Brightline Trains

[jrs2]

So, based on all the commentary, there won't be a stop near Universal.  When AMT and Globalvia proposed a link from OIA to the OCCC and I-Drive, OIA (or Mears) said no because of the lost rental car business.  Now, you have a situation where Universal wouldn't want to make it easier for their guests to stay off-site, much like Disney.  So, what we're left with is Disney island, Universal Island, and I-Drive Island and Mears supplies the ferries from OIA.  The Virgin proposal is a bit of an anomaly to this; their only concern is to ensure ridership numbers much like the Obama HSR proposal with a Disney stop.  Beyond this, Mears can't stop it b/c the Virgin trains are already going to OIA (When I say Mears can't stop it I'm a realist as to who is telling OIA what regarding rail links).

[spenser1058]

A good look back at some of the history and why things may not change much:

From Rob Plays

(Also note that Disney and Universal are both playing the same game - there’s no “saint” vs. “sinner here)

[aent]

5 hours ago, jrs2 said:

So, based on all the commentary, there won't be a stop near Universal.  When AMT and Globalvia proposed a link from OIA to the OCCC and I-Drive, OIA (or Mears) said no because of the lost rental car business.  Now, you have a situation where Universal wouldn't want to make it easier for their guests to stay off-site, much like Disney.  So, what we're left with is Disney island, Universal Island, and I-Drive Island and Mears supplies the ferries from OIA.  The Virgin proposal is a bit of an anomaly to this; their only concern is to ensure ridership numbers much like the Obama HSR proposal with a Disney stop.  Beyond this, Mears can't stop it b/c the Virgin trains are already going to OIA (When I say Mears can't stop it I'm a realist as to who is telling OIA what regarding rail links).

To be fair, Virgin agreed to pay the airport a ton of money to rent the space for their stop... AMT/Globalvia refused. If Virgin goes ahead with the Disney route bypassing Universal, I do think its possible Universal sees a need for a response to that and feels their hand is forced to cooperate on an alternative route.

[dcluley98]

How about we get Disney for Virgin/HSR and Universal for Local Light Rail tying into SunRail/Communter Rail. 

 

Take that Corporations! We Got options you all need to compete for! 

Never was any good at this political stuff, but pretty good at pretty obvious stuff. 

[codypet]

The logistics of getting heavy rail (Sunrail & VT) out there just seem insurmountable to me in any political climate in the Orlando area.  Especially when you think about all the safety requirements needed to make it work on a new alignment.   For that some sort of elevated rail in an existing roadway or utility alignment or a light rail would make more sense.  You'd have to go "light" because the costs for bridge structures on heavy rail are insanity and keeping it on the ground along SLR (the most likely continuous alignment) just wouldn't make sense.

[Urban Mail Carrier]

Most likely that tourist line will be elevated light rail.

[shardoon]

12 hours ago, dcluley98 said:

How about we get Disney for Virgin/HSR and Universal for Local Light Rail tying into SunRail/Communter Rail. 

 

Take that Corporations! We Got options you all need to compete for! 

Never was any good at this political stuff, but pretty good at pretty obvious stuff. 

It amazes me how far we have come. In the next 5-10 years, when tourists come off a plane, they will go to a train station at OIA and potentially board different trains and lines to the attractions. Locals will most likely have a connecting train to another train station to Sunrail. We are getting there, although it has been a sloppy process over the years.......

Also, I am noticing land clearing along the beachline out by the 520 interchange. Does this have anything to do with Virgin?  

[HankStrong]

18 minutes ago, shardoon said:

Also, I am noticing land clearing along the beachline out by the 520 interchange. Does this have anything to do with Virgin?  

Yes, it does.  It's also going on near 436.  My buddy's son is working out there.

[IAmFloridaBorn]

Does anybody have an outline of how close to the 528 this train will be between cocoa and International Airport

[jrs2]

On 8/5/2019 at 10:53 PM, aent said:

To be fair, Virgin agreed to pay the airport a ton of money to rent the space for their stop... AMT/Globalvia refused. If Virgin goes ahead with the Disney route bypassing Universal, I do think its possible Universal sees a need for a response to that and feels their hand is forced to cooperate on an alternative route.

well, FEC agreed to house 8 of 12 trains for the entire then-Brightline system at a maintenance facility on OIA property...and pay GOAA rent for that. 

