Metro Jacksonville

QuoteA long-sought effort to get Amtrak on the Florida East Coast Railway is sidelined for now.

Long before Florida East Coast Industries announced its new passenger service between Miami and Orlando, the Florida Department of Transportation had been working with Amtrak to revive passenger service on the FEC.

It even set aside $118 million to help pay for infrastructure costs so Amtrak could provide long-distance passenger service between Miami and Jacksonville. The state transportation money was supposed to attract federal money for the project.

But federal funding never became available, and the state money set aside is no longer dedicated to that project, said Fred Wise, director of the Florida Department of Transportation's Florida Rail Enterprise.

The money would have helped pay for infrastructure improvements between West Palm Beach and Jacksonville, including new stations all along the coast in Daytona Beach, St. Augustine, Titusville, Vero Beach, Cocoa, Melbourne and Fort Pierce.

The state DOT and Amtrak are still in discussions, Wise said. But they're just in the beginning process of discussing costs and how to share those costs.

"We have a lot of work to do," Wise said.

Currently, Amtrak service between Miami and Jacksonville runs on CSX Transportation tracks that parallel Interstate 95. But that trip takes about 10 hours because CSX tracks veer into central Florida and then through Orlando. A direct route on the FEC would shorten that trip to six hours.

This Amtrak-FEC proposed line is separate from All Aboard Florida, the passenger service being established between Miami and Orlando by Florida East Coast Industries. It's investing $1 billion to run 16 to 19 trains a day each way. All Aboard Florida includes double-tracking much of FEC railroad in South Florida and building new stations.

Ledoux said All Aboard Florida would not preclude Amtrak from providing its own passenger service on the FEC.

Christina Deeds, Amtrak's media relations manager, said in a statement via email that Amtrak considers Florida an important market.

"We recognize the market potential and desire for passenger rail service among Florida east coast communities," the statement said. "Amtrak has provided state transportation officials a proposed plan that would provide this service. We continue to work with the state on finalizing details of the plan and look forward to a joint announcement."

Wise said the state did not have any specific plans from Amtrak. Bob Ledoux, Florida East Coast Railway vice president, also said the railroad has not received any plans from Amtrak.

The proposed Amtrak service was looking at only one round trip a day on the FEC. FDOT, partnering with Amtrak, applied twice for federal grants for the project but was turned down each time.

Palm Beach County transportation officials have been eager to see the Amtrak project move forward, particularly because it would require a connector be built between the CSX and FEC railroads just north of West Palm Beach.

The connector would open the door for Tri-Rail's long-awaited northward expansion to Jupiter along the FEC tracks. The commuter line now ends in Mangonia Park, just north of West Palm Beach.

"We're still hoping it will happen," said Randy Whitfield, the Palm Beach Metropolitan Planning Organization's executive director. "We're still strongly in support of starting that service."

Kim Delaney, strategic development coordinator, with the Treasure Coast Planning Council who has worked with state officials on the Amtrak-FEC project, said Amtrak in the past has looked favorably on the expansion. And the cities that would have new stations and stops in their towns also have embraced the project.

"It opens up a potentially new market for Amtrak," she said.

SOURCE: By Angel Streeter, Sun Sentinel
12:59 p.m. EST, February 22, 2013

Not surprising.  You can't blame it on the state.  They put some money aside and Amtrak, feds or whatever, made no moves.  It's sort of like the $100 million in BJP funds set aside for transit.  JTA didn't get around to using it and it disappeared.  That's the way things go. Use it or lose it.

Not sure how much Mica was pushing this, but its up to Nelson/Rubio now.

Kind of hard to get a grant for a rail service, while more efficient, duplicates another route.  While the politics behind this was strong in south Florida, there was local politics against it in central Florida.

Too many other routes in Amtrak need funds. When a state puts up the dough and Amtrak and the politicians can't come up with the match, that tells you how bad it really is up on the hill.

If FEC's AAF pans out, does it even matter at this point?

^^No.

