they allow outside food and drink on the train. They even allow open containers of alcohol! So game days and event nights definitely have a “party train” feel on Caltrain.

BART ($12.45 Each Way, Exactly 78 Minutes)

BART is your quickest public transit option, though you will also have to take a VTA light-rail train between the BART’s Berryessa/North San Jose station and Levi’s Stadium. The BART fare is $9.95 each way, and the VTA fare is $2.50, for a total round trip of $24.90.

You have many San Francisco options for which BART station to enter or exit, but you’ll want a train heading to Berryessa/North San Jose station. That station (seen above) is pretty nice, with a working pay phone and a clean bathroom. But the BART trains themselves do not have bathrooms, so know that going into your one-hour, eight-minute BART ride.  

Amtrak ($15 Each Way, Not Recommended)

Amtrak trains go to Santa Clara, but we do not recommend this method for a number of reasons. You would need to head to the Oakland suburb of Emeryville on your San Francisco end of the trip, which will add about an hour (each way) onto your trip. But if you’re staying in the East Bay, check the Amtrak trip planner, and plan your trip between that stations “Emeryville, CA” and “Santa Clara, CA - Great America.”

Related: Super Bowl Drone Ban Declared at Several SF Locations, in Addition to Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara [SFist]

Image: Joe Kukura, SFist

• Authorities are investigating an incident caught on video of a man assaulting someone trying to protect a fellow Caltrain passenger whom the attacker was verbally harassing. The incident took place on December 23 at the San Carlos station, and the Good Samaritan was taken to the hospital with facial fractures. [KTVU]

• Parts of Marin County experienced heavy flooding Friday, and a flood advisory was in effect along the coast of the Bay Area through Sunday. This weekend’s king tides are expected to break a 28-year record with flooding extending two-and-a-half feet higher than previous years. [KGO]

• Kirk Laroy Richardson, 61, was arrested for the murder of his parents, who were found dead of gunshot wounds in their Concord home on New Year’s Eve. Richardson reportedly had run-ins with his neighbors in the past, who said they lived in fear of him and filed restraining orders in 2013. [KRON4]

National:

• The FBI announced Friday that the agency prevented a terrorist attack that was potentially going to take place on New Year’s Eve in North Carolina. Authorities arrested Christian Sturdivant, 18, of Mint Hill, North Carolina, a suburb of Charlotte, who was allegedly inspired by ISIS and had been planning the attack for over a year. [NBC News]
• The Trump administration has killed 110 people on alleged drug boats in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific since its first attack September 2. Earlier this week, the US struck a convoy of three boats, and authorities were reportedly searching for eight survivors. [BBC]
• Canadian musician Ashley MacIsaac’s concert was recently canceled after a Google AI overview falsely identified him as a convicted sex offender with the same name, and he’s looking to file a lawsuit for defamation. [NME]

Video of the Day:

• The best view of San Francisco’s New Year’s Eve fireworks just may have been on the Bay Bridge, as drivers abandoned their cars to take in the spectacle.

Leanne Maxwell/SFist

• Congressional candidates, Connie Chan, Saikat Chakrabarti, and Scott Wiener, who are all running for Nancy Pelosi’s old seat, discussed how they’ll address the climate crisis at an event Friday night organized by the popular youth-led climate justice group, Climate Defiance, as part of its national fundraising tour. [Climate Defiance/Instagram]

• Acclaimed comedic actor Dick Van Dyke turned 100 Saturday, which he says is not enough as he plans to live many more years. [KRON4]
• SF-based Reddit is suing the country of Australia over its new ban on social media for kids under 16, explaining that the platform is not a social media site, and the law inhibits free political discourse, as outlined in the country’s constitution. [Engadget]
• The SFPD is asking for the public’s help finding Hank, a French bulldog who was stolen while his owners walked him in the Castro Wednesday night. [KGO]

• Last-minute shoppers: turn your procrastination into an adventure with this lovely, hyperlocal gift guide — all while supporting local artisans and small businesses. [48 Hills]

Image: Leanne Maxwell/SFist

Muni, Caltrain, and all the public transit services that take Clipper will accept credit or debit card taps for rides in just a week, as paying with credit or debit won’t just be a BART thing anymore starting this Wednesday.

It was four months ago when BART started accepting debit cards and credit cards for fare payment instead of just Clipper Cards. They referred to this as “open payments,” and it seemed a glorious upgrade, but the upgrade did not apply to any other Bay Area public transit system that takes Clipper. The Bay Area’s Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) Clipper Card program director Jason Weinstein explained at a July meeting that “After evaluating the benefits and considerations, it was decided that we’d try to roll out open payments at one operator, and that the most impactful rollout could be at BART.”

