Florida's Lost Transportation
(http://photos.metrojacksonville.com/photos/2818168341_mG88M4G-M.jpg)
The lost urban railroads of Florida. A brief photo album of the lost rail transit systems in Florida.
Full Article
http://www.metrojacksonville.com/article/2013-oct-floridas-lost-transportation
Ock, Way to RAIL back to health with a super article.
Ennis, nice job.
Replace the horse and mule with a tricked out golf cart or 4 wheeler. Legislation is pending before city council to have a local gated community use golf carts.
Before you give away all the Downtown city owned property to the PFPF (A mistake) allow for an amendment for a dedicated street car line. Why not? A bunch of singles.
CSX- Where are you?
It seems that most of these systems were very short lived and unsustainable. The only systems that were killed by busses were those in the major cities, Jax, Miami, Tampa, Etc.
Yes, most of these privately owned systems where short lived. As opposed to being simply public transportation, many were a means to funnel people to and from development properties. Ock may correct me but from what I can find, the longest continuous mix of operating systems happened to be in the larger cities of that era.
60 years (1886-1946) - Tampa
56 years (1880-1936) - Jacksonville
48 years (1884-1932) - Pensacola
45 years (1881-1926) - Key West
31 years (1895-1926) - St. Augustine
30 years (1919-1949) - St. Petersburg
+30 years (1886-192?) - Fernandina Beach
25 years (1915-1940) - Miami/Miami Beach
Another great article and pictures.
Though they weren't part of a streetcar system, if the tracks had survived, the old J,M,&P, and FEC branch line to Pablo Beach would have been perfect for commuter rail today.
From what we can tell, even after track to Pablo Beach was abandoned, there was still passenger service to St. Nicholas and Hogan.
Streetcars served a specific purpose in the era they existed.
Cities chock full of people were using horses as their primary means of transportation and it was causing health issues as well, making the areas amassed with flies from the large amounts of laying horse dung.
So when streetcars came along, cities excitedly embraced them because once they became ubiquitous, they began to outlaw horses in the central city for non-commercial use. The side effect was that, people could go farther to seek out commerce, work and recreation.
The oversight, was when cars came along. Cities assumed incorrectly that accommodating them would increase the appeal of the city center by improving its accessibility.
Ultimately, the car brought all of the issues the horse did. Instead of large amounts of shared transport, we went back to individual transport with something that polluted like a horse and residual impacts (just like the horse) as in, where do I put this thing?
When cities decided to give higher ROW to cars instead of streetcars, the complaints rose about their being "in the way".
It was the end. Cities rose up to undermine the private lines and did nothing to make the public sustainable.
Only now are again finding their benefit. It will be a slow road back up the hill.