The Transbay Transit Center (officially the Salesforce Transit Center for sponsorship purposes) is a transit station in downtown

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17th ...

. It serves as the primary bus terminal — and potentially as a future rail terminal — for the

San Francisco Bay Area The San Francisco Bay Area, often referred to as simply the Bay Area, is a populous region surrounding the San Francisco, San Pablo, and Suisun Bay estuaries in Northern California. The Bay Area is defined by the Association of Bay Area Gover ...

. The centerpiece of the

San Francisco Transbay development The San Francisco Transbay development is a completed redevelopment plan for the neighborhood surrounding the Transbay Transit Center site, South of Market near the Financial District in San Francisco, California. The new transit center replaced t ...

, the construction is governed by the

Transbay Joint Powers Authority The San Francisco Transbay development is a completed redevelopment plan for the neighborhood surrounding the Transbay Transit Center site, South of Market near the Financial District in San Francisco, California. The new transit center replaced t ...

(TJPA). The building is located one block south of Market Street, a primary commercial and transportation artery in San Francisco. Construction of the new terminal was necessitated by the

1989 Loma Prieta earthquake The 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake occurred on California's Central Coast on October 17 at local time. The shock was centered in The Forest of Nisene Marks State Park in Santa Cruz County, approximately northeast of Santa Cruz on a section of ...

, which damaged the 1939-opened

Transbay Terminal The San Francisco Transbay Terminal was a transportation complex in San Francisco, California, United States, roughly in the center of the rectangle bounded north–south by Mission Street and Howard Street, and east–west by Beale Street and ...

, and voters approved funds for the new Transbay Transit Center in 1999. Construction on the first phase, the aboveground bus terminal, began in 2010. Limited

Muni Muni may refer to: Municipal * A common US abbreviation for municipal, municipal services, and the like *Municipal bond *Municipal Bridge, the former name of the George Rogers Clark Memorial Bridge in Louisville, Kentucky *"Muni", slang for a mun ...

bus service began in December 2017, and full service from AC Transit and other regional and intercity bus operators began in August 2018. Full funding has not yet been secured for the second phase of construction, the

Downtown Rail Extension The Downtown Rail Extension (DTX) is a planned second phase of the San Francisco Transbay Transit Center (TTC). When complete, it will extend the Caltrain Peninsula Corridor commuter rail line from its current northern terminus at 4th and King ...

, which hopes to add an underground terminal station for

Caltrain Caltrain (reporting mark JPBX) is a California commuter rail line serving the San Francisco Peninsula and Santa Clara Valley (Silicon Valley). The southern terminus is in San Jose at Tamien station with weekday rush hour service running as far ...

and

California High-Speed Rail California High-Speed Rail (also known as CAHSR or CHSR) is a publicly funded high-speed rail system currently under construction in California in the United States. Planning for the project began in 1996, when the California Legislature and Gove ...

. The transit center was abruptly ordered closed on September 25, 2018, following the discovery of a crack in a steel beam supporting the rooftop park. A crack in a second beam was found the next day. Repairs to these beams were completed in May 2019, while construction and road closures related to building issues were still ongoing. The rooftop park reopened on July 1; bus service that uses the surface level resumed on July 13. Full bus service resumed at the transit center on August 11, 2019.

Design

Designed by Pelli Clarke Pelli Architects (PCPA), the Salesforce Transit Center is about long and wide. It occupies the entire block between Minna and Natoma Streets (just southeast of Mission Street), and stretches from Beale Street to east of 2nd Street. The first phase of the project includes the aboveground structure plus a belowground shell for the second phase. The structure has four levels: the ground floor with entrances, retail space, ticketing, and Muni/Golden Gate Transit boarding platforms; the second floor with retail space, food hall, offices, and Greyhound ticket counter and waiting room; the bus deck with bus bays surrounding a central waiting area; and the rooftop park. The bus deck has a dedicated highway ramp (consisting, in part, of a

cable-stayed bridge A cable-stayed bridge has one or more ''towers'' (or ''pylons''), from which cables support the bridge deck. A distinctive feature are the cables or stays, which run directly from the tower to the deck, normally forming a fan-like pattern ...

