Embarcadero Station

From SFWiki

Embarcadero Station is the easternmost of seven subway stations below Market Street and one of the four shared downtown stations with service by both Muni Metro and the regional BART system.

As the name implies the station is located near The Embarcadero with the Ferry Building located just one block away. Ferries are just one of the service

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History

The original plan did not include Embarcadero Station which would have ended at Montgomery Station before BART entered the Transbay Tube.

The State had agreed to fund the distance between the eastern-most San Francisco and western-most Oakland stations, encouraging plans to make that gap as long as possible. SPUR (San Francisco Planning and Urban Research, website) is credited as, almost single-handedly, making Embarcadero Station a reality. This is their own account of what happened from their history page:

"SPUR recognized that new development, stimulated by the Redevelopment Area, was rapidly moving east of the Montgomery Street Station and an additional stop was going to be vital.

"John Jacobs, then Deputy Director of SPUR, described what happened next: 'SPUR realized that somehow another station had to be financed. One day while shaving at home I came up with the idea of expanding the Golden Gate Redevelopment Project and selling tax bonds to finance the new station. Well, once Terrell Hill, who was our Transportation Committee Chairman and a BART fanatic, heard about this, he was out the door in a flash, lobbying for the boundary change and raising some $250,000 for designing the new station.'

"SPUR proposed realigning the Golden Gateway Redevelopment Project to include the new Embarcadero Station so that it would be eligible for tax increment financing to pay for the estimated $35 million cost. This was done under the direction of Justin Herman. Without that contribution it is very likely BART today would be without the crucial Embarcadero Station."

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