Metro Jacksonville

QuoteBY MICHAEL TURNBELL

SUN SENTINEL

Been on Tri-Rail lately? It’s standing room only at times on weekdays.
Yes, you read that correctly.

Often derided by critics as the train to nowhere, high gasoline prices have helped ridership rise about 11 percent every month since the start of the year. Now, about 14,500 ride the Palm Beach-Broward-Miami-Dade rail line weekdays. At the same time, more passengers are bringing bicycle with them, crowding aisles and doors.

While the ridership numbers were higher when gas was $4 a gallon, the current surge in passengers comes as Tri-Rail’s aging cars are increasingly breaking down. Fewer working cars and more passengers mean it’s tougher to find a seat at rush hour.

Officials predict the number of passengers might rise even further next year once a three-year construction project on Interstate 95 between Fort Lauderdale and Miami-Dade’s Golden Glades interchange gets fully underway.
“I think some of the people who defected to the express buses will be back on the train once they realize that they’re going to be stuck in traffic like everyone else,” said Tri-Rail spokeswoman Bonnie Arnold.

The trains becomes especially cramped when they run with two cars instead of the standard three, something likely to continue until the middle or end of next year, when new locomotives and cars are put into service.
And then there are accidents that take a car out of service.

For example, on Nov. 7, the day after a train struck a stalled car, every seat on the two-car P639 southbound evening rush hour train was filled. Two dozen people stood in the aisles and there were 10 bikes in each car, according to passengers.

“It’s a mess with two cars,” said Heather Drawdy, who takes the train from Boynton Beach to Fort Lauderdale and back on weekdays. “It’s an even a bigger mess when the trains are delayed, as you are adding twice the people.”
Sometimes there are so many bikes, it’s tough for passengers to enter or exit.

“That’s a hazard if there is an accident,” said Steve Inglese, who rides weekdays from the Fort Lauderdale Airport Station to Boca Raton. “If we get a two-car train, there’s 35 people standing and bikes blocking the door.”
Chuck Gauran, a flight attendant from Fort Lauderdale who rides to and from Miami International Airport, said airport passengers further clog the seating areas because they are not aware of luggage racks on the lower levels of the cars.

“The rules for bike and luggage stowage are not enforced,” he said.

Conductors occasionally have told passengers with bikes to wait for the next train, said Arnold.
“It’s been an ongoing project to manage the bikes,” Arnold said. “We hoped the installation of bike lockers at all of the stations would ease the congestion, and it has â€" somewhat â€" but not as much as we had wished.”

Most of Tri-Rail’s fleet is more than 30 years old and prone to mechanical breakdowns. The commuter railroad is spending almost $95 million on 24 new cars and 10 locomotives. The money includes $15 million in federal economic stimulus funds as well as state money and gas tax funds from the three counties.

“People think that now that we have all this money to buy equipment, it will start magically appearing, but that’s just not the case,” said Arnold, explaining that the engines and cars have to be built, which can take 18 to 24 months.

Tri-Rail’s purchase is part of a much bigger contract including Los Angeles’ Metrolink commuter railroad. Rail agencies commonly purchase vehicles together to save money.

Since Metrolink ordered 137 of the 161 cars in the contract and since that agency coordinated the contract, its purchase has priority over Tri-Rail’s.

http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/11/20/2511030/with-a-shrinking-fleet-and-more.html

From where I sit in Jacksonville it seems like a nice problem to have.

How long does it take to build a commuter rail car, for heaven's sake?  Or is it matter of Rick Scott trying to kill Tri-Rail so there's no money for repalcements?

Ock, do you have any answers?