) to the San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge and an off-site bus storage facility under the western Bay Bridge approach. In order to allow buses with doors on the right to serve the central (island) platform on the bus deck, buses circulate clockwise (i.e., driving on the left) while inside the terminal. The bus bridge includes a

traffic light Traffic lights, traffic signals, or stoplights – known also as robots in South Africa are signalling devices positioned at road intersections, pedestrian crossings, and other locations in order to control flows of traffic. Traffic lights ...

to facilitate the transition between right-hand traffic (outside the transit center) and left-hand traffic (inside the transit center). The rooftop park, designed by

PWP Landscape Architecture Peter Walker is an American landscape architect and the founder of PWP Landscape Architecture. Early life Peter Walker The inclusion of the park was part of the winning bid in the architectural design composition for the structure. The building includes a free

aerial tram An aerial tramway, sky tram, cable car, ropeway, aerial tram, telepherique, or seilbahn is a type of aerial lift which uses one or two stationary ropes for support while a third moving rope provides propulsion. With this form of lift, the grip ...

to provide access from the street level (at Mission Street and Fremont Street) to the rooftop park. The tram vehicle has a capacity of twenty passengers. Upon completion (anticipated by September 24, 2018), the system will be the first aerial tram to operate in San Francisco since the closure of the tram at the Cliff House in 1961. The second phase of the project, constructed as part of the

, will add a two-level underground train station to be served by

and

. The platform area will have three island platforms serving six tracks. A mezzanine with ticketing and waiting areas will be located above the platform and below the ground-level entrances. A pedestrian tunnel will be constructed below Beale Street to Embarcadero station, connecting the Transbay Transit Center with

BART Bart is a masculine given name, usually a diminutive of Bartholomew, sometimes of Barton, Bartolomeo, etc. Bart is a Dutch and Ashkenazi Jewish surname, and derives from the name ''Bartholomäus'', a German form of the biblical name ''Barth ...

and Muni Metro. The proposed second Transbay Tube, which may be used by Caltrain, CAHSR, and/or BART, may also connect to the Transit Center. This extension would cost as much as $6 billion on top of the $2 billion already spent, and is currently unfunded.

Public art

Based on the policies established by the FTA encouraging the inclusion of public art in transportation facilities, the TJPA committed $4.75 million to fund the creation of public artwork for the Program. Working with the San Francisco Arts Commission, the TJPA oversees the planning and development of the public art program. Initially there were five artists included in the program: James Carpenter, Julie Chang, Tim Hawkinson,

Jenny Holzer Jenny Holzer (born July 29, 1950) is an American neo-conceptual artist, based in Hoosick, New York. The main focus of her work is the delivery of words and ideas in public spaces and includes large-scale installations, advertising billboards, p ...

and

Ned Kahn Ned Kahn is an environmental artist and sculptor, known in particular for museum exhibits he has built for the Exploratorium in San Francisco. His works usually intend to capture an invisible aspect of nature and make it visible. Early life Kahn ...

. In June 2017, SFAC and TJPA announced the planned Hawkinson installation would be cancelled as "the nature of the materials, the sculpture's size, and its location" made it "a particularly complex engineering task." *James Carpenter's installation, titled ''Parallel Light Fields'', consists of illuminated ceiling segments and benches along Shaw Alley, a pedestrian/retail corridor at ground level beneath the Transit Center. *Julie Chang's installation, titled ''The Secret Garden'', is the decorated terrazzo floor of the Grand Hall in the Transit Center. *Jenny Holzer's installation, titled ''White Light'', is a large scrolling LED sign approximately high, displaying text specific to the San Francisco Bay Area. The sign is installed just below the elliptical skylight of the Grand Hall in the Transit Center. *Ned Kahn's installation, titled ''Bus Jet Fountain'', consists of water jets on the rooftop of the Transit Center. The jets are designed to respond to the flow of buses on the deck below. *Tim Hawkinson's planned installation was a high sculpture to serve as a "guardian" for travelers. It was to have been partially constructed from material salvaged from the demolition of the Transbay Terminal, but due to cost and engineering issues, was cancelled.

History

Planning

AC Transit buses at Transbay Terminal (21284664895)

The original

opened in 1939 to serve Key System and

East Bay Electric Lines The East Bay Electric Lines were a unit of the Southern Pacific Railroad that operated electric interurban-type trains in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area.Tufveson.Ford (1977). Beginning in 1862, the SP and its predecessors opera ...

commuter trains and

Sacramento Northern Railway The Sacramento Northern Railway (reporting mark SN) was a electric interurban railway that connected Chico in northern California with Oakland via the California capital, Sacramento. In its operation it ran directly on the streets of Oaklan ...

interurban trains operating over the new Bay Bridge. It was converted to a bus terminal in 1958 and began serving AC Transit commuter buses. The structure was damaged in the

