Caltrain plans to have its Baby Bullet express trains on line by
spring. While none of the express trains will come to the southern
end of the line here, South Valley riders will be able to transfer
to them at San Jose
’s Diridon Station.
Caltrain plans to have its Baby Bullet express trains on line by spring. While none of the express trains will come to the southern end of the line here, South Valley riders will be able to transfer to them at San Jose’s Diridon Station.
A rider would save approximately 35 minutes from Morgan Hill to San Francisco and the same on the way back – at no extra cost – according to the newly proposed Caltrain timetable.
Only one person attended a public meeting Caltrain officials held last week evening to solicit input, according to spokeswoman Jayme Kunz.
Caltrain has received more than 400 comments on the project from throughout Santa Clara, San Mateo and San Francisco counties, the three Caltrain serves, Kunz said.
The Baby Bullets will only run on weekdays, as all Caltrain trains now do. Caltrain is bringing back weekend service in spring – once track renovation work is completed – but not to the South Valley. Caltrain found, from a pilot project of a couple years ago, that rider interest in weekend service to South Valley was “basically non-existent,” Kunz said.
The Baby Bullet project is costing $157 million – $110 million for construction and $47 million for the trains – which is being split by the three tax-funded county agencies that govern Caltrain: the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority, Samtrans (San Mateo County) and San Francisco Municipal Railway. While these agencies pay Caltrain operating costs according to how many passengers board in each county, they split capital costs evenly.
The reason Caltrain can charge the same for a Baby Bullet ticket as it does now is that, even though express service costs more to operate per mile, the same train can make more runs in a day, lessening employee layover time and making operations more efficient overall.
