Santa Clara, CA
Stop on the proposed 17,000-mile maglev network. Next stop: San Jose, CA (3.4 mi).
About Santa Clara
Santa Clara is a city in Santa Clara County, California, United States. Located in the southern San Francisco Bay Area, it was founded by the Spanish in 1777 with the establishment of Mission Santa Clara de Asís under the leadership of Junípero Serra. The city's population was 127,647 at the 2020 census, making it the eighth-most populous city in the Bay Area.
Source: Wikipedia summary (full article). Population and facts as published there.
Cost breakdown (proposal-scale estimates — see math)
| Item | Basis | Estimate |
|---|---|---|
| Terminal construction | Large-city terminal (range $2–4B) | $3B |
| Land acquisition | Regional factor 1.5× on $200M base | $300M |
| Track: Santa Clara → San Jose | 3.4 mi × $500M/mi | $1.7B |
| Annual operations (share) | Staffing, power, maintenance | $60M/yr |
| Stop total (excl. annual ops) | $5.0B |
Best terminal location (proposed)
the Santa Clara Transit Center (Caltrain/Amtrak) district. Santa Clara's transit center links Caltrain, Capitol Corridor, ACE and VTA light rail in one place, with San Jose's airport minutes away. The station district sits amid the densest job cluster in Silicon Valley. It captures the north San Jose–Santa Clara employment core that drives the region's peak travel.
Before / after
Aerial mock-up (illustrative, not an engineering rendering). Left: the proposed site today. Right: with the maglev terminal.
- The Coleman Avenue corridor — commercial zone straddling the city line.
- San Jose's Stockton Avenue area — neighborhood on the approach to Diridon at the corridor's end.