, necessitating replacement. In 1995,

agreed to study extending its commuter rail service from its Fourth and King terminus closer to the Financial District, including whether the obsolete Transbay Terminal should be removed, remodeled, or rebuilt. Ultimately, it was decided that the Transbay Terminal should be rebuilt, with the rail extension entering the Terminal under Second Street. In November 1999, San Francisco voters adopted Proposition H declaring that

shall be extended downtown into a new regional intermodal transit station constructed to replace the former Transbay Terminal. The Transbay Joint Powers Authority (TJPA) was founded in 2001 as the administrative joint powers authority for the project. The final Environmental Impact Report (EIR) was published in 2004. The project was divided into two phases, with Phase 1 being demolition of the original terminal and construction of the Transbay Transit Center, and Phase 2 being the downtown rail extension (DTX). In 2006, developers agreed to a new

Mello-Roos Community Facilities Districts (CFDs), more commonly known as Mello-Roos, are special districts established by local governments in California as a means of obtaining additional public funding. Counties, cities, special districts, joint powers aut ...

tax district in the area surrounding the Transbay Transit Center in order for permits for higher buildings to move forward. San Francisco set the tax rate in 2012 at 0.55 percent of assessed value; due to rising real estate prices, however, the 2014 tax burden had risen by nearly 50% compared to the 2012 tax burden, and the developers threatened to pull their building plans entirely or sue the city. The lawsuits never materialized, however. On September 20, 2007, the design proposed by

César Pelli César Pelli (October 12, 1926 – July 19, 2019) was an Argentine-American architect who designed some of the world's tallest buildings and other major urban landmarks. Two of his most notable buildings are the Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur ...

of Pelli Clarke Pelli Architects was chosen for both the Transit Center and the Transbay Tower, now known as Salesforce Tower.

Construction

The first phase of construction consisted of the aboveground bus terminal, including retail spaces and the rooftop park, plus the concrete shell of the underground rail levels. It cost $2.4 billion, of which $500 million was for the underground shell. On August 7, 2010, all bus service was moved to the interim Temporary Transbay Terminal. The $18 million outdoor terminal is located on the block bounded by Folsom, Beale, Howard and Main Streets in the South of Market district, two blocks from the site of the former Transbay Terminal. Ground was broken for the new Transbay Transit Center four days later. Much of the initial construction work was underground, and aboveground evidence of construction did not appear until late 2014. As originally planned, the Transit Center was anticipated to be complete by late 2016, with bus operations expected to commence by August 2017. Demolition of the former Transbay Terminal and ramps was completed in September 2011.

Amtrak Thruway Amtrak Thruway is a system of through-ticketed transportation services to connect passengers with areas not served by Amtrak trains. In most cases these are dedicated motorcoach routes, but can also be non-dedicated intercity bus services, transit ...

bus service, which connects to Amtrak trains at

Emeryville station Emeryville station is an Amtrak station in Emeryville, California, United States. The station is served by the ''California Zephyr'', ''Capitol Corridor'', ''Coast Starlight'', and ''San Joaquins''. The station is the primary connection point for ...

, moved from the

Ferry Station Post Office Building The Ferry Station Post Office Building, also known as the Agriculture Building, is a historic building in San Francisco, California San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the ...

to the Temporary Transbay Terminal on March 2, 2015. Under a naming rights deal announced on July 7, 2017, the transit center was given the official name of Salesforce Transit Center; the adjoined City Park took the official name Salesforce Park. The first phase of the new Transit Center was originally to be completed by the end of 2017. This was delayed to March 2018 in July 2017, and to June 2018 that December. On December 26, 2017, Muni began operating route buses into the ground level of the terminal in order to meet the federal deadline of some service to the terminal beginning in 2017. On June 16, 2018, Muni began operating all , , , , and buses to the surface level of the terminal.

Opening

The first phase opened for full bus service on August 12, 2018; the rooftop park opened on the same date. Greyhound and BoltBus service moved from the Temporary Transbay Terminal three days later on August 15, leaving Amtrak Thruway as the sole remaining bus operator using the Temporary Transbay Terminal. Amtrak buses began using a street-level stop at Salesforce Plaza on Mission Street near Fremont Street on October 28, 2019. That stop was temporarily relocated along Mission Street to near 2nd Street on November 9, 2020. Without the revenue from the 100,000 expected rail passengers, the bus-only terminal is expected to lose as much as $20 million annually.

