Caltrain will add third bike car with increased seat capacity
Just weeks after SVBC announced shared Caltrain goals with SFBC and BikeSMC, and a month after SFBC reps and I spoke at Caltrain's Joint Powers Board meeting in early December advocating for the need for a third bike car on Bombardier trains, Executive Director Michael Scanlon announced that the agency would do just that.Caltrain has historically been extremely accommodating to people who bike by having two bike cars on each train and helping many to access transit. Currently, five-car Bombardier train sets carry only 48 bikes on two designated bike cars. The five-car Gallery train sets carry 80 on two designated bike cars. Because of this difference and the uncertainty of which train will arrive at one's point of origin, many bicycle-train commuters have been "bumped" from trains due to overcapacity of bicycle riders.As Caltrain announced the purchase of additional Bombardier cars from Metrolink to expand the capacity of Bombardier train sets from five to six cars, we were ready with our data to support the third car as a bike car. Currently 13% of passengers bring a bike on board, and adding a third bike car to Bombardier trains would help to meet that demand, expand bike capacity to more closely match that of the Gallery cars, and reduce bike bumps. The addition of a third car will increase bike capacity from 48 to 72 spaces per train set as well as add 2,000 seats across Caltrain's Bombardier fleet.Thank you to Adina Levin of Friends of Caltrain for her detailed day analysis. Thank you to all who wrote in or attended meetings in support of this addition as well as Caltrain staff and board for being responsive to the needs of its passengers.Next steps:
- Sign our petition for immediate improvements Caltrain can take to improve bike usage.
- Stay tuned for more information on the new cars for electrification which will be completed in 2021.
