#caltrain

Caltrain is a commuter rail line running between San Francisco and San José, and it began electric service last month.

This is a huge deal because it cuts the travel time between San Francisco and San José (the 17th and 13th largest cities in the US, by population) by 25%.

A local train making all stops went from 100 to 75 minutes, limited stops trains to a little over an hour, and peak hourexpress trains from 75 to 59. It's by the slimmest margin, but it took an incredible amount of work to get to "under an hour."

Caltrain is crawling towards construction of that long-planned extension to the Transbay Transit Center in Downtown San Francisco. 

Where trains make that final turn towards 4th & King Station and spread out, they’ll enter a tunnel with 4th & King becoming a pass-thru subway station. That leaves a lot of property available to do something with.

“The real estate firm submitted an application Tuesday to the Planning Department for a redevelopment project that would remake a 20-acre site between 4th and 7th streets, currently a Caltrain railyard and station.  The proposal by Prologis — best known for renting warehouses to Amazon — is anchored by a mixed-use, 850-foot-tall tower at the site of the station, which would remain operational during construction and would eventually be incorporated into the base of the new building.  Prologis said the project, dubbed ‘SF Railyards,’ may total 8 million square feet at the end of buildout, which could take 20 years. Half the development would be for commercial use, including office, retail, and potentially a hotel. The remainder would include up to 2,500 housing units.”

If Caltrain accepts this proposal, there is still detailed planning and studies to be done. Major construction of the extension is probably still 5 years away.