As for the actual station built mostly with FDOT money and rent at that intermodal facility, I'm not familiar with that or how much rent they would pay- assumingly like a gate fee an airline pays?

But the major element here is that BL doesn't compete with Mears; rather, it will feed Mears or it will deflect lost Mears customers from the airlines.  Either way Mears wins.

With AMT/Globalvia, Mears can't ever win b/c if AMT pays GOAA the difference in lost rental car fees, does GOAA turn around and reimburse Mears?  I don't think so.  

I kind of don't see GOAA butting heads with Orange County and I-Drive and the OCCC because AMT wouldn't agree to pay gate fees to dock at the Intermodal facility, but, it could be- or it could be a convenient excuse to give to cover up Mears' involvement.

 

38 minutes ago, IAmFloridaBorn said:

Does anybody have an outline of how close to the 528 this train will be between cocoa and International Airport

the track will be just to the south of the 528 easement, within a couple of hundred feet, in schematics I saw 4 years ago.

[IAmFloridaBorn]

I guess the better question is will I be able to see the bright-line train from the 528? Because I'm going to try and race it

[HankStrong]

Yes.  Very close to 528

[shardoon]

4 hours ago, jrs2 said:

well, FEC agreed to house 8 of 12 trains for the entire then-Brightline system at a maintenance facility on OIA property...and pay GOAA rent for that. 

As for the actual station built mostly with FDOT money and rent at that intermodal facility, I'm not familiar with that or how much rent they would pay- assumingly like a gate fee an airline pays?

But the major element here is that BL doesn't compete with Mears; rather, it will feed Mears or it will deflect lost Mears customers from the airlines.  Either way Mears wins.

With AMT/Globalvia, Mears can't ever win b/c if AMT pays GOAA the difference in lost rental car fees, does GOAA turn around and reimburse Mears?  I don't think so.  

I kind of don't see GOAA butting heads with Orange County and I-Drive and the OCCC because AMT wouldn't agree to pay gate fees to dock at the Intermodal facility, but, it could be- or it could be a convenient excuse to give to cover up Mears' involvement.

 

the track will be just to the south of the 528 easement, within a couple of hundred feet, in schematics I saw 4 years ago.

However, if the Disney station comes to fruition, Mears, can kiss that Magical Express contract goodbye. 

[codypet]

4 hours ago, IAmFloridaBorn said:

I guess the better question is will I be able to see the bright-line train from the 528? Because I'm going to try and race it

Drive out to Innovation Way and SR 528.   You see the bridges for the ramps?  That wasn't just an exercise in building bridges.  

The Water Management District has the approved plans on their website.  There's going to be some design changes, but you'll get the gist of it.  Site clearing and rough grading is being done and there's gonna be a lot of it.

[jrs2]

20 minutes ago, codypet said:

Drive out to Innovation Way and SR 528.   You see the bridges for the ramps?  That wasn't just an exercise in building bridges.  

The Water Management District has the approved plans on their website.  There's going to be some design changes, but you'll get the gist of it.  Site clearing and rough grading is being done and there's gonna be a lot of it.

I saw that a couple of months back and thought about that; I didn't even know that exit was up and running...

[shardoon]

But what is all the clearing to the north side of 528 from 520 onwards for miles and miles along the road? 

[aent]

7 hours ago, jrs2 said:

well, FEC agreed to house 8 of 12 trains for the entire then-Brightline system at a maintenance facility on OIA property...and pay GOAA rent for that. 

As for the actual station built mostly with FDOT money and rent at that intermodal facility, I'm not familiar with that or how much rent they would pay- assumingly like a gate fee an airline pays?

But the major element here is that BL doesn't compete with Mears; rather, it will feed Mears or it will deflect lost Mears customers from the airlines.  Either way Mears wins.

With AMT/Globalvia, Mears can't ever win b/c if AMT pays GOAA the difference in lost rental car fees, does GOAA turn around and reimburse Mears?  I don't think so.  

I kind of don't see GOAA butting heads with Orange County and I-Drive and the OCCC because AMT wouldn't agree to pay gate fees to dock at the Intermodal facility, but, it could be- or it could be a convenient excuse to give to cover up Mears' involvement.

 

the track will be just to the south of the 528 easement, within a couple of hundred feet, in schematics I saw 4 years ago.

I can't find the agreement which I did find before, but I did find they're currently paying $4 million in rent to GOAA each year for the terminal being empty, and when its operational, rent will go up.

