Amtrak on the Florida East Coast FEC Jacksonville - Miami

[goodnightjohnwayne]

The FEC has been mooted as a potential Amtrak route since the late 1990s. There was even a reference to the FEC in the March 5 BusinessWeek to the current owners having hoped for passenger service to make their investment pay. The real issue has always been funding. Just how much would it cost to partially offset the $3.5 billion purchase price of the FEC?

Basically, the FEC has the best existing trackage and the best potential passenger route in the entire State of Florida. Even without major improvements, it might be possible to integrate two daily round trips with the existing FEC schedule. However, routing either of Amtrak's Silver Service trains would lead to horrific delays in FEC freight operations. Ideally, Amtrak could extend the Palmetto back to Jacksonville and have a cross platform connection with Jacksonville to Miami trains.

Of course, the whole issue comes down to money. Look at how much CSX is getting for the far less valuable track for the dubious, low ridership Sunrail proposal. Considering that the FEC has top notch infrastructure and a desirable route with real potential, I would think that it would take well over $1 billion just to get service started.

[Gilbert B Norman]

Allow me to X-ref some parallel discussion of sorts moving forth over at the FEC Forum:

http://www.railroad.net/forums/viewtopi ... 35#p785632

[Noel Weaver]

I attended the meeting yesterday in Cocoa, driving 168 miles each way from Fort Lauderdale to do so. I think this COULD
amount to a lot time time around. The State of Florida was represented by Transportation Secretary Stephanie Kopelousos
and Amtrak by Director of Goverment Affairs, Southest Todd Stennis.
I wrote out a lot of notes from this meeting and when I get time, I will post them here.
I echo that this is the BEST passenger route in the entire state and it should have been the Amtrak route for a long time.
There are issues to address but it is very possible to do so and it will require a commitment from all parties involved.
Amtrak and the FEC are both receptive to the idea.
I will have more news on this later on today or tomorrow and there is more to the story than this.
Noel Weaver

[goodnightjohnwayne]

I attended the meeting yesterday in Cocoa, driving 168 miles each way from Fort Lauderdale to do so. I think this COULD
amount to a lot time time around. The State of Florida was represented by Transportation Secretary Stephanie Kopelousos
and Amtrak by Director of Goverment Affairs, Southest Todd Stennis.
I wrote out a lot of notes from this meeting and when I get time, I will post them here.
I echo that this is the BEST passenger route in the entire state and it should have been the Amtrak route for a long time.
There are issues to address but it is very possible to do so and it will require a commitment from all parties involved.
Amtrak and the FEC are both receptive to the idea.
I will have more news on this later on today or tomorrow and there is more to the story than this.
Noel Weaver

Again, money is the issue here. From that Businessweek article, it's clear that Fortress Investment Group has been waiting for passenger rail to be funded, in part to offset the $3.5 billion paid for the FEC. Just how much will be paid to Fortress? If CSX got $491 million for the "A" line between Deland and Poinciana, while retaining trackage rights, how much will it cost to set up Amtrak on the FEC?

[NellieBly]

There are a number of possibilities here. Prior to "going over to the dark side" and joining the USDOT, I worked as a consultant on the South Florida East Coast transportation study. In that analysis, we looked at commuter and/or light rail either on or adjacent to the FEC from Miami to as far north as Jupiter. The "preferred local alternative" appeared to be a mix of light rail and commuter rail, with Tri-Rail extended north from West Palm Beach to Jupiter, light rail north from Miami to Ft. Lauderdale in the US 1 corridor (adjacent to FEC), and possibly commuter rail from Ft. Lauderdale to West Palm on the FEC.

Fortress was interested in selling the FEC from West Palm south, while continuing to operate freight service.

Independently, the state came close to agreement about a decade ago with Amtrak on a re-route of one of the Florida trains via the FEC between West Palm and Jacksonville, using the "Northwood Connection" in West Palm. They even went so far as to draw up contract documents for an upgrade of the half-mile connector.

With the likely extension of Tri-Rail to Jupiter (using a newly constructed connector to the FEC a bit farther north), such a connector would be available to Amtrak trains as well. I agree with Mr. Weaver that use of the FEC route for passenger trains would be a great idea, and probably should have happened a long time ago. The question now is how much Fortress will want for the property. On the other hand, Fortress is in tough financial shape and may not be able to hold out a long time for the best price. This should be interesting to watch.