Yeah, but we were promised this capability way back in the summer of 2023! Well, the day is now upon us. Or rather, that day will be upon us this coming Wednesday December 10.

KQED has a nice article today on the Clipper Card 2.0 rollout, and yes there are a few lovely upgrades mentioned: your funds will be available instantly no matter how you add money to your card, there are some discounts when you switch transit systems on the same ride, and there's a new “family plan” where parents can manage their kids’ accounts. But the big enchilada is the fact that you’ll be able to use credit or debt cards on Muni, Caltrain, and any of the 24 transit agencies that take Clipper.

“Bay Area transit riders have been able to use a chip-enabled credit or debit card to pay for BART since August, but beginning on December 10, all Bay Area transit agencies that accept Clipper (Caltrain, Golden Gate Transit, VTA, the list goes on …) will now also accept chip-enabled credit or debit cards as a form of payment,” according to KQED.

We have seen no formal announcements from Muni, but an SFMTA representative confirmed to SFist that they would indeed be going live with this feature on December 10. Meanwhile, Caltrain announced the change in the tweet from this afternoon seen above, and also on their website.

That site says that effective December 10, you can “Use major contactless payment cards Visa, Mastercard, American Express, and Discover — as well as Apple Pay and Google Pay directly.”

Be aware, however, that any student or senior discounts will not be applied if you’re using a credit or debit card to tap on. You will still need to use your Clipper Card to get those discounts.

Related: BART Will Finally Let You Tap to Enter With a Credit Card or Debit Card, Starting Wednesday [SFist]

Image: SFMTA

• Workers are unionizing at four Blue Bottle Coffee East Bay locations — a  Nestle-owned company, citing unsafe conditions, lack of benefits, and management neglect, including a sewage leak that required OSHA intervention. After a worker who read the union letter was fired and management failed to respond by the June 20 deadline, employees held pickets and filed for a union election with the National Labor Relations Board. [Oaklandside]
• Despite ridership being up 55% since last year, Caltrain will raise its base fare by 25 cents starting Tuesday to help offset a projected $75 million annual deficit. The agency says it may face deep service cuts and station closures without additional funding. [East Bay Times]
• A man who ambushed and killed Sacramento police officer Tara O’Sullivan during a 2019 domestic violence call was sentenced to death Friday, though the execution is unlikely due to California’s moratorium. Officer O’Sullivan, 26, was remembered as a rising star, and a local bridge was memorialized in her name. [SFGate]
• Here’s a running list that tracks every person killed by San Francisco police since 2000, which is now at 65 — most of them young men of color, many with mental illness or experiencing homelessness. [Mission Local]
• Two more former guards at Dublin’s now-shuttered federal women’s prison — infamously dubbed “the rape club” — have been charged with sexually abusing inmates, bringing the total number of accused employees to ten in a scandal that has led to multiple convictions, lawsuits, and a $116 million federal settlement. [KPIX]
• After an elderly Pleasanton woman lost over $200,000 to a phone scam, police arrested a 35-year-old courier using a sting operation with fake cash during a planned pickup. [Bay Area News Group]

An ambitious transit enthusiast just rode all the way from San Francisco (actually Oakland) to Los Angeles, a trek that cost a mere $61, but took two full days to pull off, and required an overnight hotel stay.

We are fans of people pulling ambitious public transportation stunts, like the Berkeley kids whose set a Guinness World Record for the fastest systemwide BART speedrun ever, or the two young men who rode all 24 Clipper Card-using services in 24 hours. So of course we were intrigued by this week's Jalopnik report that some fellow attempted to ride from San Francisco to Los Angeles using only public transportation, not even using Amtrak or Greyhound, but just public transportation.

“Every time I go to LA, I do it in a slightly worse way,” explains the Youtuber “Adam Does Not Exist,” aka Adam DuVander. He successfully pulled this off using exclusively public transit, on a sprained ankle even, though he often struggled to find a public bathroom.

Adam technically starts in Oakland, not San Francisco, and he uses a Baywheels bike to get to the Oakland 19th Street station. After BART, the journey is then all buses between Caltrain and LA’s Metrolink. Some of these buses had free WiFi or available USB chargers. But these buses would often stop every couple blocks, making for some interminably long bus rides.