Mears will lose if Virgin continues west to Disney or any tourist attraction. It reduces the need for their services. I don't think Mears holds the power it once did... the introduction of Uber/Lyft really hurt them bad, and hasn't Mears been sold off at this point to some national investment company?

But GOAA literally did butt heads with Orange County/I-Drive over the gate fee/minimum rent to cover all lost rental car revenue. Its apparent FEC was negotiating at the same time, so maybe part of it was they couldn't give AMT a great deal/minimal rent and charge Brightline a ton. When AMT/Globalvia couldn't come to an agreement with GOAA, they asked if they could split the project into 2 phases and prove the system operational with the route just from I-Drive/OCCC to Florida Mall, and then make the airport connection a phase 2, but the OC government denied that request, they said the airport needed to be in phase 1.

Of course, at that time, there was little to no cooperation from Universal, and Universal didn't own the new land yet. So a lot of stuff has changed since that happened, so hopefully they'll give it another shot.

[jgardnerucf]

3 hours ago, shardoon said:

But what is all the clearing to the north side of 528 from 520 onwards for miles and miles along the road? 

Contractor has the plans upside down lol

[codypet]

13 hours ago, shardoon said:

But what is all the clearing to the north side of 528 from 520 onwards for miles and miles along the road? 

If its as far west as SR 520 maybe the contract does have the plans upside down.  It should only be between 95 and 1 on the north.

These are the plans if you want to see where they're going.  Link

[shardoon]

13 minutes ago, codypet said:

If its as far west as SR 520 maybe the contract does have the plans upside down.  It should only be between 95 and 1 on the north.

These are the plans if you want to see where they're going.  Link

They are clearing all along 528 on the north end from St. John's river to Wedgefield. Although, I now noticed land clearing along 528 on the south side between 520 and the first toll this morning. 

[dcluley98]

There was an article in the Sentinel that a ton of cities are trying to get stations on the Brightline/Virgin Trains route, including Boca Raton, Aventura, Port of Miami, Hollywood. 

https://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/transportation/fl-bz-brightline-stations-outlook-20190812-zzsscpe7vffkdpomb6gppmi2ly-story.html

This makes absolutely no sense to me, as it is supposed to be inter-regional HSR option, not local light/commuter rail. So stupid if they let this happen instead of keeping it high speed with through trains. 

[jrs2]

53 minutes ago, dcluley98 said:

There was an article in the Sentinel that a ton of cities are trying to get stations on the Brightline/Virgin Trains route, including Boca Raton, Aventura, Port of Miami, Hollywood. 

https://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/transportation/fl-bz-brightline-stations-outlook-20190812-zzsscpe7vffkdpomb6gppmi2ly-story.html

This makes absolutely no sense to me, as it is supposed to be inter-regional HSR option, not local light/commuter rail. So stupid if they let this happen instead of keeping it high speed with through trains. 

very true, but as for this being HSR or true HSR, it was doomed from the get go when it didn't follow an easement down the middle of an expressway, free from signals and cross streets.  not saying that they should give Aventura or Boca a station.  

Does BL has interconnectivity with Tri-Rail?  Isn't it the same track?

[Urban Mail Carrier]

I guess it’s easier to ask Virgin trains then FDOT for a train station. As we all know the State does not properly fund its transit systems.

[codypet]

28 minutes ago, jrs2 said:

very true, but as for this being HSR or true HSR, it was doomed from the get go when it didn't follow an easement down the middle of an expressway, free from signals and cross streets.  not saying that they should give Aventura or Boca a station.  

Does BL has interconnectivity with Tri-Rail?  Isn't it the same track?

No, Tri-rail uses the CSX line along I-95.  VT uses FEC's line along US1 which is through a lot of the cities.  The true HSR route has to be a dedicated alignment and is doomed with out eminent domain.  Even in the median of a major highway,  the curves of the highway end up being the limiting factor making speeds up to 220mph very very rare.  ORL to Tampa in 2011 I think could only hit 220 for a brief stretch in Polk county but otherwise was mostly in the 100's.  I always envisioned a local version of VT using the same track would make sense.  You have the track, routes are a totally different story.  Just like Autotrain doesn't stop at every city on the way.  No idea if they have something like that in the works though.

[HankStrong]

It will be a crying shame if there isn't eventually a stop in Cocoa, simply for the port to transport to it.