SunRail, Tri-Rail, High-Speed Rail

"So-Called Deal-with-the-Devil SunRail Bill Paves the Way for a Southeast Florida Mass Transit Nexus" by v. johns

Since this is old news, I'm going to keep this post as short as possible... As you may know, funding Tri-Rail has been an issue almost since its inception. Several attempts to do so, including the creation of a surcharge on car rentals in Palm Beach, Broward and Miami-Dade counties, that was vetoed by Jeb Bush and would have served as permanent revenue for the train, have all failed up to this point. To add insult to injury, last year, in an attempt to get votes for a similar new system in the Orlando area, Tri-Rail's fate was linked, by a few crooked Central Florida politicians, to the approval of that system. South Florida elected officials rejected the apparent bribe and voted "no," dooming both the proposed SunRail and the existing Tri-Rail into potential nonexistence. A "yes" vote would have granted Tri-Rail its funding while saddling the state with the mandated creation of $1.2 billion system for the Orlando region that it would not have been able to afford amid the state budget crisis that had, in 2008 and 2009, forced state and local governments to make drastic cuts in services and operating budgets.

Enter the Obama Administration's promise to get high-speed rail outfits up and running across the nation... Last fall, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, at a conference in Orlando, told the state's leaders, literally, to get their "act together," regarding Sun-Rail's liability-contingent approval and Tri-Rail's funding-source issues. This led Senator Jeff Atwater, of North Palm Beach, to push for a special legislative session, late last year, to resolve these issues. If not, Florida's chance at a potential $2.6 billion stimulus grant to get high-speed rail up and running in the state, would have been lost. Federal dollars, totaling $8 billion, were only to be allocated to states with shovel-ready projects and a proven ability to operate commuter rail lines. This being "Flori-DUH," our legislature's failure to fund Tri-Rail, after 20 years of its existence, has exposed, albeit very briefly, the dirty politics and poor policies that have been hiding behind Florida's governmental incompetence in even the most mundane of matters.

This incompetence nearly cost our state a piece of the high-speed rail line pie. And while the cesspool of incompetence, camping out here in our state, is quite obvious, the arrogance, greed and utter filth that hides behind it, isn't always apparent...

Over the holidays, the Palm Beach Post reported that the bill from the aforementioned special legislative session to solve Florida's commuter rail issues had passed by a margin of 27-10 in the state senate. Out of this bill has come, not only a new Florida's-Turnpike-like entity called the Florida Rail Enterprise, that will oversee Tri-Rail, SunRail, high-speed rail and other commuter rail projects being proposed throughout the state, but also the $13million - $15 million per year in state funding for Tri-Rail, which will be taken from "state fuel taxes and fees." A far cry from its $47 million annual operating budget (St. Petersburg Times, Chardy), but a start nonetheless. And as suggested, just one sentence ago, the approval of a brand-spanking new SunRail system for the Orlando area has gotten its long awaited approval...

For more information and history on this issue, and to learn why this bill is seen as a deal with the devil, please refer to the Palm Beach Post's print and online editions, with special attention to articles by Dara Kam and editorial columns by Joel Engelhardt. See also: PostOnPolitics.com...

In the meantime, for the purpose of this blog, I'd like to focus on analyzing this, and other recent developments, to form the clearest picture of commuter rail in Southeast Florida that will potentially evolve from the passage of the bill, namely, the creation of what I call the Southeast Florida Mass Transit Nexus, which I define as the dynamic convergence of federal, state and local mass transit systems along South Florida's coastal urban core. This "Nexus," upon realization, will consist of five core components: (1) Amtrak service along Florida's entire east coast from Jacksonville to Miami, (2) high-speed rail lines connecting Tampa to Orlando to Miami, (3) Tri-Rail sevice from Miami to the Treasure Coast, (4) the proposed South Florida East Coast Corridor between Palm Beach and Miami-Dade that will compliment and complete Tri-Rail service, and (5) the smaller county and city-based bus and train systems, like Palm Tran and Metrorail, that will plug into these large train systems, allowing unprecedented full regional access and mobility to occur, throughout seven counties from Indian River county on down to Monroe...

I will be delving further into this issue in upcoming posts. For now, however, I just wanted to go on record in fleshing out how I believe these systems will ultimately evolve to form a massive point of convergence and access throughout South Florida's seven counties (Indian River, St. Lucie, Martin, Palm Beach, Broward, Miami-Dade, Monroe). The result will be unlike anything in the nation, not only rivaling the systems that serve the great Northeast Corridor, anchored by New York City, but reaching the level of putting South Florida on par with Europe and Asia, in mobility, to compete for the best medical, technical and biotech talent and capital from around the world. While we Americans are pretty comfortable in our cars, trucks and SUV's, the immigrants trickling into the state from Europe, Asia and Latin America, who may be used to transit-based lives and will be fueling the next great boom in our state, just might feel right at home. In the meantime, for those of us here now, without the proper infrastructure in place for full regional mobility, we may as well be stuck in the mud. But with the upcoming arrival of the Southeast Florida Mass Transit Nexus rail corridor will put South Florida on pace to go from being a lost paradise to finally becoming the best place in the world to live, work, study, play, relax and do business...