1.
Palo Alto, California
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Palo Alto is a charter city located in the northwest corner of Santa Clara County, California, in the San Francisco Bay Area of the United States. The city shares its borders with East Palo Alto, Mountain View, Los Altos, Los Altos Hills, Stanford, Portola Valley and it is named after a coast redwood tree called El Palo Alto. Palo Alto was established by Leland Stanford Sr. when he founded Stanford University, following the death of his son and it has also served as an incubator to several other high-technology companies such as Google, Facebook, Logitech, Intuit, Pinterest, and PayPal. As of the 2010 census, the total resident population is 64,403. Palo Alto is one of the most expensive cities in the United States, the recorded history of Palo Alto dates back to 1769, when Gaspar de Portolá noted an Ohlone settlement. This remains an area of known Indian mounds, a plaque at Middlefield Road and Embarcadero Road commemorates the area. The city got its name from a tall coast redwood tree, named El Palo Alto, a plaque there recounts the story of the Portolà expedition, a 63-man, 200-horse expedition from San Diego to Monterey from November 7–11,1769. The group overshot Monterey in the fog and when they reached modern-day Pacifica, they ascended Sweeney Ridge, thinking the bay was too wide to cross, the group retraced their journey to Monterey, never becoming aware of the Golden Gate entrance to the Bay. Located south of the San Francisquito Creek, west of todays I-280, in 1835, Rafael Soto and family settled near the San Francisquito Creek near Newell and Middlefield, selling goods to travelers. Rafael Soto died in 1839, but his wife, Maria Antonia Mesa, was granted Rancho Rinconada del Arroyo de San Francisquito in 1841, in 1839, their daughter María Luisa Soto married John Coppinger, who was the grantee of Rancho Cañada de Raymundo. Rancho Cañada de Raymundo was West of San Francisquito Creek, and began at Alambique Creek, the border of Rancho Corte de Madera. Bear Gulch Creek flowed on his land in Portola Valley, the rancho also abutted Buelnas grant near Skyline Boulevard and Matadero Creek. Upon Coppingers death, Maria inherited it and later married a visiting boat captain, Greer owned a home on the site that is now Town & Country Village on Embarcadero and El Camino Real. Greer Avenue and Court are named for him, to the west of Rafael Soto, near El Camino and following the Creek, was Rancho San Francisquito granted in 1839 to Antonio Buelna and wife Maria Concepcion. To the south of the Sotos, the brothers Secundino and Teodoro Robles in 1849 bought Rancho Rincon de San Francisquito from José Peña, where the Joness house was, then east down Arastradero Rd. to the north property line of Alta Mesa Memorial Park and Terman Park. The property then went along the bay to the Embarcadero, a boundary in the day, then up to the Stanford University gates, up Galvez. The grant was bounded on the south by Mariano Castros Rancho Pastoria de las Borregas grant across San Antonio Road, thats the Robles Rancho, about 80% of Palo Alto and Stanford University. It was whittled down by 1863 through courts to 6,981 acres, stories say their grand hacienda was built on the former meager adobe of José Peña near Ferne off San Antonio Road, midway between Middlefield and Alma Street
2.
Stanford University
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Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California, adjacent to Palo Alto and between San Jose and San Francisco. Its 8, 180-acre campus is one of the largest in the United States, Stanford also has land and facilities elsewhere. The university was founded in 1885 by Leland and Jane Stanford in memory of their only child, Stanford was a former Governor of California and U. S. Senator, he made his fortune as a railroad tycoon. The school admitted its first students 125 years ago on October 1,1891, Stanford University struggled financially after Leland Stanfords death in 1893 and again after much of the campus was damaged by the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. Following World War II, Provost Frederick Terman supported faculty and graduates entrepreneurialism to build self-sufficient local industry in what would later be known as Silicon Valley. The university is one of the top fundraising institutions in the country. There are three schools that have both undergraduate and graduate students and another four professional schools. Students compete in 36 varsity sports, and the university is one of two institutions in the Division I FBS Pac-12 Conference. Stanford faculty and alumni have founded a number of companies that produce more than $2.7 trillion in annual revenue. It is the alma mater of 30 living billionaires,17 astronauts and it is also one of the leading producers of members of the United States Congress. Sixty Nobel laureates and seven Fields Medalists have been affiliated with Stanford as students, alumni, Stanford University was founded in 1885 by Leland and Jane Stanford, dedicated to Leland Stanford Jr, their only child. The institution opened in 1891 on Stanfords previous Palo Alto farm, despite being impacted by earthquakes in both 1906 and 1989, the campus was rebuilt each time. In 1919, The Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace was started by Herbert Hoover to preserve artifacts related to World War I, the Stanford Medical Center, completed in 1959, is a teaching hospital with over 800 beds. The SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, which was established in 1962, in 2008, 60% of this land remained undeveloped. Besides the central campus described below, the university also operates at more remote locations, some elsewhere on the main campus. Stanfords main campus includes a place within unincorporated Santa Clara County. The campus also includes land in unincorporated San Mateo County, as well as in the city limits of Menlo Park, Woodside. The academic central campus is adjacent to Palo Alto, bounded by El Camino Real, Stanford Avenue, Junipero Serra Boulevard, the United States Postal Service has assigned it two ZIP codes,94305 for campus mail and 94309 for P. O. box mail
3.
