iCaltrain: Caltrain Schedule for iPhone, gPhone, and Mobile Phones

Some good and some bad Caltrain news: baby bullet trains on weekends, but fewer trains on weekdays.

• Caltrain Fare Increase, Service Reductions Take Effect Jan. 1

Beginning Jan. 1, the Caltrain fare for each zone will increase 25 cents, with multi-ride tickets and passes adjusted accordingly. In addition, four midday trains will be eliminated. The changes were approved by the Caltrain Board of Directors in October to close a $2.3 million gap in the Fiscal Year 2010 operating budget.

• Caltrain to Test Weekend Baby Bullet Service

Beginning Jan. 1, 2011, Caltrain will introduce weekend Baby Bullet service, a pilot project aimed at increasing revenue and ridership for the rail system.

iCaltrain has been updated to show the new schedule, and the schedule is now color coded to show baby bullet and limited-stop trains.

The web version of iCaltrain now shows a yellow bike icon next to the 36 weekday trains that have an extra bike car. The App Store version will be updated in the next release.

iCaltrain v1.2 will show the new Caltrain schedule starting Aug 31, 2009.

 iCaltrain will be updated soon to reflect the upcoming schedule change:

“Beginning Aug. 31, eight midday trains will be eliminated between the hours of 10 a.m. and 2 p.m., so trains will operate hourly. This change will save the agency approximately $1.93 million.”

iCaltran now works on Palm Pre’s web browser. Simply point your Pre to http://icaltrain.com and you’ll see the Pre optimized version.

Are there Palm Pre users who’d like to see a native version? The preDevCamp is coming up this weekend at Palm’s headquarter in Sunnyvale. It’s a 30min walk from the Sunnyvale Caltrain station.

Google I/O is a 13-min walk (1Km/0.6mi) from the SF Caltrain station. Walking directions from Google Maps below:

Caltrain updated its schedule today (March 2) and the iCaltrain mobile web schedule has been updated to show the latest schedule. The iPhone / iPod Touch update (v1.1) for App Store has been submitted to Apple as well, and should appear as a free update in the next few days.

Quick summary:
- Weekdays: three southbound evening trains (192, 194, and 196) depart 10min later.
- Weekends: all southbound EXCEPT 454 departs 15min later.

The new schedule is now posted at Caltrain.com.

Quick summary:
- Weekdays: three southbound evening trains (192, 194, and 196) depart 10min later than current schedule.
- Weekends: all southbound EXCEPT 454 departs 15min later than current schedule.

iCaltrain for iPhone/iPod Touch will get a free v1.1 update in the coming weeks with the new schedule. The web schedule for iPhone, Android (gPhone) and other mobile phones will be updated on March 2, 2009.

There will be an upcoming Caltrain schedule change.

Trains that are affected:
1. Weekday Southbound Trains: 192, 194, 196
2. All Weekend Southbound trains except 454, the last train.

Also, the 8-ride fare is replacing the 10-ride tickets.

Caltrain introduced a $0.25 base increase on Jan 1, 2009. However, no schedule change took place in January. According to my sources at Caltrain, they simply misprinted the paper schedules with the notice. That explains why their website does not mention any schedule changes. The actual schedule change will take place in March 2009, and will be announced in Feb.

iCaltrain App v1.0 and the web app remain up-to-date on its schedule info. App v1.0.1 is now available in the App Store and shows the updated fare. I had hoped to get it into the App Store before the New Year, but I had to take several weeks off in December due to health reasons.

The March 2009 schedule change will be included in the free, v1.1 update, which I expect to submit to the App Store in mid-Feb. Schedule updates beyond 2009 will be released in a future version of iCaltrain.