An "Away" Game Close to Home

[kevin_standlee]

The Giants play the A's this weekend in Oakland, Friday-Sunday. There seem to be plenty of seats available, including excellent, in/close for under $40. I'm thinking of going to at least one of them. It would be the first time I've seen a game that counted at the Coliseum. I'd take BART, of course. There's a Capitol Corridor train that would get me to the game at a convenient time, and I have several unused Capitol tickets sitting here, but getting home would be a hassle and would require me to either have to walk the 6 km home from BART late at night (doable, but inconvenient) or take a taxi.

For the benefit of those who don't know the Bay Area geography, the A's play in a ball park that's closer to me than the Giants ("my" team). The A's park is adjacent to a BART station, one I go to fairly regularly because it's also the connection for Oakland Airport.

There's a proposal to move the A's down here to Fremont where I live. I'm opposed to it, not because the A's are the "other team" -- as they play in the Other League, I don't really care about them that much -- but because they want to put the park far away from public transit connections and rely on shuttle buses to get people to and from BART. Whoever dreamed up that idea is either "a knave or a fool." That is, they either know it's a dumb idea but have to try and cover things so they can pull off the move, or they really think people will be happy with queuing for buses and inching through the traffic jams around the ball park. I sometimes wonder if the people who cook up these ideas ever take transit to an event themselves.

Buses are not a substitute for high-capacity rail transit.

Comments

[johno.livejournal.com]

If they would ever build that damned Warm Springs station....

[kevin-standlee.livejournal.com]

Construction, or at least advance work that will support the Warm Springs Extension, is actually under way in Fremont. The road work on Paseo Padre Parkway and Washington Blvd is part of it. You know how slow construction goes around here. *sigh*

But in any event, except for making the shuttle bus ride a little shorter, the Warm Springs extension is still no use for a prospective A's ballpark, which would be several miles away over near the Pacific Commons shopping center west of I-880 and Auto Mall Parkway. The Cisco Field Fact Sheet on the A's web site says, "Public transportation will be available from both the commuter train station as well as BART." Translation: Shuttle buses at best. Compare that to the existing park, which is attached to a BART and commuter rail station. They're happy to announce that "Approximately 9.000 parking spaces will be available within a comfortable walking radius of the ballpark, approximately 500 more than is currently available at the Coliseum." In short, the only practical way to get to a game would be to drive. That will clog up I-800 and all of the surface streets in the area worse that the current situation at the Coliseum, which is no picnic right now.

[johno.livejournal.com]

I miss understood.

I though the WSS would be part of the complex. I had not relized it's location had moved from Ball Park/United Motors area to the Pacific Commons area.

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Which means it also now crosses 880, which means even longer construction time.

[johno.livejournal.com]

BTW, we'll be at BASFA tonight.

Do you have Carla's CD with you?

[kevin-standlee.livejournal.com]

Now I do. I wouldn't have if you hadn't told me you were coming.

[kevin-standlee.livejournal.com]

No, the BART Warm Springs Extension will not cross I-880. It will end down near where Mission Blvd (officially CA-262) connects I-880 to I-680.

The baseball park, if it is built, which I hope will never happen, will be over on the west side of I-880 between the Pacific Commons shopping center and the Union Pacific (Capitol Corridor) railroad tracks.

The ball park and the BART station will be miles apart. They aren't connected to each other. Perhaps they won't be quite as far from each other as Oakland Airport is from BART's Coliseum/Airport station, but it's the same idea -- the distance won't generally be perceived as walkable.