Information on taking bicycles on Caltrain

The San Francisco Bicycle Coalition contains a great deal of information about bicycles and commuting; including their own newsletter The Tubular Times

Caltrain Has their own page.

The Bay Area Transit Information page contains general information about Bay Area transportation.

John Boyle's www.bikemap.com site contains more links, and arranges information on a map.

There is a Caltrain bikes mailing list. To subscribe, send a message to caltrain-bikes-request@cycling.org, with the word "subscribe" in the body of the message. There's more information at cycling.org

Bicycle Tags

If you're going to be taking bikes on the train, it's a great idea to attach a tag to your bike so that other riders will know how far your bike is going, and stow their own bikes accordingly. If everybody makes sure they don't put their bike on top of another bike that's getting off first, there will be a lot less confusion.

FLASH: Caltrain is now giving away bike commuter kits at their staffed stations. You get an envelope with a nice clip-on badge holder, a collection of tags, and some useful information.

The best tags are the "badge holder" kind that clip onto your bike. You print your destination on a slip of paper and put it into the badge holder for all to see. Some people who commute back and forth between two places will just permanently label their bikes with their two destinations.

I've made up some nice postscript tags which fit nicely into a standard badge holder.

Here are some hints for taking your bike on the train:

• There is a yellow rules card near the foyer that contains all the rules for bringing bikes on the train.
• Be nice to the conductors, even when things go wrong. They don't make the rules, they just have to follow them. We're much better off if the conductors like us.
• Holding up the train irritates people whose good will we'd like to have. Bikes take longer to board than people, so when a train arrives, don't waste time; get on quickly and sort yourselves out on board.
• Avoid the temptation to grab an empty rack if you're not going far; the next person to get on might be going to the end of the line.
• Pay attention to how bikes are stacked on the racks so you don't have to re-arrange them. The ideal is for your bike to go on top of a bike that's going one station further than you.
• When several bikes are waiting for a train, ask your fellow cyclists who's going to what station. The furthest distance should get on first so they can stack first.
• When getting on, look for bike tags in badge holders, labels taped to crossbars, pieces of paper held on with rubber bands, etc. If you don't find any, shout out "Is anybody going past X?"
• When other people are getting on, keep an ear open in case somebody asks if anybody is going past Y, or in case somebody asks how far your bike is going.
• Finally, buy some badge holders, make copies of this sheet, and give them away to other bike riders.

Page maintained by Ed Falk