{"id":191380,"date":"2026-02-24T12:43:45","date_gmt":"2026-02-24T12:43:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/191380\/"},"modified":"2026-02-24T12:43:45","modified_gmt":"2026-02-24T12:43:45","slug":"the-grand-central-of-the-west-will-link-to-cas-high-speed-rail-heres-the-giant-tunnel-project-happening-under-sfs-streets","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/191380\/","title":{"rendered":"The ‘Grand Central Of The West’ Will Link To CA’s High-Speed Rail \u2014 Here’s The Giant Tunnel Project Happening Under SF\u2019s Streets"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"The<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tTransbay Joint Powers Authority \/ Will Truettner via Unsplash\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\"\"\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\t\u00a0\u2013\u00a0
\n\t\t\t\tSenior Staff Writer\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\u00a0\u00b7\u00a0
\n\t\t\tFebruary 23, 2026<\/p>\n

San Francisco\u2019s Salesforce Transit Center has a busy bus deck and a stunningly futuristic rooftop park<\/a>, earning an evocative nickname as the \u201cGrand Central of the West.\u201d<\/p>\n

But below the surface lies an empty, two-story rail station waiting to be connected to Caltrain and the future California High-Speed Rail line<\/a>. <\/p>\n

That missing link is a new 1.3-mile tunnel project called The Portal, an enormous underground effort that will take place out of sight beneath our feet. <\/p>\n

Here\u2019s a closer look\u2026<\/p>\n

\"SF's\"SF'sEngel Ching \/ Shutterstock<\/p>\n

A hidden station waiting for trains<\/p>\n

The six-level Salesforce Transit Center building opened in Downtown San Francisco in 2018, living up to its ambitious rendering with a verdant rooftop garden<\/a> and sleek interiors. And while its upper bus deck and ground-level plaza are already serving AC Transit, Greyhound, Muni, and Amtrak Thruway buses, there\u2019s more to look forward to over the next, well\u2026 several decades.<\/p>\n

The transit center is planned as the northern terminus for California\u2019s long-awaited bullet train to Southern California, A.K.A. California High-Speed Rail (CAHSR), which will share infrastructure with Caltrain. <\/p>\n

While the two-story \u201ctrain box\u201d is already built, it\u2019s still missing a tunnel to connect it to the future rail line. The Downtown Rail Extension, now called The Portal, is a 1.3-mile tunnel that will link Caltrain\u2019s current terminal at 4th & King to Salesforce Transit Center. This will ultimately create a connection to 11 transit systems from the Bay Area and Southern California. <\/p>\n

The project already has federal environmental clearance and is in the process of advancing design and funding agreements. According to a project schedule on the Transbay Joint Powers Authority (TJPA) website<\/a>, tunnel construction will begin in 2028-29, and the tunnel should be ready for service in 2035.<\/p>\n

\"CA\"CACourtesy of California High Speed Rail Authority<\/p>\n

What\u2019s going on with California\u2019s bullet train?<\/p>\n

Once The Portal is constructed, it will carry Caltrain \u2014 and later California High\u2011Speed Rail (CAHSR) trains \u2014 straight into the underground station beneath Salesforce Transit Center. <\/p>\n

We\u2019re nearing a major milestone in the CAHSR project, as 2026 is the year when work will finally transition from civil construction to high-speed track laying. The past 11 years of construction have been focused across 119 miles of the 171-mile Initial Operating Segment (IOS) in the Central Valley, which connects the Merced and Bakersfield extensions. You can read our article to learn more about the next steps<\/a> for this section, projected to open in 2032.<\/p>\n

Due to current funding and planning restrictions, there\u2019s still no firm projected opening date for the San Francisco-to-Los Angeles route, which would cover the distance between the two cities in 2 hours and 40 minutes. <\/p>\n

\ud83c\udf10\u00a0Learn more:\u00a0California High-Speed Rail Authority<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Transbay Joint Powers Authority \/ Will Truettner via Unsplash \u00a0\u2013\u00a0 Senior Staff Writer \u00a0\u00b7\u00a0 February 23, 2026 San…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":191381,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[101,103,102,104,106,105],"class_list":{"0":"post-191380","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-francisco","8":"tag-san-francisco","9":"tag-san-francisco-headlines","10":"tag-san-francisco-news","11":"tag-sf","12":"tag-sf-headlines","13":"tag-sf-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191380","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=191380"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191380\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/191381"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=191380"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=191380"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=191380"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}