Go to the Friends of Caltrain for the most current actions to save Caltrain.

Caltrain is planning to eliminate 8-ride tickets and raise fares on paper tickets. The 8-ride tickets, which is available on Clipper cards only, offer a 15% discount off the regular one way fares. Besides eliminating the 8-ride tickets, Caltrain also plans to increase fares on one way and day pass paper tickets by 25 cents and 50 cents per zone respectively. However the one way fares for riders using Clipper Cards would stay the same.

If this proposal takes effect, regular riders using Clipper and 8-ride tickets would have to pay a higher fare for each ride, but not as much as those who buy paper tickets. On the other hand, riders currently buying paper tickets could avoid the fare increase by paying with a Clipper card.

Is this proposal fair to those who use 8-ride tickets? Caltrain will be accepting public comments at four public meetings throughout the three counties later this month and at the JPB meeting in February.

JPB meeting

Thursday, Feb. 2, 2012 at 10 a.m.
1250 San Carlos Ave., San Carlos

Public meetings

Caltrain will hold four public meetings to present the proposal and receive comments. The meetings will take place in:

Gilroy – Jan. 24 at 6 p.m.
Gilroy Senior Center, 7371 Hanna St.

San Francisco – Jan. 24 at 6 p.m.
San Francisco Tennis Club, 645 Fifth St.

Mountain View – Jan. 25 at 6 p.m.
City Council Chambers, 500 Castro St.

San Carlos – Jan. 25 at 6 p.m.
Caltrain Administrative Office, 1250 San Carlos Ave.

Caltrain also accepts written comments by email: changes@caltrain.com

In the last couple of weeks, over 400 people have sent letters to Caltrain urging them to add wifi on the train, in line with other services around the states and around the world. So far, the ratio of supporters to skeptics has been 410 to 4.

The main concern of the few wifi skeptics is that Caltrain’s top priority should be funding to maintain and improve its train service. Friends of Caltrain agrees that this is the highest priority – but since the financial emergency is at bay for the moment, it is a good time to look into improvements that increase ridership and satisfaction. One rider noted that some people subscribe to data services that already get them wireless everywhere. Since over 400 people have expressed their demand for wifi, clearly many people do not have these services.

Friends of Caltrain looked into the issue. It turns out that in the September board meeting, Caltrain had actually hired a consultant to revisit the possibility of adding wifi to the trains. The project is included in a list of ten consulting companies hired for a variety of IT projects, see Agenda Item 5 My best guess is that LM Consulting is the firm looking into the wifi option based on googling their names – please comment if you find more.

Wifi isn’t a frill these days. Muni Wireless reports that “According to Amtrak, Wi-Fi is the most important technology amenity required by passengers; 89% of those polled said Wi-Fi influenced their decision to choose the Acela service, while an astonishing 35% of all passengers use the Wi-Fi network every day with an 80% satisfaction rate.”

Other services with successful wifi programs includes the Boston MBTA commuter rail, which had 10,000 riders using wifi on the Framingham/Worcester line as of September. In Europe, Virgin Trains in the UK serves over 100k users per month, and SJ trains in Sweden serves 80,000 riders per month.

Some services charge for access, and others offer it at no charge. One powerful economic model is to use the network to provide other internal operations services to reduce costs. For example, the MBTA uses it as a maintenance tool to provide train malfunction data through a web browser system to accelerate the response of the Mechanical department in correcting any malfunctions.

Hopefully the consultant will identify practical and cost-effective solutions, and Caltrain will be able to head down the path to provide wifi.

This week, the High Speed Rail Authority published their business plan for the project. There are a lot of things to digest and debate about the proposal – this post discusses what it might mean for Caltrain.

The High Speed Rail Authority’s acceptance of a “blended system” is overall positive, but may not have practical benefit for the region. Given the proposed schedule, where High Speed Rail wouldn’t get here until at least 2033, the Caltrain corridor needs to be on the lookout for alternative sources of funding to upgrade the system.

High Speed Rail Authority’s comments on the blended system

The High Speed Rail Authority issued a letter endorsing the concept of a blended system. This is a positive step, considering HSRA’s early insistence on a 4-track elevated system all the way through the Peninsula.

Unfortunately, the Authority’s letter also described a design that increases the price tag to $5.3 billion. The design includes many elements that haven’t been proposed or or discussed locally, including “a 60-foot tall elevated viaduct from Lawrence Expressway (milepost 40.9) all the way into the upper level of a massive new elevated HSR station complex in San Jose”, and a 4-track stretch all the way through Redwood City.

According to Caltrain spokeperson Seamus Murphy, this proposal is not a Caltrain proposal, and it does not reflect Caltrain’s commitment to work closely with the communities in its path to create a design that is sensitive to local needs and feedback. Friends of Caltrain has observed that as Caltrain has studied the proposed blended system over the last six months, they have done methodical community outreach and state their intentions to continue to do so. This proposal reflects the bad old ways of the High Speed Rail Authority, where ideas are imposed from on high.

Plan B for Modernization funding?

