Officials seek public input on new transit option along FEC tracks

In as little as seven years, passenger service could return to the Florida East Coast Railway for the first time since 1968. But it's going to take a mountain of cash and political will to make it happen, the Sun-Sentinel reports.

It would cost nearly $2.5
billion to build a commuter train on the FEC similar to Tri-Rail that officials
project 59,000 people a day would ride. That doesn’t include the cost to buy or
lease the tracks, or to build a high-level bridge or a $500-million tunnel that
would be necessary so commuter trains are not held up by boats on the New River
in downtown Fort Lauderdale, Fla. And it doesn’t include the $100 million a
year it would take to operate.

After all that
investment, congestion on area roads would be reduced only slightly. Still,
officials use words like "transformational" when they describe how
such an endeavor would impact the region, much in the same way that Henry
Flagler’s railroad was the economic engine that brought people to South Florida
in the 19th century.

"It would help
create jobs and be a catalyst for development in the eastern communities,"
said Scott Seeburger, an engineer overseeing the study for the Florida
Department of Transportation.

Because the FEC runs
through 28 coastal downtowns from Miami to Jupiter, officials say using the
tracks for passenger service would provide an attractive alternative to driving
that doesn’t exist now. Tri-Rail runs on the CSX Transportation tracks through
industrial areas mostly west of Interstate 95.

Residents are invited to
speak out during five public hearings in September. They will be asked to choose
what kind of transit they would like to see along the FEC – a commuter train
like Tri-Rail, a rapid transit bus that would run right next to the tracks or a
regular bus using streets parallel to the tracks. Feedback from those hearings
will be presented to transportation planning groups in Broward, Palm Beach and
Miami-Dade counties this fall. Each county in turn will be asked to approve an
option that will be studied in more detail over the next three years.

That study will nail down
costs, how the project would be implemented and where the money would come from
to pay for it. While federal money likely would pay for a significant chunk of
the construction, the three counties and state would have to pony up matching
funds as well as prove to the feds they have a dedicated revenue source to pay
for its operations.

Seeburger said design and
construction could begin in 2015, with the first service running as early as
2017, provided there are no obstacles.

"To me it’s a no
brainer," said Ron Hammond of Fort Lauderdale, who recalled picking up his
grandparents at the FEC’s Pompano Beach station in the early ’60s when it was
possible to take a passenger train from New York to Miami. "This should
[have] been done a decade ago."

The FEC last carried
passengers in 1968. Today, the rail line moves about 26 freight trains a day,
carrying limestone blasted out of the Everglades and goods arriving or
departing through the area’s seaports.

In the 1980s, the state
approached the FEC about using its tracks when Tri-Rail was created to offset
congestion while I-95 was widened. But the FEC refused to allow passenger
trains on its tracks because it wanted freight to be its top priority. So the
state instead bought a 72-mile stretch of the CSXT tracks. Two decades later,
the FEC, under new ownership, says it is willing to negotiate use of an 85-mile
stretch of track from Jupiter to Miami for passenger service.

Among the four options
considered by the state, a commuter train powered by a self-propelled rail car
called a Diesel Multiple Unit or DMU is the winner when it comes to generating
the highest ridership and moving the fastest. A DMU doesn’t use a locomotive,
so it can get up to speed and brake faster than a traditional train. It also
operates more quietly and with less vibration, a big consideration since the
tracks pass through many urban neighborhoods.

The other rail option
would use a locomotive-driven train. Most of the FEC corridor is wide enough
for the four tracks that would be necessary to handle the increased commuter
and freight train traffic, although some land would have to be acquired for
stations and "pinch points" that can’t accommodate four tracks.

There are two bus
options, but both would take twice as much time to travel between Miami and
Jupiter. One, called bus rapid transit, would use buses that resemble rail cars
and run them in a new roadway built next to the tracks for exclusive use by
buses. The other bus option, the cheapest by far among the four being
considered, would rely on buses using local streets that parallel the tracks,
like U.S. 1, Andrews Avenue or Dixie Highway.

The company that owns the
FEC opposes building a road for buses along the tracks because it would limit
expansion for freight service and generate less robust economic development
around stops compared to passenger rail stations.

As many as 192 passenger
trains a day could be added to the FEC, although not all of them would travel
the entire length of the corridor. They would run every 15 minutes at rush hour
and every half hour the rest of the day. Tri-Rail offers 50 trains a day on
weekdays but only a limited number run every 20 minutes at rush hour.

The increased number of
trains means officials would be looking to address crossing safety by
recommending the closure of seven crossings in Palm Beach County and
one in Broward
County. Up to 24 crossings
in the three counties would be studied for overpasses.

Tri-Rail service would be
bolstered because commuter trains on the FEC would be linked to the Tri-Rail
tracks via east-west rail spurs in Pompano Beach and West Palm Beach. The rail
connections would allow a mix of express and local service to run on both
tracks.