Even before it was completed, in 1863 the
San Francisco and San Jose Railroad (SF&SJ) was urged to build passenger and freight stations along Market Street. Once complete, the SF&SJ offered train service into San Francisco with a northern terminus at a now-demolished station at 18th and Valencia streets. Soon after
Southern Pacific (SP) took over the
Peninsula Commute route from the SF&SJ, SP would go on to build the
Bayshore Cutoff in 1907, rerouting the line between San Francisco and
San Bruno to the
San Francisco Bay shoreline. The relocated station in San Francisco near Third and Townsend was soon deemed "[notoriously] inadequate even for present passenger traffic" in 1910. Instead of moving the station closer to
Market, SP built a new passenger terminal, the
Third and Townsend Depot, at the same location in San Francisco in 1914, anticipating the need for increased capacity to handle visitors traveling to the 1915
Panama–Pacific International Exposition.
Southern Pacific plans Starting in 1909, SP purchased sixteen complete blocks in a direct line between the foot of Market and the existing Third and Townsend depot at a cost of $5 million (equivalent to $ in ), and the
San Francisco Call believed this meant a station uniting SP with the
Santa Fe and
Western Pacific near the
San Francisco Ferry Building was imminent. When the new Third and Townsend Depot was announced in November 1912, Charles S. Fee, SP passenger traffic manager, denied the prior rumors putting a new depot at Market and Beale, saying the Ferry Building would be handling the bulk of the traffic and that a Market and Beale station could not be completed in time for Panama–Pacific service. at One Market Street in San Francisco The
San Francisco Chronicle speculated that Third and Townsend could have been announced as a bargaining tactic to knock down the asking price of the few landowners remaining between the existing station and Market and Beale. as shown by the configuration of the new
Southern Pacific General Office building at 1 Market Street. That building was completed in 1917 with an E-shaped floor plan, and Southern Pacific had retained tenancy of the first-floor spaces facing the "courtyard", implying that a ground-floor courtyard station space may have been planned for the future, but plans to extend the rails into downtown San Francisco were put on hold following the
United States's entry into World War I and were never revived. Some of the land was later sold to the federal government and used for the
Rincon Annex post office and mail distribution center. In 1955, the
California Public Utilities Commission published a report to evaluate SP's Peninsula Commute service in the wake of a 1950 application to raise fares. The report noted "While the Peninsula Service furnishes a rapid rail transportation, particularly during morning and evening peak periods, it does not carry passengers within reasonable walking distance of downtown San Francisco" and "a considerable portion of the commuter's total traveling time is spent in transit between the S. P. Depot and downtown San Francisco, and at an additional expense to the commuter of 30¢ a day." By counting passengers who disembarked at 3rd and Townsend, the report concluded that 70% of passengers disembarking in San Francisco used Muni to reach their final destination, and the time spent on Muni could equal or exceed the time spent on SP's trains.
Planned BART takeover During the planning phases of what would become BART, a planned Peninsula line would take over from the existing Southern Pacific commute service. Although that planned Peninsula line was proposed to be built on the existing SP right-of-way and enter a subway section at the intersection of 7th and Hooper Streets, a 1960 report noted SP still intended to extend service to downtown. A 1963 report to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors projected the inevitable decline of the Third and Townsend Depot once the planned San Mateo line of what would become BART was built: Despite the plans, BART service to San Mateo County via the proposed Peninsula Line was dropped after that county pulled out of the BART district in December 1961, and SP never extended the commuter rail service from San Jose to the downtown Financial District. A 1968
Rapid Transit Service to San Francisco International Airport and to the Peninsula report for the City of San Francisco proposed an underground extension taking the SP line to Second and Market. The 1968
Rapid Transit report said "the Southern Pacific suburban railway from San Jose to San Francisco is good as far as it goes, but it does not go far enough into San Francisco. The 'Southern Pacific Depot' at Third and Townsend Streets ... is almost one mile south of the destination of 80 percent of its patrons" and called "fast and frequent service ... a prime need for by-passing and hopefully reducing peak-hour freeway congestion," along with improved transit service to
San Francisco International Airport (SFO) (later realized in 2003 with the completion of the
BART to SFO extension) and the
Bayview-Hunters Point area of southeastern San Francisco (realized in 2007 after the new
T Third Muni Metro line went into revenue service).
PERSUS noted the single largest destination, San Francisco's downtown Financial District, was not directly served by the SP Peninsula Commute and called the Townsend Street station "an obstacle to the [Central Business District]-destined commuter who must expend additional time and fares, and a deterrent to the off-peak rider who must contend with less frequent transit service or pedestrian hazards on the streets."