And while Adam pulled off the SF-to-LA trip for a mere $61.10, it took two full days, and also required an overnight stay at a Radisson hotel in Santa Maria (cost not disclosed). Though Adam is funny and charming, and anyone who’s done a very long public transportation commute can certainly relate to these experiences.

But still, these videos are influencer bullshit. Both 30-minute videos are just glorified ads, with lengthy asides for products that have nothing to do with public transportation.

Still, would you ever do something this stupid? You might, perhaps out of necessity. Or if you’re just curious, here are the transit systems and costs that it would take you to get from SF to LA using only public transportation:

• Baywheels: $6
• BART: $6.15
• Caltrain: $7.70
• VTA: $2.60
• Monterey-Salinas Transit: $6 (Three rides, $2 apiece)
• SLO Regional Transit Authority: $5.50 (Two rides, $3.25 and $2.25)
• Santa Maria Regional Transit: $8.50 (Two rides, $1.50 and $7)
• Ventura County Transit: $5.75 (Two rides, $4 and $1.75)
• Metrolink: $11.50
• LA Metro Rail: $1.75
• LA Metro Rapid: $1.75

Related: Two Transit Nerds Embark on Nine-County Odyssey to Ride All 24 Clipper Card Transit Services In 24 Hours [SFist]

Image: Adam via Youtube

These two youngsters with a big appetite for Bay Area public transit took on the task of seeing if they could ride all 24 Clipper Card-using transit agencies within a 24-hour period, and actually pulled it off by a hair.  

We have seen and enjoyed the exploits of various public transit thrillseekers who try to “back door” their way into public transportation fame. There were the Berkeley kids who set a World Record for hitting all 50 BART stations in six hours, and a 2022 stunt where the Chronicle’s Heather Knight and Peter Hartlaub tried to ride all 27 Bay Area transit agencies on the same day (they did not quite complete this). But today’s Chronicle reports on a new dynamic transit duo who attempted another grand odyssey, by riding all 24 Bay Area transit services that use a Clipper Card in 24 hours. This is their story.  

These two gentlemen are graphic designer Jay Sathe, who’s done some work for BART, and Miles Taylor, who hops all across the country recording transit stunts for his Miles on Transit Youtube channel. (A video of this exploit is promised to be forthcoming, though not yet posted.)    

27 agencies, 24 hours. @milesintransit.bsky.social and I are attempting to do the impossible: ride every Clipper Card accepting transit agency in one day.

[image or embed]

— bsquiklehausen (@bsquiklehausen.com) February 6, 2025 at 4:11 PM

Their trek can be followed in a series of Bluesky threads, the first of which is above. While they initially thought this would require riding 27 agencies, they quickly discovered it was just 24. Starting just after 4pm last Thursday, they started on a Golden Gate Ferry to Marin, used well-known transit services like BART, Muni, Caltrain, and Samtrans, plus far-flung, lesser-known, regional services like the Dumbarton Express, Solano County’s SolTrans, and the Vacaville City Coach.

Morale dropping after it's gotten dark and wet as we wait for a bus

[image or embed]

— bsquiklehausen (@bsquiklehausen.com) February 6, 2025 at 6:29 PM

And indeed this was an all-nighter, as the pair had to get in their late-night rides on 24-hour services, like VTA and the Union City Transit. But they found connections between all of these pretty easy, even at the wee hours when nothing but transit services were operating.

“We got a ton of comments like, 'Wow, be sure to enjoy the Bay’s fractured, fragmented transportation network,'” Sathe told the Chronicle. “And over the 24 hours, with a couple exceptions, it was not that fractured or fragmented.”

THE NUMBERS ARE IN. WE DID IT! 24 HOURS EXACTLY.

[image or embed]

— bsquiklehausen (@bsquiklehausen.com) February 7, 2025 at 5:40 PM

And these young men did complete their task in the allotted 24 hours, ending their trek at the Vacaville Transportation Center. They had budgeted the whole trip, deducing the whole thing would cost them $116 apiece. Yet as the Chronicle notes, that tab “was $40 to $50 cheaper because of unexpected transfer discounts and a couple agencies with broken fare boxes that didn’t require payment.”

Related: Crazy Berkeley Kids Appear to Have Set Guinness World Record for Fastest-Ever ‘BART Speedrun’

Image: ‪@bsquiklehausen.com‬ via Bluesky

The latest twist in the ambitious plans to extend Caltrain and eventually the high-speed rail to the Salesforce Transit Center is a developer hoping to send the train tracks underground, and cover that land with new towers, one of which would be taller than the Transamerica Pyramid.

