I'm glad they're raising fares. The amount of people in proportion to the overall population of the area who use Caltrain is minimal. I never have used Caltrain and do not see any reason to. The cost for the new electrical system should be passed on to the riders instead of taxpayers who do not gain any benefit from this

And this will increase ridership how?

PV Res:

The benefit non-caltrain-riding taxpayers get is that it reduces traffic and congestion from the cars that would have otherwise been sharing the road with you.

'Operations and management costs have increased because of increased ridership and an aging diesel system' is NOT an excuse for raising fares.

If your aging locomotives are costing you money, lease newer locomotives - don't raise fares. The locomotive leasing market is very fluid. Your current locomotives are very smokey, so it is not like you need to be picky about getting an ultra clean locomotive.

If you have increased ridership then your income should increase, even if your fares don't change. If you need fare increases then somehow you are not running your system as well as you used to.

These days a good bit of the time I have to stand in an aisle, Caltrain doesn't even have to provide me with a seat. So I expect fares to go down, not up.

As John noted, the increased ridership should increase the operating income. If you ask the current riders, the most critical issues are:
1) crowed trains during the peak hours.
2) Infrequent trains in non-Rush our
3) No service to Gilroy except very limited at beginning & end of the day

All of these, and the reliability issue, can be solved by buying the new clean diesel locomotives (such as used by Amtrak in Oakland, Metrolink in LA & now BART) immediately and retiring the very old, dirty, current diesels. A very small part of the >$1 Billion now being spent of electrification (available in 5+ years) could drastically upgrade the service and take more people off the roads.

The real issue with Caltrain is that it is being run by a Bus Transportation Company (SamTrans) and "governed" by a politically appointed, non-qualified Government bureaucracy. Further, we will be asked (no - Told) to approve a special additional sales tax this fall that will be dedicated to Caltrain's operating expenses.

We need to say "No" & force Caltrain to run an efficient operation.

Why are the comments complaining about how the fare will affect the number of riders? Caltrain is currently over-capacity. Raising the prices to make demand match supply is just basic market economics. They can then invest the extra revenue into actually increasing capacity via electrification, which will improve things in the long run. Also basic market economics.