A Case Study of California's Lowest-Ranked Transit Station

Mark Srikishnan provides a case study of the worst rail station in the state of California—that dubious distinction courtesy of the metric produced by a report recently released by Next 10, which graded the state's 489 rail stations on their connection to their surrounding neighborhood.

The lowest scoring station of all 489 stations: the Gillespie Field trolley station, located in El Cajon on the Green Line of the San Diego Metropolitan Transit System. According to Srikishnan, the station is located near the county-owned Gillespie Field Airport, but not much else.

The isolation of the station did not fare well with the criteria of the study, described by Srikishnan: "There needed to be a high number of residents or employees in the surrounding areas who actually relied on public transportation. The station needed to be near amenities, like stores, banks and restaurants. It also needed to encourage walking with features like dense housing, sidewalks and cross-walks. The study also looked at home values, crime rates and any future plans for development in the transit areas."

So, for instance, the Gillespie Station earns a Walkscore of 32. Srikishnan also reports that development plans on the table in 1995, when the station originally opened, failed to materialize. Both CalTrans and the San Diego Association of Governments have targeted the Gillespie Field for growth, and "El Cajon recently submitted a proposal to SANDAG for funds to actually make some of these visions a reality."