[Noel Weaver]

Here are my notes from the meeting in Cocoa yesterday, hope you all find them interesting, it was a very interesting day.

AMTRAK/FEC CORRIDOR COALITION – KICKOFF MEETING
COCOA CITY HALL, FRIDAY, MARCH 26, 2010 AT 10:00 AM

Here are my notes from this meeting, Noel Weaver.

The meeting was attended by over 100 people in the commission chambers at the brand new city hall building in Cocoa and started right on time. In addition there were people on telephone
conference calls tuned in as well as a live internet connection.
The meeting was well organized and led. It was conducted by Doug Smith, Martin County
Commissioner, representing Amtrak was Todd Stennis, Director of Government Affairs out of New Orleans and representing the State of Florida was Transportation Secretary Stephanie Kopelousos. There may have been somebody from the FEC as well but if so it was not made
known to the people attending.
1. Welcome and Introductions
2. National Amtrak Rail Program – Todd Stennis
3. State Rail Program – Stephanie Kopelousos
Passenger Rail Enterprise
High Speed Rail Update
Commuter Rail Update
Intercity Passenger Rail
Amtrak/FEC Corridor Project
Project Overview
Funding
Project Timeframe
4 Amtrak “Station Cities” Update Update by Individual City Representatives
5. Open Discussion
6. Newt Steps

Various representatives from congressional offices attended and all who spoke expressed support for this project.
At the start of his presentation the Amtrak representative made it pretty clear that the liability
issue with Sunrail must be resolved before much if anything can happen on anything else
regarding Amtrak in Florida and Amtrak is making an effort to do this. All parties have to be
involved (Amtrak, FEC, State of Florida and locals as well).

Under this idea station stops on the FEC would be at St. Augustine, Daytona Beach, Titusville,
Cocoa, Melbourne, Vero Beach, Fort Pierce and Stuart for a total of 8 intermediate stops.
Representatives from New Smyrna Beach and Bunnell pleaded to be included but I am not sure that either will be, Amtrak wants the LD trains to make fewer stops and if more are desired this is where state supported corridor trains would or could come in plus commuter services.

Per Amtrak an inspection train will operate on the FEC in either late April or early May between Jacksonville and Miami, details are not settled yet. A number of people in attendance
expressed an interest in being included.

It was also stated that Amtrak is working with another Rail America railroad regarding
passenger service at present. (my comment – the New England Central)
In my opinion, Amtrak provided a good and interesting presentation.

After Amtrak finished, the Secretary of Transportation for the state of Florida Stephanie Koperlousos made a presentation a bit of which follows:
Great enterprise, now how about funding. It was impressed that all should contact their state
representatives (legislature) and push for funding. The governor supports this, if he didn’t I wouldn’t be here this morning. On the high speed rail project good progress has been made.
As for local stations, local cities may need to help out on this financially. It was also brought up that some private funding might be available for development which would include a rail
facility in the process.
She also stated that the FEC and Sunrail are not tied together but Amtrak insists that they are.

After this presentation, representatives from the local cities in which stops are planned were asked to update:
Jacksonville – Working on getting commuter rail to St. Augustine as well as locating a station close to downtown for commuter rail, Amtrak and everything else.
St. Augustine – This representative did not have much to add but said they are looking for state
funds.
Daytona Beach – Thinking about the old location, much land is leased out by FEC and they are
willing to work things out.
Titusville – Considering two different locations.
Cocoa – Very committed to this, two locations under consideration in the area of St. Johns
Street the other near Stone Street.
Melbourne – Two locations under consideration near the airport and also downtown and the
local representative expressed a preference for the downtown location.
Vero Beach – In the historic area downtown
Fort Pierce – Several locations under consideration in historic district. Considering a public/private partnership on this.
Stuart – Immediate downtown area already owned by Martin County and planning a transit facility. In my opinion Stuart seemed to have their act together more than
the others in this regard.
All of the above localities expressed enthusiasm and very strong support.

After some closing remarks the meeting finished about 12:30 PM.

My comments, I think Amtrak had their act together on this, I am not so sure about the
others, some of the politicians did not seem to grasp reality on this, I sure hope it works out.

I was glad to have the opportunity to attend this meeting although it was a long drive up and
back from Fort Lauderdale.

If there are errors, please don’t “shoot the messenger”.

Regards,
Noel Weaver

[CREngineer]

Thanks Noel, good note taking! Now begins the good stuff..............