East Palo Alto, California
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East Palo Alto is a city in San Mateo County, California, United States. As of the 2010 census, the population of East Palo Alto was 28,155 and it is situated on the San Francisco Peninsula, roughly halfway between the cities of San Francisco and San Jose. To the north and east is the San Francisco Bay, to the west is the city of Menlo Park, despite being called East Palo Alto, this is a misnomer, as the city is precisely due north of Palo Alto. While often incorrectly assumed to be part of the city of Palo Alto and it is also in San Mateo County, while Palo Alto is in Santa Clara County. The two cities are separated only by San Francisquito Creek and, largely, the Bayshore Freeway, East Palo Alto and Palo Alto share both telephone area codes and postal ZIP codes. 43% of East Palo Altos residents were African Americans in 1990, latinos now constitute about 65% of the total population, while the proportion of African Americans has decreased to about 15%. A small minority of Pacific Islanders also reside in East Palo Alto, East Palo Alto has the largest concentration of Pacific Islanders of any American city or town outside of Hawaii. In the past, East Palo Alto experienced profound crime and poverty, especially during the 1980s and early 1990s. In 1992, it had the highest homicide rate in the country with 24,322 people, since then the citys crime problems have subsided, and the murder rate in particular has declined to a typical urban level. In 2006, East Palo Alto experienced a comparatively low six murders, seven in 2007, the prosperity that benefited the Silicon Valley during the dot-com boom of the late 1990s largely bypassed East Palo Alto. The Ravenswood City School District, which serves East Palo Alto, eventually, however, the Peninsulas shortage of land and soaring property prices meant that even East Palo Alto became an option for urban regeneration. Until recently, gentrification has been rare in East Palo Alto, the city has torn down Whiskey Gulch and replaced it with the University Circle office complex. A 200-room Four Seasons hotel opened in University Circle in 2006, the Ohlone tribe of Native Americans inhabited this area at least by 1500 to 1000 BCE. One tumulus was discovered in 1951 during development of the University Village subdivision near todays Costaño School, after a year-long excavation of 60 graves and 3,000 artifacts, researchers concluded Native Americans had utilized the area as a cemetery and camp, rather than as a permanent settlement. In later years another mound was found near Willow Road and the railroad right-of-way, from the 1850s through the 1940s, East Palo Alto went through many changes. In 1849, Isaiah Woods attempted to make East Palo Alto a major shipping town, in 1868, after Woods investments failed he sold the wharf to Lester Cooley, who built a brick factory. When the brick factory closed down, it reverted to a farming community, with the outbreak of World War I, the north side of East Palo Alto became a military training ground, of which only the Veterans Administration Hospital in Menlo Park still exists. In the 1940s, East Palo Alto was a community with many Japanese residents
4.
Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority
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It is one of the governing parties for the Caltrain commuter rail line that serves the county. In 1969, Santa Clara County had three private bus companies, all of which were in financial trouble, Peninsula Transit, San Jose City Lines. The California Legislature passed a Santa Clara County Transit District Act in 1969, however, the Act did not supply any funding for the new district. The formation of the Santa Clara County Transit District was rejected in 1969 and 1970 before it was approved by county voters on June 6,1972. The SCCTD took over the operations of the three old bus companies on January 1,1973, on September 26,1974, the county Board of Supervisors dissolved the Public Works Department. Non-transit operations went into a new General Services Agency, while transit operations were placed into a new Santa Clara County Transportation Agency. In its early years the Santa Clara County Transportation District approached the task of replacing the bus fleet it inherited from its predecessors, at first the district bought propane-fueled Twin Coaches and Gilligs. SCCTD switched to an all-diesel fleet after six buses went up in flames between December 1977 and April 1978, at the time, critics referred to the buses as rolling propane bombs. On March 6,1976, Santa Clara County voters approved a half-cent sales tax, Measure A, in 1977, the primary Overhaul and Repair Facility was built at the Cerone Yard. Also in 1977, County Supervisors decided to change the bus fleet from propane to diesel, by 1979, three additional bus yards were built and commissioned into service. Another issue was improving the diversity of its workforce, in December 1978, the SCCTD approved an affirmative action plan for the Transportation Agency. After a long battle, the U. S. Supreme Court by a 6-3 majority upheld the gender component of the plan against a civil rights challenge on March 25,1987. On January 1,1995, the SCCTA merged with the county Congestion Management Agency to become the SCVTA, for convenience, the acronym was later shortened to VTA. In 1996, voters approved a half-cent general county sales tax, Measure B, the measure was challenged, but in 1998, the California Supreme Court ruled that the two measure system was valid. The tax was to be collected for ten years, in 2000, voters approved a 30-year extension of the 1996 sales tax to fund an extension of Bay Area Rapid Transit to Santa Clara. The measure was placed on the ballot by the VTA and does not include funding specifically for highway projects, the measure passed with 70% of the vote. Revenues from the tax would not begin being collected until April 2006. After 2000, due to the dot-com bust, existing revenue sources declined and VTA was forced to cut service, VTA introduced a series of fare increases between 1998 and 2005
5.
Caltrain
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Caltrain is a California commuter rail line on the San Francisco Peninsula and in the Santa Clara Valley. The northern terminus of the line is in San Francisco at 4th, extra trains were often run for special events held in AT&T Park in San Francisco, Stanford Stadium in Palo Alto, and SAP Center in San Jose. Caltrain operates 92 weekday trains,6 of which are extended to Gilroy, weekday ridership in February 2016 averaged 62,416, up 83% since 2010. Caltrain is governed by the Peninsula Corridor Joint Powers Board which consists of agencies from the three counties served by Caltrain, San Francisco, San Mateo and Santa Clara, each member agency has three representatives on a nine-member Board of Directors. The member agencies are the City and County of San Francisco, SamTrans, Caltrain has 29 regular stops, one football-only stop, and two weekend-only stops. As of October 2012 Caltrain runs 92 weekday trains,36 Saturday, the original commuter railroad built in 1863 was the San Francisco and San Jose Rail Road, it was purchased by Southern Pacific in 1870. Southern Pacific double-tracked the line in 1904 and rerouted it via Bayshore, after 1945, ridership declined with the rise in automobile use, in 1977 SP petitioned the state Public Utilities Commission to discontinue the commute operation because of ongoing losses. To preserve the service, in 1980 Caltrans contracted with SP. Caltrans purchased new locomotives and rolling stock, replacing SP equipment in 1985, Caltrans also upgraded stations, added shuttle buses to nearby employers, and dubbed the operation CalTrain. The Peninsula Corridor Joint Powers Board was formed in 1987 to manage the line, subsequently, San Mateo and Santa Clara Counties commissioned Earth Metrics, Inc. to prepare an Environmental Impact Report on right-of-way acquisition and expansion of operations. With state and local funding, the PCJPB bought the right of way between San Francisco and San Jose from SP in 1991. The following year, PCJPB took responsibility for CalTrain operations and selected Amtrak as the contract operator, PCJPB extended the CalTrain service from San Jose to Gilroy, connecting to VTA Light Rail at Tamien Station in San Jose. In July 1995 CalTrain became accessible to passengers in wheelchairs, five months later, CalTrain increased the bicycle limit to 24 per train, making the service attractive to commuters in bicycle-friendly cities such as San Francisco and Palo Alto. In July 1997 the current logo was adopted, and the name became Caltrain. A year later, VTA extended its rail service from north Santa Clara to the Mountain View Caltrain station. In June 2003, a connection for the Bay Area Rapid Transit. In 2006, Caltrain announced that wireless internet access would be available on trains at no additional charge, Caltrain invested more than $1 million in researching and testing WiFi in 2006. Caltrain still hopes to offer the service eventually as part of a comprehensive communication package
6.
