San Mateo is an important Caltrain Station that receives service from many of the express Caltrain trips that bypass other stations including a few Baby Bullet Express trains in the San Fransico-bound Peak Direction only (from S.F. in the AM, two in the PM). The weekend Baby Bullets also stops. The station also had a ticket office until it was closed between 2003 and 2004. The original SP station was demolished in 1974 to make way for a parking structure, the current San Mateo Transit Center was dedicated on September 23, 2000 and has a 'retro' look with its own signage format generally of white all caps text on a maroon background. These circular looking signs dot the light green lampposts along both platforms.
The station has two side platforms for the two-track line that begin at the grade-crossing of 1st Avenue and run north. From a birds eye view and street level the stop looks like a normal downtown station. Along the San Jose-bound platform is a large retro-looking transit center with an adobe colored (but made of concrete) clock tower and gabled roof shingled eves covering portions of the platform beneath. There are a couple of interior areas, none-open to the riding public. The main concession of the station is a branch of the Melting Pot Fondue Restaurant, the opposite of an establishment designed for a quick coffee before catching your train. There is a small parking lot just north of the building and at the northern end of it is a sign for the Transit Center Parking garage and a parking car ramp that gradually curves underground to a large parking garage beneath the surface of the station and ground-level. To provide parkers access to the trains a pedestrian tunnel is along the northern edge of the station building. This tunnel has an elevator and staircase up to both platforms. It arrives at the San Francisco-bound platform (that has Railroad Avenue running parallel to it) beneath a complicated gable-roofed and shingled canopy structure that covers about two cars. Across 1 Avenue from the station is a regular 4 story parking garage, the Main Street Parking Structure dedicated January 2005 with certain spaces that can be used for commuter parking. Most parking here is controlled by the city and not Caltrain and costs 25¢ to 50¢ per hour.
Burlingame