The bus plaza at the station is served by Amtrak Thruway, Greyhound, Monterey–Salinas Transit, Santa Cruz METRO (Highway 17 Express), and VTA buses.

The only other large depots built in California during the 1930s were the Los Angeles Union Passenger Terminal and Stockton Cabral station.

A rail station at this location was established in 1878, when the narrow-gauge South Pacific Coast Railroad opened their San Jose Depot on the site.

When Southern Pacific gained control of the railroad in 1887, the station was folded into the system and referred to as the West San Jose Depot.

The new depot replaced the Fourth Street line's station for passengers,[9]: 26  though freight operations persisted for some time at the old facility.

[10] In 1996, Santa Clara County voters approved a half cent sales tax to fund the 1996 Measure B Transportation Improvement Project.

It is also the northern terminus for South County Connector diesel services from Gilroy, which provide timed transfers to and from electric trains for passengers continuing to points north of Diridon.

The station is the southern terminus for the Capitol Corridor, Amtrak's regional rail service for the urban core of Northern California, with seven round trips to Sacramento on weekdays and six on weekends.

The San Jose Diridon station is planned as a future stop on the California High-Speed Rail line and Phase II of VTA's Silicon Valley BART extension in Santa Clara County.