I don’t understand the boosters saying BART and Caltrain are good systems. When I lived there, and part of the reason I left, those systems were frequently delayed, full of drug addicts, and they lacked comprehensive service throughout SF, requiring dependence on Muni, which is worse than the other 2. I don’t think those who say this is a great system have been exposed to how other places in the world handle these things.

1. I live and work around BART stations so it works well for me 2. I just ignore the drug addicts 3. The delays are there but it all works well enough to be very useful

I've never experienced any of these on Caltrain in the last ~10 years, for what it's worth.

Maybe you were the drug addict?

Really? You haven't seen frequent delays in the last decade?

Not even for the (sadly) semi-regular pedestrian fatalities that happen once or twice a month? Those usually delay trains for over an hour.

Caltrain's own reports say there are hundreds of late trains every month.

Caltrain is no slouch - punctual, clean, safe, really good wifi, electric.

It also doesn’t get you around the city (and isn’t near any significant number of schools).

It is good for getting in and out, assuming you already have a way of getting to the Caltrain station which isn’t exactly in the center of the city.

Eventually Caltrain will go to Salesforce tower

That is the baseline, not a high bar.