Extended closure

Repairs at the Transbay Transit Center in 2018-0128

The transit center was abruptly ordered closed on September 25, 2018—six weeks after opening and during Salesforce's annual Dreamforce conference—following the discovery by workers installing the final ceiling panels of a “major crack” in a steel beam supporting the bus deck above Fremont Street. Beale, Fremont, and First Streets were closed beneath and adjacent to the transit center; Beale and First reopened soon after. The Temporary Transbay Terminal, which had been in use during construction of the new transit center, was hastily reopened to serve riders. The following day, a second, parallel beam was also found to be cracked, causing the transit center and Fremont Street to remain closed at least through the end of the following week. On October 2, 2018, it was reported that the Transit Center would remain closed at least through the end of the month. Fremont Street reopened on October 15. A Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) peer review panel investigated whether the cracks may have been caused by flaws that developed in the steel during fabrication, plus by stress concentrations arising from

weld access hole The weld access hole or rat hole is a structural engineering technique in which a part of the web of an I-beam or T-beam is cut out at the end or ends of the beam. The hole in the web allows a welder to weld the flange to another part of the str ...

s or ''weld termination holes'' cut into the beams, that were added after the shop designs were submitted for approval. Weld access holes have more stringent building code requirements than weld termination holes, and it was not clear which type of holes were added. In February 2019, the TJPA announced that it expected repairs to be completed in June 2019, but cautioned that the center would not reopen until the MTC peer review panel published its final report. In April 2019, it was determined that the cracks were caused when crews welding the beams together skipped a crucial step—mandated by the building code—that led to tiny micro-cracks forming. Multiple inspections failed to notice the skipped step, and those micro-cracks grew into larger ones. The facility is under warranty for two years "after substantial completion", placing financial responsibility for the issue on contractors,

Webcor Builders Webcor is a commercial construction contractor with headquarters in San Francisco, California. The firm also has regional offices in Alameda, Los Angeles, San Diego, San Jose, and Hawaii, and is among the largest builders in California with cl ...

and Obayashi Corporation, and their subcontractors. The beams were fabricated by Herrick Corporation in Stockton as part of a $189 million contract between Skanska USA Civil West of New York and the TJPA. The TJPA announced on May 10 that repairs were complete. The rooftop park reopened on July 1, 2019. Muni and Golden Gate Transit buses resumed using the surface bus plaza on July 13, and the full facility reopened on August 11.

Other issues and criticism

The park has been criticized for allowing a commercial company to own the naming rights, as well as not having enough bike lanes connecting to other major transit routes. ''Wired'' criticized the park for its control over access, claiming that there could never be a political demonstration at the park. In September 2018, just a month after the transit center's opening, the TJPA revealed that the walkway around the rooftop park, made of decomposed granite, had begun to deteriorate much faster than expected. Repairs on the pathway were completed in May 2019, but it is not clear if the costs fall under warranty.

New skyscrapers

Along with the new transit center, thirteen towers have been built or proposed on adjacent parcels, ranging from to tall, on land freed by the demolition of the former terminal and bus and freeway ramps. The most prominent of these is the city's new tallest building, Salesforce Tower. Two of the skyscrapers, Salesforce Tower and 181 Fremont, are linked directly to the rooftop park. Salesforce Tower has a dedicated pair of elevators, open to the public and accessible via the rear lobby, which serve as one of the access points to the park.

Bus services

The following services use the bus deck: * AC Transit: B, C, CB, E, F, FS, G, H, J, L, LA, NL, NX, NX1, NX2, NX3, NX4, NXC, O, OX, P, S, SB, V, W, Z, 705 * Greyhound Lines *

: *

WestCAT WestCAT is a public transportation service in western Contra Costa County (north of Oakland, CA). It is a service of the Western Contra Costa Transit Authority. The Western Contra Costa County Transit (WestCAT) was established in August 1977 as ...

: LYNX Several additional services use the street-level transit plaza: * Muni: , , , , , *

Golden Gate Transit Golden Gate Transit (GGT) is a public transportation system serving the North Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area in California, United States. It primarily serves Marin County, Sonoma County, and San Francisco, and also provides limited se ...

101 101 may refer to: * 101 (number), the number * AD 101, a year in the 2nd century AD * 101 BC, a year in the 2nd century BC It may also refer to: Entertainment * ''101'' (album), a live album and documentary by Depeche Mode * "101" (song), ...

, 114,

130 130 may refer to: *130 (number) *AD 130 *130 BC Thirteen or 13 may refer to: * 13 (number), the natural number following 12 and preceding 14 * One of the years 13 BC, AD 13, 1913, 2013 Music * 13AD (band), an Indian classic and hard rock band ...

132 132 may refer to: *132 (number) *AD 132 *132 BC __NOTOC__ Year 132 BC was a year of the pre-Julian Roman calendar. At the time it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Laenas and Rupilius (or, less frequently, year 622 ''Ab urbe condita'') ...

