Potential Job Offer in South San Francisco

Hello Y'all, long time lurker. I was going to post in Reddit, but everyone there gets overly excited about taking public transit... but being from the south, I would much rather drive lol

I'm interviewing with two companies in South San Francisco. My question to you, is do you commute with your tacos, or do you live in the city. If you're a commuter, what's the drive like? Where do you commute from? Is it as soul sucking as Houston traffic can be?

Right now I live outside of Houston, and drive like 5 miles to and from work (I have a 2017 TRD OR 6MT), but I used to do a lot of commuting when I lived in Georgia (20-70 miles one way). I definitely don't mind driving up to an hour, but I have no idea at all where to even start looking for housing

Thanks y'all! (Mods, if this is inappropriate for this forum, please remove)

 

live on the peninsula south and take caltrain or drive.

sell the tacoma so you can afford your rent.

good luck in the bay

 

SSF is a mostly industrial city. Some tech over off Grandview. The weather tends to be cooler than the South Bay but there’s more to do there.

Years ago, I lived in Palo Alto and commuted to SSF doing 280 to 380 and surface streets in town. Some work colleagues rode the train from San Jose-this is a good deal because it takes more or less the same amount of time. The trick is you buy a beater and leave it at the train station.

Traffic sucks in the Bay Area and a long commute makes it worse. No way to really say it any other way. Some of the tech companies also offer shuttles which may not be so bad either since they get to use commute lanes.

I would live nearer rather than farther away. If you plan to work late, daily commute works best. Maybe ask if 4x10 is an option (or wfh). Me personally? I would not live in SF. High rent and no place to park.

 

You can also take the ferry everyday!

 

I visited the area and people seemed to care little about bumping into each others cars when trying to park. I saw numerous people playing bumper tag while trying to squeeze into a parallel parking spot. I actually drove my brand new Tacoma from Oregon and passed thru this area on the way home. Just wanted to see San Fran. I was basically terrified my new truck was going to get hit/smashed/tagged while passing thru. I moved to SOCAL from Ohio. Make sure you are fully fully fully aware of the price of housing....

 

Its going to be very dependent on where you want/ can afford to live. Generally, commuting by car will be not awesome unless you live within a few miles of the job. I work in SF and BART into the city from the East Bay. The commute from Walnut Creek to SF by car would be soul crushing. I purposely looked for the type of housing I wanted that was near to public transportation.

I recommend you see what transportation system (BART, CalTrain, Muni, etc.) is nearest to the job and use that as a factor of where you might want live. If you're able to live close enough to make the commute by car that's great but having public trans as an option is always good.

 

I worked in SSF for years. I lived in half moon bay which is right on the ocean. I started early so it took 27 min in the morning and 35-45 on the way home. I highly recommend it. Another option is if you lived In Alameda, There is a ferry to south San Fran (oyster point) And you can just walk bike or one wheel to work for most of the pharma companies there. Alameda has a great downtown with tons of good food too.

 

I will admit, I've never lived in a big city before... but the cost of living out there kinda terrifies me. I'm still interviewing and I've been window shopping apartments too. Parking is definitely a concern. Since most of my work is lab based, I know I would have to be in the office whenever I have experiments. I'm gonna keep on looking though and check out the areas y'all suggested. If there are shuttle options, and the train isn't too bad, I may just suck it up and do that. I would like to not sell the truck if I can help it though.

I"ll also ask about flexible scheduling so that way I can possibly avoid the busy times too

Wouldn't the ferry be slower lol? I'm definitely showing my inexperience here. I'm used to miles of normal highway

I may have to invest in steel bumpers if people wanna mess around and play bumper tag though...

 

Oh, It's worse.

Here are the ten urban areas with the worst congestion in the country:

1. Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, CA: Annual Delay — 119 hours.
2. San Francisco-Oakland, CA: Annual Delay — 103 hours.
3. Washington DC: Annual Delay — 102 hours.
4. New York-Newark, NY: Annual Delay — 92 hours.
5. Boston, MA: Annual Delay — 80 hours.
6. Atlanta, GA: Annual Delay — 77 hours.
7. Houston, TX: Annual Delay — 75 hours.
8. Chicago, IL: Annual Delay — 73 hours.
9. Miami, FL: Annual Delay — 69 hours.
10. Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX: Annual Delay — 67 hours.