Quote from: thelakelander on February 22, 2013, 03:28:30 PM
If FEC's AAF pans out, does it even matter at this point?

Actually it does Lake, Amtrak is an interstate carrier and AAF is strictly intrastate (to avoid a bunch of federal red tape). This was Amtrak's best shot at rebuilding the east coast corridor which had as many as 4 daily trains to the northeast even well into the Amtrak era (there were 10 each way prior to Amtrak). They are responsible for the absolute destruction of the most viable interstate route in the nation, right on the heels of trashing the midwest Florida corridor.

Meanwhile they've just signed on with a pact with Southeast High Speed Rail, to jointly rebuild the former 'S' line between Virginia and Raleigh (a plug CSX pulled out more then likely to sink passenger rail). The new (old) route then veers off on NS trackage to Charlotte. Their talking of the northeast corridor running from Boston to Atlanta. There were strong winds blowing toward Atlanta-Jacksonville, which shifted to Atlanta-Savannah and now seems to have fizzled too. Meanwhile we are not getting S**t! Nothing for the FEC, no word on restoration of at least a single train down the central state 'S' line, nothing on Atlanta, nothing on terminating the Palmetto (NYC-SAV daylight train) in Jax, 149 miles short of 1.4 million people.

In California Amtrak has split an equipment order for new trains capable of 220 MPH but operable at HrSR speeds as well:

QuoteAmtrak Joins California to Help Buy High-Speed Rail Gear
By Angela Greiling Keane - Jan 17, 2013 11:31 AM ET

Amtrak agreed to work with California, the only U.S. state planning to begin construction on a high-speed rail project this year, to buy passenger-rail equipment.

Amtrak, the U.S. long-distance passenger railroad, will ask companies starting today for information on building as many as 60 trains, which will add units on the Northeast Corridor, replace Acela trains and provide equipment for California, Chief Executive Officer Joseph Boardman said.

New trains might cost $35 million to $55 million each, Boardman said in Washington, declining to estimate the value of a contract. Amtrak and California, which plans to begin fast- train rail operations in 2022, will seek bids from companies by September, Boardman said.

“If everyone’s out issuing their own orders, everyone’s subject to what the industry can provide,” said Jeff Morales, CEO of the California High-Speed Rail Authority. “We can drive the market in a way we can’t if we purchase separately.”
California plans to lay tracks for trains running as fast as 220 miles an hour (354 kilometers an hour) in a $68.4 billion project linking San Francisco with Los Angeles.

Bombardier Inc. (BBD/B) of Montreal and Levallois-Perret, France- based Alstom SA (ALO) built Amtrak’s Acela trains for the route between Boston and Washington. They run on electrified track and are the fastest trains in service in the U.S.
Congress has effectively cut off using federal money to fund California’s rail project. Representative Jeff Denham, a California Republican and critic of the state project, was named this week as vice chairman of the rail subcommittee of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.

Boardman said the plan for Amtrak and California to order equipment jointly is “about doing the right thing for the United States” and not a new way to get U.S. money to the California project.

Long ago some wise railroaders hung a moniker on the Amtrak logo calling it "The Pointless Arrow," from all that I've observed they were right.

actually there is pretty decent talk of Southeast High Speed Rail from Raleigh north....AND from Raleigh down to Jacksonville

It will reach Atlanta long before it heads our way. It 'already' reaches Charlotte as they incrementally move into HrSR. NC has a huge advantage over FL, GA and SC in that it owns much of the actual trackage as part of a rather antebellum 'state railway system' which is largely leased to NS today. Watching them twist the supposed Atlanta-Jacksonville link over to Savannah completely ignoring the NS route straight down from Macon to Valdosta M/L alongside I-75 and from Valdosta to Jax in a bee line through the southern tip of the Okefenokee Swamp and south Georgia is proof enough that nobody in Florida has a clue. Likewise they are ignoring the nearly identical mileage wise routes from Waycross or Jesup to Macon and points north. I wouldn't hold my breath on a Raleigh-Jax link for a long, long time.