Caltrain Wins $105.5M Rail Grants as SF Prop B Public Bank Takes Lead

Major transportation investments, municipal banking reform, and federal biomedical enforcement are reshaping policy discussions across San Francisco and the Peninsula. The Federal Railroad Administration awarded Caltrain $105.5 million in Railroad Crossing Elimination grants under Administrator David Fink to replace two heavily traveled at-grade rail crossings with separated structures.

Of the total federal package, $90 million is designated for construction of the Broadway Grade Separation in Burlingame, which the California Public Utilities Commission ranked as the number 1 priority crossing in the state and which carries more than 30,000 vehicles daily. The award supplements $3 million previously secured by Representative Kevin Mullin, with construction scheduled to run from May 2027 through January 2032 alongside San Mateo County Transportation Authority Chair Julia Mates and Burlingame Mayor Michael Brownrigg. The remaining $15.5 million, paired with a 21% local funding match, will finance final engineering design for the Mary Avenue Grade Separation in Sunnyvale—a project backed by Sunnyvale Mayor Larry Klein, Representative Ro Khanna, Senators Alex Padilla and Adam Schiff, and Caltrain Board Chair Rico E. Medina.

In San Francisco, Proposition B jumped into the lead in Thursday's 4 p.m. ballot count, rising from 48.46% support on Election Day to 51.16% in favor and 48.84% opposed—a margin of roughly 5,500 votes. Sponsored by District 11 Supervisor Chyanne Chen and co-sponsored by Supervisors Jackie Fielder, Bilal Mahmood, Myrna Melgar, and Shamann Walton (with only Supervisors Stephen Sherrill and Alan Wong voting against ballot placement), the charter amendment authorizes the city to establish a nonprofit municipal finance corporation and, after 3 years of operation, petition state regulators for a nonprofit public bank license under California's 2019 Assembly Bill 857 before that statute sunsets in 2028. A 2023 Reinvestment Working Group study estimated 8-year startup costs between $310 million and $460 million. Campaign finance filings show the Yes on B committee raised $392,000—including $175,000 from Saikat Chakrabarti, $125,000 from the San Francisco Foundation, and $50,000 from SEIU Local 2015—while opponents GrowSF and SPUR spent more than $23,000 and $5,800, respectively.

Meanwhile, along the northern waterfront near Fisherman's Wharf, a black-tie gathering hosted by Haus Fund aboard the decommissioned World War II cargo vessel S.S. Jeremiah O'Brien underscored regulatory boundaries around experimental longevity compounds. Attendees who signed liability waivers received free peptide samples, including topical GHK-Cu and an Afterglow Science dissolving oral strip combining BPC-157 and TB-500 labeled for research use only. The waterfront showcase followed an October 30 Department of Health and Human Services interim enforcement policy addressing Section 503A pharmacy compounding of 6 substances—BPC-157, TB-500, KPV, Epitalon, Semax, and MOTS-C—by state-licensed pharmacies, federal facilities, and licensed physicians while the Food and Drug Administration develops its formal 503A bulk drug substances list. Health law analysts noted the interim policy does not grant FDA approval or cover Section 503B outsourcing facilities, even as BPC-157 videos generated over 50 million views on YouTube and TikTok in 2024 and drove a 33-fold rise in usage despite a 2025 scientific review identifying 35 preclinical animal studies and only 1 human clinical study.