Talk to you later, thanks again

[Gilbert B Norman]

Mr, Weaver, from your report it appears that this proposed service over the FEC would be an additional train funded by the State, as distinct from a reroute of the Federally funded Meteor.

If "we the people of Florida" are agreeable to paying for it, I'm sure Amtrak will throw their hat in the ring for a contract to operate it. Amtrak would still have "two a day" serving Orlando and would, if future budget cutters were to put the gun to Amtrak's head, would have the means to discontinue the Meteor without Notice under ARRA '97.

Such proposal is well within the scope of short-distance locally funded services that now two Administrations have favored. What I guess would have simply been "too good to be true" is if a representative from FEC was there to proclaim "we're ready to work with any responsible party to get this service up and running".

What also was not addressed is if there would be a need for each of the twelve counties through which the train would operate, namely Duvall, St Johns, Flagler, Volusia, Brevard, Cocoa, Indian River, St Lucie, Martin, Palm Beach, Broward and Dade, to impose a County-level excise tax to support the operation such as any county desiring regional service is required to do. I doubt as such is the case as this proposal would very simply be a "DOA".

[Noel Weaver]

Mr, Weaver, from your report it appears that this proposed service over the FEC would be an additional train funded by the State, as distinct from a reroute of the Federally funded Meteor.

If "we the people of Florida" are agreeable to paying for it, I'm sure Amtrak will throw their hat in the ring for a contract to operate it. Amtrak would still have "two a day" serving Orlando and would, if future budget cutters were to put the gun to Amtrak's head, would have the means to discontinue the Meteor without Notice under ARRA '97.

What also was not addressed is if there would be a need for each county, namely Duvall, Brevard, Cocoa, Indian River, Okeechobee, Jupiter, Martin, Palm Beach, Broward and Dade, to impose a County-level excise tax to support the operation such as any county desiring regional service is required to do.

Negative at least for now. It involves the LD trains running on the FEC. Many details to be worked out and maybe one
train and maybe both trains.
I think it is extremely unlikely that the Meteor is going to come off anytime soon and probably in to the future either.
Let's all think positive on this one, please, lets try, OK?
Noel Weaver

[CREngineer]

Actually Mr. Norman, this project would be a re-routing of one of the present trains operating to Miami, not an additional "corridor" train as implied and funded by the State of Florida. Of course, that option is always open. But that is something to look forward to in the future.

If the citizens along the East Coast, where i think about 8 million folks live, convince FDOT and Tallahassee that this proposal makes good sense, i am sure there could be additional "corridor" trains operated over the other routes as well.

First and foremost needed in Florida is a solution to the liability issue that has become a thorn to expanded operations in Florida. Once that hurdle is cleared, and if the citizens of FL do in fact desire an updated rail system, Amtrak as the sole provider of intercity passenger trains in America (as well as the only operator of HSR in the Western Hemisphere) will be in position to operate an expanded service in FL.

[Matt Johnson]

Would this be seen as a competing project to the HSR Phase II extension from Orlando to Miami?

[Gilbert B Norman]

I think it is extremely unlikely that the Meteor is going to come off anytime soon and probably in to the future either.
Let's all think positive on this one, please, lets try, OK?

I doubt if such be the case either, Mr. Weaver.

As I noted over at the FEC Forum, it appears that the passenger train's "star" has not shone so brightly "in many a moon" as it does at present - Washington or Tallahassee as the case may be.

But again I hold that IF the budget cutters get aggressive", then it would appear unwise to give up that "Ace in the hole' of being able to discontinue an LD train (as distinct from a route) without Notice under ARAA '97. There is always that chance that someone will press the issue of Notice and Sunset East is restored.

[CREngineer]

I don't believe so Matt, and this project could be up and running before the design of Phase 1 is completed. Also, there is a completed study that points out where speeds could be raised considerably on the FEC side, not HSR speeds, but considerably greater than they are now.

[St. Augustine User]

News story by Larry Hannan on the AMTRAK/FEC Corridor Coalition meeting in Cocoa --- from Morris News wire:
http://staugustine.com/news/local-news/ ... local-stop

MetroJacksonville:
http://www.metrojacksonville.com/articl ... ng-forward

There is also a Facebook fan page:AMTRAK/FEC Corridor Coalition-- Passenger Rail in Florida.

[george matthews]

If it's a Florida train, shouldn't it go from Miami to Tallahassee?