[1] Technically the train goes to Sacramento in the north, but the section from Richmond to Benicia is very slow.
SJ has so much room to grow. With the airport, soil geology, aquifer [subsidence], etc., you're not going to see much beyond 6-12 storeys, 20 max, but just getting that in some key areas like North SJ would allow pop growth really easily. North SJ (also south of 280 in some areas) was light industrial, so you won't get so much NIMBYism) and there is no excuse of "ruins the views" there are no views in SJ.
The surface area where you can build even low-rise, some mid-rise modern condos in areas where 1960's and 70's poorly built apartment building are in disrepair and with poor earthquake readiness makes for so much (re)building opportunity.
Whether residential or commercial, density is far more efficient--more revenue per acre, fewer expenditures per capita. Not choosing higher density is budgetary non-sense. Cities reject higher density because of NIMBYism, and because the costs of sprawl are hidden and delayed, whereas the costs of density are immediate and obvious. If the costs of sprawl were as transparent as the costs of density, development would be much more dense.
And height limits down the middle for SJC.
Piffle.
I'm a NIMBYist, you're a NIMBYist, everyone's a NIMBYist. It's just a question of over which criteria.
If you (think) you disagree - let me build that industrial-scale trash incineration in your backyard, and we'll see how long you hold your tongue.
It would be easy to double, even triple population without "Manhattanizing" SJ.
101, 880, and 280 are gridlocked for 7-8 hours per weekday as it is.
+ BART in 2026
too bad the SJC airport runway axis runs straight across downtown. They could otherwise go much much higher/denser in the urban core.
Capitol Corridor really could use an investment from the state (instead of HSR boondoogle). Huge chunk of the north-bay could be shifted to proper public transit connections to SF/East Bay economic centers.
I'm only half joking. The San Carlos airport several miles north has daily commuters who fly in for Redwood Shores offices/Oracle.
Unfortunately bandwidth is much worse than road and train networks. You can't support thousands of people commuting by air every day.
You can get plenty of density without going over 200 feet high. Just look at most European cities.
There's also a great used book store a quarter mile further down the Alameda