If you’ve been following these elaborate plans to build a new downtown SF Caltrain stop at the Salesforce Transit Center, and all of the futuristic high-speed rail fantasies that come with it, be aware that another futuristic urbanist fantasy has entered the chat. The Chronicle reports today on an elaborate new development proposed on what is now just Caltrain tracks south of the SF’s main Fourth and King Street station, saying that (if it became reality) it would be “San Francisco’s second-densest transit-oriented development hub.”

In plain English, this scheme would put much of Caltrain’s SF tracks underground (which was already the plan for the downtown extension), but also adds an 850-foot tower to that land, one which would be even taller than the Transamerica Pyramid. There is no use or purpose described for this tower, just that the plans call for one.

We wish we had some renderings of this proposal to get hot and bothered over, but alas, there are none in the new 23-page developer submission to the SF Planning Department. But this plan will be discussed at length at Thursday’s SF Planning Commission meeting, which starts at 12 noon, and will be broadcast on SFGovTV2.

Still, we have a handy map in those developer submission materials that explains the multiple prongs of this very complex endeavor. The red line is the new underground Caltrain tunnel to the Salesforce Transit Center, which is already approved and definitely going to happen, though likely at a years-long snail’s pace. The orange zone described as “4th and King Railyards” is the fugly and otherwise barren train track zone leading into and out of that Caltrain station.

That orange zone gets covered with shiny office towers under this plan. Then Caltrain tracks go underground in what is being described as the “Pennsylvania Avenue Extension (PAX) Tunnel.” This effectively renders Caltrain an underground system from downtown to what we now call the 22nd Street station.

And people who use that Caltrain 22nd Street station will likely notice that the map references an “Existing CalTrain 22nd Street Station” and a “Future CalTrain Station Location TBD.” Is Caltrain considering demolishing the 22nd Street station for something newer and more modern? I don’t see any other way to read this, and frankly, Potrero and Dogpatch commuters would probably welcome that with open arms.

As a fun curiosity, Fifth and Sixth streets, which currently dead-end at the Caltrain station, could go all the way to Mission Creek under this proposal (maybe further with some nice little bridges). So that’s interesting.

“It’s a complicated puzzle but the preliminary business case establishes what Caltrain’s needs are, the development needs are and how those could co-exist on the site,” said VP Genevieve Cadwalader of Prologis, the owner of the land on which the Caltrain tracks sit, told the Chronicle. “If you thread the needle there is something that can work for all parties involved.”

The plans also include a timeline, seen above, and the many public agencies involved in this plan. Umm, even this best-case scenario describes 2028 as “Begin Phase 1 Building Permits.” So do not hold your breath. As the Chronicle puts it, "the project will likely take 20 years to build out."

Any of this becoming reality is many years away, and maybe that’s a good thing. The SF office space market remains dismal, and even at projects for which there is demand, construction is stalled. Caltrain, for its part, is also included in those “doomsday scenario” and “death spiral” conversations affecting all Bay Area public transit. And while this plan initially appears largely paid for by the developer, you’ve got at least a half-dozen different SF city and county/regional transit authorities in this mix. So you figure there are inevitably going to be some taxpayer dollars involved.

And very important, there is no mention of the potential cost of this whole thing in the 23-page packet that will be presented at Thursday’s SF Planning Commission meeting.

Related: Feds Pony Up $3.4 Billion for Caltrain Extension to Salesforce Transit Center, Which Is Now Being Called ‘The Portal’ [SFist]

Image: SF Planning Department

Photo courtesy of Caltrain

The high-speed rail expansion connecting the Caltrain station at Fourth and King streets to the Salesforce Transit Center just got a major boost, as the Federal Transit Administration just kicked down $3.4 billion to make the project a reality.

We noted in our photoset of Sunday’s Bay to Breakers this morning that as seen below, a handful of jokers made themselves into a cardboard Caltrain to spend the day partying and celebrating on the streets.

But officials at Caltrain may have spent the weekend partying and celebrating too. NBC Bay Area reports that the Transbay Joint Powers Authority (TJPA), which is managing the effort to extend Caltrain to the Salesforce Transit Center has been awarded $3.4 billion from the Federal Transit Administration to complete the underground tunnels connecting the two transit facilities. The TJPA was reliant on the federal money, and now they’ve secured it. And the tunnel project has a new name, as they’re now calling it “The Portal.”    

They picked a funny week to call something “Portal,” but that’s the new shorthand name.

