Bayshore station (Caltrain)

Bayshore was established by the Southern Pacific Railroad in 1907 along the new Bayshore Cutoff, a more direct route into San Francisco. The railroad planned to build an extensive terminal facility in Visitacion Valley that would serve as the primary maintenance and marshaling facility for the San Francisco Peninsula. Financial problems delayed completion of the project, and the 250-acre (1.0 km²) Bayshore rail yard and shops did not open until 1918. The facility operated around the clock and employed over 1,000 workers.

The Bayshore shops maintained all the locomotives on the Southern Pacific's Coast Division which stretched south to Santa Barbara. By 1952, this was 133 steam engines, but by 1954, diesel-electric locomotives had become common enough that the Bayshore steam shops were closed. The roundhouse continued to service diesel locomotives, but the decline of industry and shipping in San Francisco and along the peninsula led to the closure of the yards in the early 1980s.

Muni intended to establish another light rail connection to the Bayshore station at Visitacion Valley in southern San Francisco with its new Third Street light rail extension. However, following the CTX Project, completed in 2004, the Bayshore station was rebuilt and moved south. As of 2018, the existing Bayshore station straddles the border between the counties of San Mateo and San Francisco; the platform itself is in Brisbane while the main parking lot is in San Francisco.

The Third Street extension opened in early 2007 without a connection to Caltrain. The closest Muni station, Arleta Station, is approximately seven minutes (by foot) north from the Bayshore Caltrain station along Tunnel Avenue.[2] Although Sunnydale Station is geographically closer to Bayshore, there is no public pathway running east–west directly connecting those two stations.[3]

The potential connection has also been plagued by cost and design issues. Two proposed development projects adjacent to the station, the Visitacion Valley Transit Oriented Development (TOD) Project (on the former site of the Schlage factory)[4][5] and the Brisbane Baylands development (on the former Bayshore Railyard and San Francisco Municipal Landfill),[6][7] could hasten the planning and conversion of Bayshore Station into an Intermodal Transit Station with a connection to Muni. The San Francisco County Transportation Authority adopted the Bayshore Intermodal Station Access Study in 2012.[8] This study examined several alternatives, and proposed to move the platform south by 150 to 700 feet (46 to 213 m) to lie completely within San Mateo County. A loop extension of T Third would be built largely on San Mateo County land connecting the Sunnydale Station to a new intermodal platform west of the Peninsula Corridor rail line on land planned for redevelopment as part of the Brisbane Baylands.[9] According to the Bi-County Transportation Study (2013), the estimated cost of extending T Third is $58 million, with an additional $31 million required to reconfigure Bayshore station.[10][11]

In addition, Geneva Avenue would be extended east from Bayshore Boulevard (where it presently dead-ends) over the rail line to Harney and would connect a proposed Muni bus rapid transit (BRT) line to Bayshore Station.[9][12] In the Geneva-Harney BRT Feasibility Study final report, published in July 2015, all of the near-term alternatives for BRT alignment would use existing streets, connecting the new Geneva-Harney line with T Third at Arleta; the long-term alternatives studied would extend Geneva (with a grade separation and connection to Bayshore) by 2040, making a new intermodal station for bus, light rail, and heavy/commuter rail.[13] According to the Bi-County Transportation Study (2013), the estimated cost of extending Geneva is $90 million, and an additional $210 million would be required to set up the Geneva-Harney BRT line.[10]

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• Caltrain Bayshore station page