Caltrain Express
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California State Senator Jackie Speier and Caltrain leadership are credited with the idea to provide an express service for Caltrain during a brainstorming session. The funding request for the Caltrain express service was incorporated directly into the Governors budget. CTX was one of the projects recommended by the Metropolitan Transportation Commission under Resolution 3434 in December 2001, CTX officially broke ground during a ceremony held at 4th and King on June 28,2002. At the time, it was the largest capital improvement program for Caltrain, during CTX construction, Caltrain shut down weekend service for two years starting in July 2002 to allow track work. M. and the line only had two intermediate stops, at Hillsdale and Palo Alto. After construction was complete and weekend service resumed in June 2004, during construction, service was also reduced to a single track on Thursday and Friday nights after 9 P. M. By April 2004, Caltrain was showing off the stock it had acquired for Baby Bullet service. The first southbound Baby Bullet left San Francisco with 420 passengers at 7,20 AM, Baby Bullet trains often ran at standing room capacity during the first year. Just prior to the inauguration of Baby Bullet service, Caltrain served an average of 27,000 riders per weekday. One year later, Caltrain ridership had increased by 12%, and by 2014, ten years later, Caltrain ridership had more than doubled to over 60,000 riders per weekday. In addition to having one of the new locomotives named for her, CTX received a Tranny award from the California Transportation Foundation as the Program of the Year for 2004. During the same ceremony, Speier was honored as the Legislator of the Year, Caltrain split the CTX project into two separate phases, based on geographic region. The North CTX extended from San Francisco to Redwood City, the North CTX contract was awarded in April 2002 to the joint venture partnership of Herzog Contracting Corporation and Stacy and Witbeck. Herzog-Stacy-Witbeck also won the South CTX contract, as announced in January 2003, the key elements of CTX were the overtake tracks, high-speed crossovers, and a central traffic control system which collectively allowed a single office to route trains. To support smoother operation at higher sustained speeds, Caltrain also laid down continuous-welded rails, during the CTX project, Caltrain rebuilt the Bayshore station, relocating it slightly south of the prior location to accommodate the north quad track overtake section ending just south of Tunnel #4. A small rail bridge south of Bayshore was built over a creek as part of CTX, Lawrence Station was in the right-of-way planned for the south quad-track overtake section, so Lawrence was rebuilt with new platforms and an under-track pedestrian tunnel. Work at Lawrence was anticipated to be completed by the end of 2003, the Millbrae station also received some upgrades, a third track was added and existing tracks were relocated, requiring Caltrain to demolish the existing platform. Millbrae station updates were scheduled to complete with the opening of the new station in January 2003. CTX added quad-track overtake sections near the cities of Brisbane and Sunnyvale, during the initial design phase, overtakes were also announced for Millbrae and Redwood City
7.
National Register of Historic Places
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The National Register of Historic Places is the United States federal governments official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures, and objects deemed worthy of preservation. The passage of the National Historic Preservation Act in 1966 established the National Register, of the more than one million properties on the National Register,80,000 are listed individually. The remainder are contributing resources within historic districts, each year approximately 30,000 properties are added to the National Register as part of districts or by individual listings. For most of its history the National Register has been administered by the National Park Service and its goals are to help property owners and interest groups, such as the National Trust for Historic Preservation, coordinate, identify, and protect historic sites in the United States. While National Register listings are mostly symbolic, their recognition of significance provides some financial incentive to owners of listed properties, protection of the property is not guaranteed. During the nomination process, the property is evaluated in terms of the four criteria for inclusion on the National Register of Historic Places, the application of those criteria has been the subject of criticism by academics of history and preservation, as well as the public and politicians. Occasionally, historic sites outside the proper, but associated with the United States are also listed. Properties can be nominated in a variety of forms, including individual properties, historic districts, the Register categorizes general listings into one of five types of properties, district, site, structure, building, or object. National Register Historic Districts are defined geographical areas consisting of contributing and non-contributing properties, some properties are added automatically to the National Register when they become administered by the National Park Service. These include National Historic Landmarks, National Historic Sites, National Historical Parks, National Military Parks/Battlefields, National Memorials, on October 15,1966, the Historic Preservation Act created the National Register of Historic Places and the corresponding State Historic Preservation Offices. Initially, the National Register consisted of the National Historic Landmarks designated before the Registers creation, approval of the act, which was amended in 1980 and 1992, represented the first time the United States had a broad-based historic preservation policy. To administer the newly created National Register of Historic Places, the National Park Service of the U. S. Department of the Interior, hartzog, Jr. established an administrative division named the Office of Archeology and Historic Preservation. Hartzog charged OAHP with creating the National Register program mandated by the 1966 law, ernest Connally was the Offices first director. Within OAHP new divisions were created to deal with the National Register, the first official Keeper of the Register was William J. Murtagh, an architectural historian. During the Registers earliest years in the late 1960s and early 1970s, organization was lax and SHPOs were small, understaffed, and underfunded. A few years later in 1979, the NPS history programs affiliated with both the U. S. National Parks system and the National Register were categorized formally into two Assistant Directorates. Established were the Assistant Directorate for Archeology and Historic Preservation and the Assistant Directorate for Park Historic Preservation, from 1978 until 1981, the main agency for the National Register was the Heritage Conservation and Recreation Service of the United States Department of the Interior. In February 1983, the two assistant directorates were merged to promote efficiency and recognize the interdependency of their programs, jerry L. Rogers was selected to direct this newly merged associate directorate
8.