 

You wouldn’t want to take public transportation around here (BART). Meth needles, poo, etc. Most likely you’ll live a good ways away from work, as most do. Traffic is, as stated, terrible. As everything is going back to normal expect traffic to also. If you get out of work at 5, do yourself a favor and just stop somewhere for dinner or coffee or something, and wait it out till 7. Your hair will stay on your head.

Also get a car cover for your truck. You won’t have a garage.

Labs eh? This isn’t Genentech is it?

 

alright, so the consensus I'm seeing is leverage public transit to my advantage, but also look into nearby areas

I think taking the ferry to Oyster Point would also be a good option, especially since the job is right there (I'm in pharma/biotech)

 

The ferry would be potentially faster than drive if you are close to both ends and work around it’s schedule(which is normal there) plus you get to relax and do what you want. Also companies like Genentech have robust free bussing all over the Bay Area. Again you end up just working around the bus schedules. Some people count the bus or ferry rides as part of their work days as they work on them with their laptops.

 

Not Genentech! But it is a biotech.

More than likely this post is premature, since I'm still in the interview process, but I feel like it's important to understand the area, especially for salary negotiation purposes

 

I didn't consider that. I'm very used to just going in, working 8-infinity hours as needed, and then going. I will definitely leverage ferry time for my morning zen/check emails kinda thing (if I get the job).

I think I need to shift my mindset. I'm so used to driving everywhere, but I guess having these options means I can feel more free to use my taco for fun off road stuff (which is the reason I bought it)

 

A lot of those biotech's in South San Francisco have a 'tech park' type vibe, where you may have a full blow parking garage or parking lot. Plenty of room for a Tacoma.
Quite a different experience from downtown SF, where parking can be a tiny car nightmare and stupidly expensive. i.e. $40 - 50 per day in downtown financial district.

 

Darn. They’ve got their own private shuttle you can utilize. They travel pretty far too.

In that case OP, get a model 3 and charge it for free at work.

 

That's good to know, I will be in SSF for this job, so hopefully I can avoid that

Hey man, I just need to get myself established, then maybe one day lol.

I don't think I can bring myself to buy a Tesla. How will I take it off road and put pics on the 'gram?

 

Alameda is a nice town, I live here. Great for families but very little night life if that's your thing. I have an MT and would dread if I had to commute everyday in post pandemic traffic. Taking the ferry is a great option, especially in the summer months.

 

I have lived in the bay area my entire life. Traffic is no joke. I live in Fremont so I'm between SF and San Jose. I have worked both north and south of here.

Currently, I work in South San Francisco and have been for the past 4 years. I commute 2.5 hours per day....33 miles each way....66 miles round trip. That is on a "normal" day. You throw in an accident and you are looking at 3 hours easy. It once took me 4 hours to get home because there was a bad wreck on highway 84. I have little ones to tend to at home so my time and theirs is precious. If you're single, then go for it. You got plenty of time to waste. Also not only is our gas prices absurd, but you also get to pay $6 in toll every day as well. If you are dead set on commuting, for the live of god negotiate with your employers to ask for early hours so that you can leave before the traffic. Start your shift at 5am and leave by 2pm at the very latest.

I am a firm believer that if you are going to work in SSF...live near SSF. Save yourself the stress of traffic. It's not like rent is that much cheaper anywhere else. In fact, I'm willing to bet after you factor in your gas, wear and tear, and tolls you're actually saving money by living closer. That's not including your time and sanity. How much is that worth?

Right now COVID has cleared up the roads a bit but come the end of the year, it's slowly going to filter back in. Most tech companies here including mine are discussing bringing workers back starting in September. Best of luck.

 

I was raised there, we left some time ago. It's way too crowded for my blood. My tiny starter home in San Mateo cost me about $72K. Now it costs a little over a million. Insane