With BART Extension Imminent, San Jose Looks to Turn Suburb into Urban Village
- Mathew Hose
- Sep 3, 2019
- 5 min read
While many of the bedroom communities in Silicon Valley have clung to their residential character, even amid the Bay Area’s housing affordability crisis, San Jose has of late embraced a decidedly urban vision. Google plans to build a mixed-use headquarters downtown, and city leaders have advanced policies to make the state’s third-largest city into more of a city.
The city has a prime opportunity turn vision into reality than at Berryessa, a suburban neighborhood that will soon host Bay Area Rapid Transit’s first advance into Silicon Valley.
The $2.3 billion extension of the Richmond and Daly City BART lines, anticipated to begin service in December, will bring the passenger rail system 10 miles south from its current terminus in Warm Springs/South Fremont. The extension will include a new stop at the Milpitas Transit Center before it ends at Berryessa, just northeast of downtown San Jose.
In anticipation of BART, San Jose is currently working on the Berryessa BART Urban Village Plan, which would add around 4,800 housing units, 3 million square feet of commercial space and several acres of parks and trail connections to a 270-acre site just near the Berryessa station.
The extension is the first phase of a project that will ultimately bring BART service to Downtown San Jose, to the rail hub at Diridon Station and to Santa Clara. That second phase -- expected to cost $5.5 billion and be completed in 2026 -- would connect with Caltrain at Diridon and close the loop of rail service around much of the Bay Area.
