If you’re living in Silicon Valley / South Bay, one thing you should find out right away is where your nearest Caltrain station is [Google Maps link]. The fare price is based on zones, so from San Jose station to San Francisco round trip is $15.50 at the time this post was published. If you’re traveling alone, it makes financial sense to take the Caltrain because parking in the City is about $20, plus you can take a nap on the train. The downside of taking the train is that it takes a long ass time to get to SF — about 1.5 hours in off peak hours or an hour during rush hour’s “Baby Bullet” schedule. When I’m visiting the City, I usually go from San Jose to Millbrae then take the Bart [Google Maps link] to either Montgomery, Embarcadero or Powell Station – this route, too, takes about 1.5 hours total.
However, you can save some coin by purchasing an 8 ticket pass or a monthly pass. I’m not sure what the discount percentages are, but for an 8 trip ticket from San Jose to San Francisco, it cost me $42.50 or about $10.50 round trip. Another thing to factor in is the cost of parking. Unfortunately, it’s not free and the accountants for Caltrain decided to increase the fee from $2 to $3 recently so don’t forget to tack on that extra fee when traveling the train. I’ve taken Caltrain fairly often and only encountered an issue once during off peak hours when the train was disabled due to “technical issues” and we had to wait for the next train. Good thing I wasn’t in a hurry or I’d be in trouble because we were stuck near Sunnyvale and I parked at San Jose.
Overall, I would say if you’re a daily commuter traveling along the route served by Caltrain, I would highly recommend using their services during rush hour as their service is spot on. People are friendly and clean, unlike San Francisco’s Bart or MUNI (no offense). I’d be interested in hearing your experience in using Caltrain whether it was a pleasant or not.
Don’t forget to bookmark Caltrain’s schedule here.