150 150 may refer to: *150 (number), a natural number *AD 150, a year in the 2nd century AD *150 BC, a year in the 2nd century BC *150 Regiment RLC *Combined Task Force 150 See also * List of highways numbered 150 The following highways are numbered ...

154 Year 154 ( CLIV) was a common year starting on Monday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Aurelius and Lateranus (or, less frequently, year 907 ''Ab urbe cond ...

, 172 Numerous other transit services converge into downtown San Francisco with stops nearby. These include

and Muni Metro at Embarcadero station and Montgomery Street station, Golden Gate Transit peak-only routes (with stops on Fremont Street), Muni bus and streetcar routes, several

SamTrans SamTrans (stylized as samTrans; officially the San Mateo County Transit District) is a public transport agency in and around San Mateo, California, in the San Francisco Bay Area. It provides bus service throughout San Mateo County and into porti ...

routes, AC Transit route 800, and the

Presidio Go Shuttle Presidio Go Shuttle (formerly PresidiGo) is a public transit system in San Francisco, California serving the San Francisco Presidio. The service includes two routes: the "South Hills" route providing circulator service within the Presidio, and the ...

. ,

Amtrak Thruway Motorcoach Amtrak Thruway is a system of through-ticketed transportation services to connect passengers with areas not served by Amtrak trains. In most cases these are dedicated motorcoach routes, but can also be non-dedicated intercity bus services, trans ...

also uses a surface stop outside the terminal - despite previous plans to use the bus deck - due to disagreements between the TJPA and other agencies about costs.

Future rail service

The Transbay Transit Center project was designed to include a tunnel (the Downtown Rail Extension or DTX) extending the terminus of the Caltrain commuter rail line from its current location at Fourth and King Streets; the downtown Caltrain extension is projected to alleviate roadway traffic and Caltrain rider delays, resulting in an estimated $20 million savings per year. The Caltrain extension depends on the electrification of its rolling stock, as the current diesel engines are not appropriate for tunnel service. When this project is completed, Caltrain riders would no longer need to transfer to Muni to reach the downtown financial district. The heavy rail portion of the terminal would be designed to accommodate the planned

high speed rail High-speed rail (HSR) is a type of rail system that runs significantly faster than traditional rail, using an integrated system of specialised rolling stock and dedicated tracks. While there is no single standard that applies worldwide, lines ...

from Los Angeles, which shares the right-of-way (Peninsula Corridor) with Caltrain between San Francisco and San Jose.

has expressed interest in having their proposed Second Transbay Tube connect to the new terminal and Alameda. DTX was planned to open for rail service in 2019 at a budgeted cost of . The DTX scope also includes moving the existing 4th & King Caltrain station underground. Part of the DTX project also includes building out two below-grade levels below the TTC. One level would serve as the actual train platform, hosting six tracks and three platforms to accommodate Caltrain and HSR service. The other level would be a passenger waiting area, including ticket sales and retail amenities. The waiting area would be connected via tunnel to the BART/Muni Metro Embarcadero Station. , cost projections for the extension run as high as $6 billion, of which only $1 billion in funding sources has been identified. The project would not be completed until 2029 at the earliest. It is also doubted if the terminal as built can handle the expected amount of Caltrain traffic.

Gallery

File:Salesforce Transit Center bus bridge.jpg,

Cable-stayed A cable-stayed bridge has one or more ''towers'' (or ''pylons''), from which cables support the bridge deck. A distinctive feature are the cables or stays, which run directly from the tower to the deck, normally forming a fan-like pattern ...

bus bridge, viewed from the rooftop park File:Transbay Transit Center, on the day after the opening-7123.jpg, View of Salesforce Park on top of the bus terminal File:Salesforce Transit Center Grand Hall.jpg, The Grand Hall, with escalators to the 3rd floor bus deck and a portion of Julie Chang's terrazzo floor, titled ''The Secret Garden'' File:Salesforce Transit Center Grand Hall atrium.jpg, Grand Hall atrium, with

's work ''White Light'' visible behind the central columns File:Transbay Transit Center, July 2019-7516.jpg, Amphitheater in the rooftop park

References

External links

* {{Caltrain Proposed public transportation in the San Francisco Bay Area South of Market, San Francisco Proposed California High-Speed Rail stations Buildings and structures under construction in the United States 2018 establishments in California Bus stations in San Francisco Transit centers in the United States Aerial tramways in the United States Future Caltrain stations Salesforce