Balboa Park (BART station)

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Balboa Park Station is a Bay Area Rapid Transit station located south of Balboa Park in San Francisco, California. It consists of an island platform. Interstate 280 runs along the west side of the station, and City College of San Francisco is to the north.

Balboa Park is currently the busiest BART station outside of downtown San Francisco.^[1] It is so busy because eight Muni bus lines stop in the area as well as three Muni Metro lines. In addition, the station is popular with passengers that kiss and ride because of the station's close proximity to Interstate 280. The station is also the southernmost station that can be ridden under a Muni FastPass as Daly City Station is just over the border into Daly City.

Balboa Park Station is an official transfer station. Even though the four BART lines that pass through here continue on to the Daly City Station, the latter station has more train platforms. Furthermore, Balboa Park is a major transportation hub with its multiple transit connections with MUNI.

Service at this station began on November 3, 1973.^[2]

1 Architectural innovation
2 Transit connections
3 References
4 External links

[edit] Architectural innovation

Unlike most other BART stations, which are either completely underground and artificially illuminated, or are elevated with natural daylight, the Balboa Park station connects the underground tunnels with a large, open trench, covered by a roof and wall structure above grade which admits light to the lowest levels. Each side of the grade level is connected across the trench with attractive arches, and large areas of wall surfaces are surfaced with rough textured concrete suggesting the natural surface of an excavation. Beyond detail, the overall structure is evocative of grand structures and arcades as might be seen in Europe. As most passengers will be passing through this station on the train, the architecturally curious may wish to get off here to inspect the station while awaiting the next train.