A rendering of the finished product is seen above, and yes, the Caltrain will be heading into underground tunnels at Fourth and King streets. They’ll arrive at the Salesforce Transit Center two floors below the street-level. As the Examiner explains, “The massive undertaking would extend the Caltrain commuter rail line by 1.8 miles, dig 1.3 miles of underground tunnel, and construct two underground stations to bring Caltrain service from Fourth and King Streets to a six-level underground endpoint.”  

The whole project itself is running a $6.7 billion price tag, so the feds are basically covering half. Counting in the local and state money also lined up, the whole shebang is now two-thirds funded. “There’s only a handful of projects in the United States that have that level of commitment,” TJPA executive director Adam Van de Water told the agency at a meeting last week, per the Examiner.

Though yes, that’s $6.7 billion for an extension of… just nine blocks. But the whole thing is underground, hence the high cost.

And it’s still not determined where the remaining $2.75 billion of that is coming from. The TJPA is hoping for another $1 billion from the state, but that’s not guaranteed, considering the state is running a $28 billion deficit. The Examiner adds that state Senators Scott Wiener and Aisha Wahab are working on a bill that could raise funds through 2026 state tax ballot measure.

The station would be connected to the long-sought California high-speed rail system, which has of course been taking forever to build. But that project has made progress in recent months, with now more than 25 active construction sites in the Central Valley.

The latest estimates still show that the Salesforce Transit Center connection is not expected to be finished until 2032 or 2033, should they even line up the money in the first place.

By the way, this August will see the five-year anniversary of the Salesforce Transit Center’s opening. That opening was famously marred by mishaps and delayed by cracks in its steel beams. Similar delays seem likely to happen with this expansion. But luckily for Salsforce, it would still be called the “Salesforce Transit Center” on that timeline, as Salesforce’s naming rights deal for the facility runs to the year 2042.

Related: High-Speed Rail Could Finally Be Coming to Salesforce Transit Center, But Only If the Feds Kick Down Billions [SFist]

Image: Transbay Joint Powers Authority

There’s another attempt underway for an SF-to-LA overnighter that would compete with airline travel, this time a train service, which has made progress on getting access to the existing train tracks the trip would require.

We’ve seen efforts to make an easy and affordable SF-to-LA overnight “sleeper trip” before. In 2016, someone claimed they were launching a overnighter bus called Sleepbus that would only cost $50, but that effort stopped as soon as it started. They rebranded as Cabin a year later, but that too seems to have gone out of business before the pandemic, and now has a defunct website.

The long-touted California high-speed rail has had so many delays that one wonders if it will ever happen, and of course Elon Musk’s Hyperloop idea (which Musk claimed would be able to make the trip in 35 minutes) was sent to the dustbin of history last year.

But someone’s trying to float this concept yet again. KRON4 reports that a Newport Beach-based startup called Dreamstar Lines is making progress on an SF-to-LA overnight sleeping train. While Dreamstar Lines has existed for nearly ten years and has yet to conduct a single trip, KRON4 reports the company has “signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Union Pacific Railroad, paving the way for the two entities to come up with a final agreement that would allow Dreamstar to operate its trains on the tracks owned by Union Pacific.”

“Our collaboration with Union Pacific Railroad is a significant milestone for Dreamstar Lines and for the future of private rail travel in the United States,” Dreamstar Lines CEO Joshua Dominic told KTLA. “By launching this service, we are not only offering a luxurious and eco-friendly travel option but also revitalizing the rich heritage of overnight rail travel in America.”

The rendering above is obviously unrealistic — these tracks leading to the Golden Gate Bridge do not exist, and they never will. Though SFGate reported last year that the company intended to approach the Peninsula Corridor Joint Powers Board to use Caltrain tracks, so there is an existing track network to make the round trips. But there is no agreement yet with Caltrain, and even the MOU with Union Pacific is by no means a final agreement.

Pricing is not mentioned, so not it’s not clear if Dreamstar Lines is offering a product that would be cheaper than flying.

But they claim the amenities will be very nice. Their website touts a “premium overnight ‘hotel train’” experience, with a few renderings to back this up. The website is only in “Watch This Space” and “Join Our Mailing List” mode, but claims “We are working fast to begin service as early as the summer of 2025 on our first route -- the busy Los Angeles to San Francisco Bay Area travel corridor.”

There are also some vague references in the KRON4 report that you’d eventually be able to bring your car on the train for use on the other side of the trip. But yeah, let’s not get ahead of ourselves. That SFGate report notes that Dreamstar Lines is “working on lining up the railcars, financing, staffing and agreements needed.”

