Tea Party Rails Aginst ALL TRAINS

[JeffreyS]

Big Guy yes people like their cars they also like rail travel. Rail proves that in many diverse places every day. The idea isn't to eliminate one form of travel but to provide options so people can use the one that serves them best.
Now I will admit HSR is not the most bang for the buck in starting corridor service.

[BigGuy219]

Big Guy yes people like their cars they also like rail travel. Rail proves that in many diverse places every day. The idea isn't to eliminate one form of travel but to provide options so people can use the one that serves them best.
Now I will admit HSR is not the most bang for the buck in starting corridor service.

Rail travel works where there is proven intermodal transportation like the suburbs of New York, D.C., Atlanta, etc. When they get off the train they don't want to have to get a cab, or get on a bus with people they perceive as "undesirable" with a schedule and transit route they are unfamiliar with.

If there was light rail running to the Orlando theme parks, where the Orlando magic play, where the Tampa Buccaneers, and the Tampa Rays play all linked to this rail system and if it made stops at key locations along I-4 ... I could see the merits. But there's just not reliable city transit in Orlando or Tampa to make it work effectively.

The JTA can get anyone from downtown to the airport in 25 minutes and it runs on a fixed schedule leaving every hour. I take that route 3-4 times a week to get to River City Marketplace and I've even taken it to the airport twice, but I never see any travelers on it. Why? Because here's the elephant in the room ... middle class white people don't want to ride a bus!

[BigGuy219]

The Acela high speed train in the Northeast is great. And here's why it works. The drive from New York to D.C. is 6 hours with a lot of tolls. The drive from New York to Boston is pretty brutal too. I know, because I've been on both of those routes both on a train and in a car/bus and I can tell you ... the train is preferable. But, the 40 minute plane ride still turns people on when the company picks up the check.

Using Jacksonville as an example ... I'd like to see high speed rail from Atlanta to Jax down to Miami. I think that would work and make a lot more sense than Tampa to Orlando.

[tufsu1]

well Big Guy....the folks in ATL really like their cars too...and they didn't have a rail system 25 years ago...so what changed?

And what about other auto-oriented cities like Charlotte, Dallas, Houston, Denver, and Phoenix....why is rail working there?

as for the Tampa to Orlando HSR route....keep in mind this is just the first leg....the extension to Miami will make it more of a success for business travel.

[BigGuy219]

well Big Guy....the folks in ATL really like their cars too...and they didn't have a rail system 25 years ago...so what changed?

And what about other auto-oriented cities like Charlotte, Dallas, Houston, Denver, and Phoenix....why is rail working there?

as for the Tampa to Orlando HSR route....keep in mind this is just the first leg....the extension to Miami will make it more of a success for business travel.

The rail system works there because it stops at key locations that people have a desire to go to where parking is an issue. A train that drops you off in one part of Orlando and then another part of Tampa and wishes you luck getting to your destination won't work ... unless it links directly to light rail in those cities that hit key points of interest. But no one is even talking about that, and there's no money for it.

[Garden guy]

That's exactly what we need is a bunch of unevolved people deciding what we all need...for we as a nation to grow and move forward the last thing needed is tea people and republicans...they prove themselves time after time that they and theirs could care less about the growth of this nations and it's people. So..i cannot nor will i listen to anything the tea people or republicans has to say. Grow..evolve and stop being so darn nasty and maybe i'll listen...

[BridgeTroll]

You paint with a pretty broad brush for one so "highly evolved"...

[tufsu1]

A train that drops you off in one part of Orlando and then another part of Tampa and wishes you luck getting to your destination won't work ... unless it links directly to light rail in those cities that hit key points of interest. But no one is even talking about that, and there's no money for it.

well Orlando is building SunRail and is looking at light rail too....Tampa was planning a light rail system (before last week's defeat by the voters) but will have BRT connecting at first.

[JeffreyS]

BigGuy219 I know it seems like we are teaming up on you in some adversarial fashion but let me tell you many of us thought very similar things. At this point however there are too many examples of less dense big suburban sprawlers like the Florida cities having great success with rail.  Really just too many to make much of an argument about good plans not working.  Now is HSR the way to go probably not but demographics seem to have little to do with it.  HSR just is a too expensive form of corridor service for a state already gridded with Amtrak ROW.  That money could go a lot farther improving those routes.

[BigGuy219]

A train that drops you off in one part of Orlando and then another part of Tampa and wishes you luck getting to your destination won't work ... unless it links directly to light rail in those cities that hit key points of interest. But no one is even talking about that, and there's no money for it.

well Orlando is building SunRail and is looking at light rail too....Tampa was planning a light rail system (before last week's defeat by the voters) but will have BRT connecting at first.

Build light rail in Orlando and Tampa that hits all the key destinations (theme parks, sports venues, concert venues, et.al.) and then worry about HSR that links the two.

And good luck with BRT. To paraphrase Kanye West, "white people don't care about busses."

[thelakelander]

^It appears they're trying to build them simultaneous.