Caltrain: Take a Seat (On the Floor)

Here's a great bit from the Mercury News' Mr. Roadshow's column.  I have experienced this a few times (not including big event trips like this one):

Q People whining about not getting a seat on BART haven't ridden on Caltrain lately. At least BART gives straps and poles to hang onto and the train rides are pretty smooth. Caltrain is often standing-room-only for an hour or more and passengers have to grab whatever they can find, including other people. The older Caltrain cars are 100 times bumpier than BART. A lot of people sit on the filthy floor because they don't have the strength to stand up for that long.

A Forget wearing a suit. This is scruffy blue jeans territory.

Of course, spending billions of dollars in the Central Valley on High-cost Rail makes total sense, right?

Comments

[hillsider]

I get how hard it is to run a railroad in bad times but why do they struggle so much in good times? Is it really that hard to add a train or two or a car or two? Aren't these honchos making a quarter mil a year?

[caltrain sufferer]

The problem is funding. There's no dedicated funding for Caltrain, so money is always tight. In this day and age Caltrain has not enough seats/capacity, no WiFi on board, and too limited a schedule.

In the meantime, we as a society have decided to spend our transportation resources on high speed rail and, frankly, too many highways.

[Mom]

The society got fooled by high speed rail and woke up too late to do anything about it.

[another sufferer]

+ 1/2 and - 1/2 to another sufferer. I too suffer but we are not spending too much on highways. Kill high-speed rail and spend it on Caltrain and roads.