Summer 2025 seems exceedingly optimistic here. So for the time being, this SF-to-LA overnight trip is just a dream.

Related: Take An Overnight SF-to-LA Trip Aboard This Sleeper Pod Bus For Under $50 [SFist]

Image: Dreamstar Lines

The San Mateo County District Attorney’s Office filed charges against two former Caltrain employees for allegedly misusing public funds to construct personal residences within train stations.

Former Caltrain’s deputy director of operations, Joseph Navarro, and station manager Seth Worden are accused of felony misappropriation of public funds, per KPIX.

Navarro allegedly directed the conversion of an office space at the Burlingame station into his personal residence from 2019 to 2020. The District Attorney’s office alleges Navarro enlisted contractors, approved by Worden, to install amenities such as a kitchen, shower, heating, plumbing, and security cameras.

Prosecutors claim Navarro and Worden kept renovation costs below $3,000 per invoice to circumvent Caltrain’s approval process. This strategy allegedly allowed Navarro to occupy the Burlingame station as his primary residence until an anonymous tip in 2022 led to his discovery and subsequent termination.

Worden, a former station manager employed by TransAmerica Services Inc., the company contracted to operate Caltrain, faces similar charges. According to the DA’s office, Worden replicated Navarro’s scheme at the Millbrae station in 2019. However, Caltrain employees reportedly identified Worden’s unauthorized residence in 2020 and terminated his employment, per the Chronicle.

The total cost of the alleged misappropriation is around $50,000, with $42,000 for the Burlingame station renovations and $8,000 for Millbrae project.

Worden pleaded not guilty on Wednesday, but still awaits a preliminary hearing. Navarro’s arraignment is scheduled, where he will enter a plea.

Feature image via Unsplash/Flipboard.

You’ll be able to just swipe your debit or credit card to ride BART, Muni, and other Bay Area transit systems, eliminating the need for a Clipper Card, in a major upgrade scheduled for summer 2024.

I’m so old I remember when Clipper cards were called “TransLink cards,” and you had to go to a participating Walgreens to add fare, and sometimes the fare wouldn’t even show up on your card for two or three business days. The system has come a long way since! TransLink cards rebranded as Clipper cards in 2010, though the system was super buggy at first.

But the universal transit payment cards were finally, eventually compatible to be used on BART, Muni, and Caltrain, all of which used to have separate, distinct Fast Passes and paper transfers for Muni, paper cards for BART, and Caltrain stubs that conductors actually punched paper holes into.

Now the Clipper card system is taking another giant leap forward, though as is their habit, years after other cities’ large transit symptoms made the same change. The Chronicle reports that Clipper card readers will start accepting debit and credit cards directly at their turnstiles, eliminating the need for the extra blue Clipper card clogging up space in your wallet. (And many of you had likely tossed the cards a while back when you were able to load Clipper fares on your iPhone and watches.)

The new capability is scheduled to be added in “summer 2024,” per the Chronicle. Though as the Chron also points out, transit systems in New York and London have already had this capability for years.

"I often hear from people, ‘Oh, hey, I was just in name-your-European-country or New York City, and I didn’t need to get a (transit fare) card at all. It was fantastic,'" Metropolitan Transportation Commission director of electronic payments Carol Kuester told the Chronicle. "Well, that option is coming here, too."

The traditional blue Clipper card will still work. But you won't actually need it anymore. The readers at turnstiles will simply scan your debit or credit card, though it’s likely you'd need a “chip”-style credit or debit card for this function. But Clipper cards would probably not go extinct like Fast Passes, because we still need a cash payment option, as Bay Area lawmakers seem to hate eliminating cash payment options.

It’s a great change, but a skeptic could fairly claim that this “summer 2024” rollout is optimistic. After all, transit system upgrades often happen well behind schedule around these parts. But this one could feasibly happen on time. The technology already exists and is being used in other cities, so there’s no reinventing the wheel necessary here. And if we’re permanently tossing our Clipper cards in the trash next summer, we’ll give credit (or debit) where it’s due.

As a reminder, the debit and credit card capabilities will apply to all 24 Bay Area transit agencies that use Clipper, including BART, Muni, and Caltrain.

Related: You Can Now Pay Your Muni and BART Fares By Waving Your Apple Watch or iPhone Over a Clipper Reader [SFist]

Image: Avery Evans via Unsplash

Image via Caltrain