How to Get There & Around

There are many ways to get to Oakland and travel around the Bay Area in general. Here are some of the more popular ones, as well as some that might take you off the beaten path.

Getting There

  • Oakland International Airport: This is the international airport that’s closest to downtown Oakland, at about a 15 minute car ride away. Alaska, Horizon, Allegiant, Delta, Hawaiian, jetBlue, Southwest, Sata, United, and U.S. Airways fly here.
  • San Francisco International Airport: If you’ve got frequent flyer miles at a smaller airline or prefer one that doesn’t fly to Oakland, you can arrive at SFO instead. All major airlines fly here. It’s 35 minutes from SFO to downtown Oakland by car, or just over an hour by BART.
  • Oakland Amtrak: If you’re in a leisurely or adventurous mood, you can take the train in and get some truly spectacular views of the American west. Amtrak has a station in Oakland’s Jack London Square.

Getting Around

  • BART: Standing for Bay Area Rapid Transit, the BART is a subway that connects many regions of the bay area together. You can get from Oakland to downtown San Francisco via BART in only about 15 minutes. You can also use the BART to visit the south bay or popular regions north of Oakland, like Berkeley.
  • The Ferry: You can take the ferry across the bay from Jack London Square, and get a beautiful view of the Golden Gate Bridge and the Bay Bridge (as long as it’s not fog-covered, that is). The ferry travels to the Embarcadero region of San Francisco, and on to Angel Island, if you’d like to spend your day exploring nature. It’s $12.50 for a round trip to San Francisco, or $14.50 to Angel Island.
  • AC Transit: This is the transit authority for Alameda and Contra Costa counties, which contain Oakland and the area north of the city. There is a robust bus system servicing the East Bay, with fares set at $2.00 a trip, and $0.25 for a transfer. You can also take trans-bay buses to San Francisco, instead of taking the BART. You can use AC Transit’s website to plan your trip.
  • MUNI: This is the transit authority for the city of San Francisco. MUNI operates a bus system, as well as an over-ground street car and an underground subway system throughout the city. MUNI also operates the city’s famed cable cars—see this site for popular routes that are plied by the cable cars. Beware though: the cable cars cost $5 to ride, since today they are maintained mostly for history’s sake, and for tourists of course.
  • CalTrain: If you’re dying to get down to the south bay and the peninsula areas, you can connect from the BART to the CalTrain at the Millbrae station. This train will take you down to the famed Silicon Valley areas of Palo Alto, Mountain View, and San Jose. Google's headquarters and the Stanford University campus are nearby attractions.

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