Streamline Moderne
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Streamline Moderne, or Art Moderne, is a late type of the Art Deco architecture and design that emerged in the 1930s. Its architectural style emphasized curving forms, long lines. The first streamline buildings evolved from the work of New Objectivity artists, a movement connected to the German Werkbund, as the Great Depression of the 1930s progressed, Americans saw a new aspect of Art Deco—i. e. Cylindrical forms and long horizontal windowing also may be influenced by constructivism, as a result, an array of designers quickly ultra-modernized and streamlined the designs of everyday objects. Manufacturers of clocks, radios, telephones, cars, furniture, the style was the first to incorporate electric light into architectural structure. In the first-class dining room of the SS Normandie, fitted out 1933–35, twelve pillars of Lalique glass. The Streamline Moderne was both a reaction to Art Deco and a reflection of austere economic times, Sharp angles were replaced with simple, exotic woods and stone were replaced with cement and glass. Art Deco and Streamline Moderne were not necessarily opposites, the Sterling Streamliner Diners were diners designed like streamlined trains. Although Streamline Moderne houses are less common than streamline commercial buildings, the Lydecker House in Los Angeles, built by Howard Lydecker, is an example of Streamline Moderne design in residential architecture. In tract development, elements of the style were used as a variation in postwar row housing in San Franciscos Sunset District. The style was applied to such as electric clocks, sewing machines, small radio receivers. Their manufacturing processes exploited developments in science including aluminium and bakelite. Compared to Europe, the United States in the 1930s had a focus on design as a means to increase sales of consumer products. Streamlining was associated with prosperity and an exciting future and this hope resonated with the American middle class, the major market for consumer products. A wide range of goods from refrigerators to pencil sharpeners was produced in streamlined designs, streamlining became a widespread design practice for automobiles, railroad cars, buses, and other vehicles in the 1930s. Streamline style can be contrasted with functionalism, which was a design style in Europe at the same time. One reason for the designs in functionalism was to lower the production costs of the items. Streamlining and functionalism represent two different schools in modernistic industrial design, but both reflecting the intended consumer
9.
Train station
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A train station, railway station, railroad station, or depot is a railway facility where trains regularly stop to load or unload passengers or freight. It generally consists of at least one platform and a station building providing such ancillary services as ticket sales. If a station is on a line, it often has a passing loop to facilitate traffic movements. The smallest stations are most often referred to as stops or, in parts of the world. Stations may be at level, underground, or elevated. Connections may be available to intersecting rail lines or other modes such as buses. In British usage, the station is commonly understood to mean a railway station unless otherwise qualified. In the United States, the most common term in contemporary usage is train station, Railway station and railroad station are less frequent. Outside North America, a depot is place where buses, trains, or other vehicles are housed and maintained and from which they are dispatched for service. The two-storey Mount Clare station in Baltimore, Maryland, which survives as a museum, first saw service as the terminus of the horse-drawn Baltimore. The oldest terminal station in the world was Crown Street railway station in Liverpool, built in 1830, as the first train on the Liverpool-Manchester line left Liverpool, the station is slightly older than the Manchester terminal at Liverpool Road. The station was the first to incorporate a train shed, the station was demolished in 1836 as the Liverpool terminal station moved to Lime Street railway station. Crown Street station was converted to a goods station terminal, the first stations had little in the way of buildings or amenities. The first stations in the modern sense were on the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, manchesters Liverpool Road Station, the second oldest terminal station in the world, is preserved as part of the Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester. It resembles a row of Georgian houses, dual-purpose stations can sometimes still be found today, though in many cases goods facilities are restricted to major stations. In rural and remote communities across Canada and the United States, such stations were known as flag stops or flag stations. Many stations date from the 19th century and reflect the architecture of the time. Countries where railways arrived later may still have such architecture, as later stations often imitated 19th-century styles, various forms of architecture have been used in the construction of stations, from those boasting grand, intricate, Baroque- or Gothic-style edifices, to plainer utilitarian or modernist styles
City of Palo Alto Shuttles: Crosstown Shuttle, Embarcadero Shuttle
