»Caltrain II: Electric Boogaloo

After yesterday's experience riding the Baby Bullet, I decided to see how much I could shave off the wait time. I rolled out of work at 16.34 and arrived home at 18.01, for a one-way door-to-door time of 87 minutes. That's pretty swell. Turns out that my arriving at the Mountain View station at all early was moot, as the new stock wasn't in service for this express run; the older carriages, which accomdate 32 bicycles, were. And I was all set to bellyache about how I prefer the old to the new!

Should we, the public, spend $185,000 per (new) passenger to electrify Caltrain? Encourage the Dumbarton Rail plan? Extend BART to San Jose? Which will happen fastest?
Portland took a quick-and-dirty route to laying short-term rail: this encourages people to use transit, but means that the lines may not survive for a generation.