PENTAP recommended upgraded SP service, including more frequent reverse-peak trains (southbound in the mornings, and northbound in the evenings). which received a preliminary affirmative ruling in July 1979. In response, Assemblymember
Lou Papan introduced AB 1853 in 1977 to preserve the service by subsidizing ticket prices and SP's operation. Peninsula Commute ridership was so sensitive to gasoline shortages that passenger counts jumped by 40% in May and June 1979. makes this train appear to be much closer to
downtown than its actual location (7th and King) in 1985. A draft report prepared in 1978 to estimate the environmental impact of the SP petition to discontinue service echoed the conclusions reached by the PUC in 1955, stating "the downtown financial district of [San Francisco] is the principal destination for a large percentage of Peninsula commuters, and most SP commuters." After California took over the Peninsula Commute and set up the CalTrain commuter rail service, the downtown extension was called "critical to the survival of the service" in a 1982 public hearing. During that hearing, Mr. Fred Barton, Deputy District Director of Rail Operations for
Caltrans, noted "the existing passenger service provided by SP is not utilizing its full potential in serving the travel demands of the Peninsula residents who are employed in downtown San Francisco. This inadequacy in service is mainly due to the location of the present SP terminal which is remote from the high density employment centers in the city's financial district. In fact, an additional twenty to thirty minute travel time and a transfer to Muni bus service is required by the commuters in order to reach the financial district." As evidence, when Muni discontinued a dedicated shuttle service between 4th and Townsend and the Financial District, CalTrain ridership dropped by 18 percent, prompting Caltrans to declare a downtown extension should be implemented no later than 1991. However, Caltrans was being pressured to drop funding for CalTrain. By state law, the subsidies for the rail service would have been discontinued as the farebox recovery ratio failed to breach 40%, Once the state determined the train service provided mainly a regional, and not a statewide benefit, control of CalTrain should more appropriately be passed to a regional agency. Accordingly, a three-county agency, the Peninsula Corridor Joint Powers Board (PCJPB) was formed in 1991 and with the help of state funds, PCJPB purchased the Peninsula Corridor line and right-of-way from SP in 1992 for $202 million ($ adjusted for inflation).
Peninsula Corridor Joint Powers Board: First attempt Once PCJPB took over the stewardship of Caltrain in 1992, the downtown extension was identified as a high-priority project, Projected weekday Caltrain ridership was anticipated to double (compared to 21,700 daily passengers in 1995) with the completion of a downtown extension. nearly the same alignment as the 1911 plans; or the
Transbay Terminal.
Transbay Transit Center development (2013) While a draft environmental impact report was prepared in 1997 for the downtown extension by the Peninsula Corridor Joint Powers Board, the report was never certified and was abandoned in an incomplete state. Subsequently, the voters of San Francisco reaffirmed the project in the November 1999 election by approving Proposition H, which mandated the extension of Caltrain to a newly rebuilt Transbay transit facility and the electrification of Caltrain. At the time, the downtown extension was estimated to cost $600 million. In 2000, the City and County of San Francisco and the Peninsula Corridor Joint Powers Authority begin the environmental review process for the revived project. The
Transbay Joint Powers Authority (TJPA) is established in 2001 in order to manage the project and oversee its design and implementation. The first phase consists of the construction of the Transbay Transit Center, which contains a train box on its underground levels to accommodate Caltrain and high-speed rail. The second phase consists of the actual downtown extension, with an alignment that will carry trains from an underground station near
4th and King station to Second Street via Townsend Street, and then from Second Street into the train box in the Transbay Transit Center. The first phase broke ground in 2010 and opened to the public on August 11, 2018.
The Railyard Alternatives and I-280 Boulevard Feasibility Study In 2013,
Mayor Ed Lee pushed for a revised downtown extension plan that could substantially differ from the alignment approved in the 2004 EIR. The suggested revisions included moving the alignment to the
Mission Bay neighborhood in order to accommodate new housing development and the new
Warriors stadium that was in planning at the time. With the 2015 alternative Mission Bay alignment, trains would potentially run underground along
Third Street. The trains would then bypass the existing terminus at Fourth and King, enabling the redevelopment of the Caltrain station and potential addition of infill housing. After five years, the results of the RAB study were released in May 2018. The RAB study considered three possible alternatives that would extend or replace the environmentally cleared DTX tunnel alignment: •
Future with Surface Rail: DTX plus two grade separations created by trenching and depressing Mission Bay Dr & 16th St •
Pennsylvania Ave Alignment: A tunneled extension of DTX under Pennsylvania Avenue •
Mission Bay Alignment: An alternative tunneled extension of DTX under Third Street in Mission Bay The study ultimately recommended the second alternative. Several San Francisco city departments reviewed the project's governance structure and project delivery methods with the aid of an expert panel, culminating in a report published in October 2019. The report concluded that the governance of the project should shift from the TJPA to a new agency and that the project should be newly pitched to the public as a project of regional importance due to its role as a link in a future regional rail network. As of January 2023, the project's price tag had risen to $6.7 billion and its estimated completion date had slipped to 2032, while a planned pedestrian tunnel from the TTC to the
Market Street subway's
Embarcadero Station had been canceled. ==References==