South San Francisco station is a Caltrain

Caltrain

Caltrain is a California commuter rail line on the San Francisco Peninsula and in the Santa Clara Valley in the United States. The northern terminus of the rail line is in San Francisco, at 4th and King streets; its southern terminus is in Gilroy...

 station

Train station

A train station, also called a railroad station or railway station and often shortened to just station,"Station" is commonly understood to mean "train station" unless otherwise qualified. This is evident from dictionary entries e.g...

 in South San Francisco, California

South San Francisco, California

South San Francisco is a city in San Mateo County, California, United States, located on the San Francisco Peninsula in the San Francisco Bay Area...

. It serves Local and Limited-Stop trains. The station is on the east side of Highway 101

U.S. Route 101

U.S. Route 101, or U.S. Highway 101, is an important north–south U.S. highway that runs through the states of California, Oregon, and Washington, on the West Coast of the United States...

 beneath E. Grand Ave; downtown South San Francisco is across the freeway.

The station suffers from a poor location and poor amenities; the southbound platform is not ADA-compliant, and riders for northbound trains cross the (usually) southbound track to a narrow platform between the tracks, thus requiring a "hold out" rule at the station— if a train is stopped for passengers a train on the other track must wait. The station must be accessed via Dubuque Ave., and a tall pedestrian staircase is provided to access Grand Ave., above the station. The poor location precludes buses from connecting to the station. Although numerous Samtrans

SamTrans

SamTrans is a public transport agency in and around San Mateo, California, in the San Francisco Bay Area. It provides bus service throughout San Mateo County and into portions of San Francisco and Palo Alto...

routes run near the station on Airport Blvd., the hills and tight turns make it difficult for buses to reach the station.

Station amenities

• Caltrain Ticket Machines
• Caltrain 8-Ride Ticket Validators
• Waiting benches
• Bike racks
• All-day parking
• Public telephone

Past relocation proposals

There have been past proposals to relocate the station southward so that the train would stop along the overpass that goes above Airport Blvd. The main purpose of this would be to improve access to the station, however it does not appear that this course of action is currently planned.

Future expansion

Caltrain will be accepting bids for a station improvement project for the South San Francisco station. The project would update the aging station by renovating the current southbound platform and building a new northbound platform in order to eliminate the "hold out" rule at the station and to be ADA-compliant. The project would also construct a bus and shuttle drop-off area on Airport Blvd. and an ADA-compliant pedestrian underpass to the new platform that would also connect with E. Grand Ave. and Airport Blvd., in order to provide better access to the station.

External links

• Caltrain South San Francisco station page