Millbrae, CA

Millbrae keeps two eras of railroad history near the same tracks. Darius Ogden Mills donated land for an adobe depot completed in 1864, serving the dairy he owned with F. H. Green and shipping milk north. The station took the Millbrae name in 1865, combining Mills with the Scottish word "brae," or rolling hills. Two depots later burned; a third opened in 1907. When demolition threatened it in 1976, the newly formed Millbrae Historical Society organized to save the building. Federal recognition followed in 1978 through the National Register of Historic Places; the depot moved to its current site in 1980 and became the Millbrae Train Museum in 2004. Its semicircular bay window and cast-iron columns preserve details of a standardized Southern Pacific design.

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The preserved depot makes the city's transportation origin physically visible beside a much larger modern transfer point. The BART-Caltrain intermodal terminal opened in June 2003. As of July 2026, it provided a cross-platform connection between the two rail systems, with SamTrans buses serving the station and BART trains running through San Francisco International Airport toward San Francisco. Caltrain follows the Peninsula toward San Jose and, on selected service, farther south. Housing and commercial development also followed around the station. Gateway at Millbrae Station opened in April 2023 with homes, shops, restaurants, and offices on a former BART parking lot. Rail now shapes both regional travel and a newer district built directly around the platforms; the 1907 depot preserves the earlier freight-and-dairy story nearby. This transportation role is unusually large for a city of 3.25 square miles.

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Millbrae, incorporated on January 14, 1948, lies immediately west of San Francisco International Airport, between U.S. 101 and Interstate 280, and 15 miles south of San Francisco. Most transportation and commercial activity fits along the city's compact eastern edge. Local commerce includes hotels, restaurants, retail, and service businesses, with many storefronts concentrated along Broadway, El Camino Real, and Millbrae Avenue. Downtown Broadway begins about a three-minute walk from the intermodal station, so the airport, regional trains, hotels, and local dining occupy a compact east side of the city. Residential streets climb the rolling terrain to the west, giving the name drawn from Mills's estate an enduring geographic meaning. Broadway and the civic center host a cultural calendar that reaches beyond the station.

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The two-day Millbrae Lunar New Year Festival filled downtown Broadway on February 14 and 15, 2026, with food, arts and crafts vendors, and local businesses. Stage performances included lion and dragon dancers, bands, and singers. At Library Plaza, the Japanese Culture Festival marked its twentieth year in October 2025 with food, merchandise, entertainment, community groups, and activities. That nonprofit festival grew from a city effort to recognize the cultures of Millbrae and surrounding Peninsula communities. The city also held a public art show at the Recreation Center in May 2026. A restored 1907 depot, a cross-platform regional transfer, restaurants on Broadway, and festival stages at the library plaza all fit within Millbrae's compact footprint.