But the over-engineered design proposal that Clem Tillier critiques in his blog post is not the main concern. THe main concern is that HSR may not get to the Peninsula for 20 years or more, even if it survives the current round of financial scrutiny, and other risks along the way. If the project goes forward as proposed, the first segment to be build would be in the Central Valley, the second would be to connect the Central Valley to San Jose, and only the third would upgrade the line through the Peninsula, in 2033 at the earliest.

This means it’s nearing time for the region to seriously consider Plan B – how to upgrade the transit backbone without relying on High Speed Rail.

According to local legislative staff, the Prop 1A money does have a remaining pot of money for Connectivity, which Caltrain would be eligible for. But Caltrain was initially assigned only $42 million of the $760 million available statewide for connectivity. But that would not be nearly enough to completely fund electrification, let alone extension to the Transbay Terminal in downtown San Francisco.

Other potential options to upgrade Caltrain may include New Starts funding for Caltrain electrification, perhaps along with the Downtown Extension in SF. But Caltrain is behind in the New Starts queue for the region which includes BART extensions and the Central Subway. Alternatively, there is a federal infrastructure fund that is proposed to be in a Transit reauthorization bill which could be used for capital project. But this funding source is not yet approved by Congress and highly contested.

Caltrain has a great case to make. Growing ridership has increased farebox recovery from 44% to over 50% in recent month, and the many peak commute hour trains are standing room only. The economic vitality of the region depends on Caltrain’s ability to accommodate more riders at key rush hours.  The three counties have done a great job of working closely together to “save Caltrain” for two years.  They need to also prioritize capital funding for Caltrain electrification and work together to pursue New Starts or look at innovative strategies to capture some of the value created by new transit-oriented housing or jobs.

What will happen to High Speed Rail

What will happen to High Speed Rail as it faces a season of legislative scrutiny is an open question. The legislature could kill the project, and in that case the money would go back to the federal government. Or, to avoid embarrassing the administration, the money could be kept and used for Caltrain electrification.

Or, the legislature could also drive a restructuring the project, in which case bets are off. If the review process creates options that does the project cheaper and delivers value to the high-population endpoints earlier, that would be better. But will the legislature defy the governor’s support and put that much effort into getting HSR revamped?

In most of the likely scenarios, the outcome for the Peninsula is that we would need to find other sources of money if we want to upgrade the transit backbone.

If you are concerned about the High Speed Rail plan and its impact on Caltrain, come to an Assembly Budget Sub-committee hearing hosted by Assembly Member Rich Gordon, on November 15th from 1-5pm in Palo Alto City Council Chambers.

Five public information meetings will be held from November 2, 2011 through Nov. 10, 2011 to provide information on the Dumbarton Rail Corridor project. The goal of the project is to provide regional rail service from the East Bay to the Peninsula via the rail corridor located south of the Dumbarton Bridge. Currently this project is going through an environmental review required by the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA).

Additional information about the project is available here.

• Wednesday, Nov. 2, 2011, 6 pm – 8 pm
  Silliman Aquatic Center
  6800 Mowry Avenue
  Newark
• Thursday, Nov. 3, 2011, 6 pm – 8 pm
  Fremont Community Center
  40000 Paseo Padre Parkway
  Fremont
• Monday, Nov. 7, 2011, 6 pm – 8 pm
  Kennedy Center
  1333 Decoto Road
  Union City
• Wednesday, Nov. 9, 2011, 6 pm – 8 pm
  Redwood City Main Library
  1044 Middlefield Road
  Redwood City
• Thursday, Nov. 10, 2011, 6 pm – 8 pm
  Menlo Park Senior Center (Belle Haven)
  110 Terminal Avenue
  Menlo Park

At a Caltrain steering committee meeting on October 4, Jessica Zenk of the Silicon Valley leadership group presented the results of SVLG polling to find the right approach to fund Caltrain. Last summer’s polling suggested a 3-county sales tax measure (1/8 cent) with a short sunset (shorter polled better).  Based on the poll, victory seems possible but challenging – the highest-polling options barely cleared the 2/3 level needed to pass.

However, due to the legislative calendar, a San Mateo County ballot measure may be more practical.. The poll did not test this option, but it did show strong support for Caltrain among San Mateo County voters.

The poll found that Caltrain has near universal brand recognition and almost everyone has ridden it at some point (high 80s) but only a small percentage use it regularly (about 8%)

A further round of polling will be needed in the February/March time frame. In particular, additional polling will need to test the option of a San Mateo County focused measure. It might also be useful to poll voters about willingness to pay for capital improvements, which would require higher rates but deliver more benefits.

In the discussion about the option, several current and former officials mentioned that if the best choice is a San Mateo County focused measure, then it would be useful to also strengthen the Joint Powers Agreement. A San Mateo County measure would give SamTrans the ability to keep funding Caltrain. But given the current agreement, any partner can unilaterally choose to reduce funding, and if one partner reduces its contribution, all reduce their contributions. This results in spiky, unstable funding that is not a good fit for a system that individuals, employers, cities, and developers depend on as a stable piece of the region’s infrastructure.

The effective negotiations among the Caltrain partners resulting in funding for 2013 is a good sign that the counties can continue to work together to come up with a workable option to put on the ballot for voter support. Friends of Caltrain strongly encourages that the solution should make Caltrain more stable as well.