Brightline Trains Florida discussion

[jis]

If you are into riding as much trains as possible then do a circle trip. Go to Miami from Fort Lauderdale by Brightline. At Miami take the Metro from the adjacent Metro Station to the Airport Metro Station. Then take Tri Rail from there to West Palm Beach. Walk over to the Brightline Station and take it back to Fort Lauderdale.

 

[Mystic River Dragon]

That sounds like a lovely circle trip, jis. I think I'd like to do something like that with my train-riding friends, though, instead of by myself. I mean, if I turn to some random commuter on Tri Rail and say "Isn't this fun?" they will look at me funny.

(Perhaps a nice Gathering idea if Miami is somewhere in the future?

)

 

[chrsjrcj]

Did another RT today (I have two RT vouchers that expire June 1st), and I'd say there were about 80 people heading south and maybe a little less going north. Going south our travel time was 75 minutes and north was 70 minutes. As far as I could tell, there were no additional delays (other than going north, when we slowed to 40 mph to switch tracks).

It is my understanding that the track speed from Little River (79th Street) south on the FEC Port Lead is 40 mph. Also, the east main between Fort Lauderdale and Deerfield was not upgraded until recently. The west main between Deerfield and Fort Lauderdale was the only one upgraded to 79 mph, originally.

 

[Anderson]

@Chrsjrcj: That's about where I noticed us going 39-40 instead of 79-80. The Fort Lauderdale-Deerfield track situation would also line up with what I noticed (a lot of running at 59-60 north from Fort Lauderdale). Both sections would seem to qualify as Class 3...no idea why the section south from 79th Street is 39 instead of 59.

One other thing; They had a ton of flagmen on the streets making sure traffic didn't get in the way (and/or that we didn't have a crash). I applaud the effort, but I doubt that such is economical in the longer term.

 

[Anderson]

Another thought, on top of all of the above: I took a friend with me on the Brightline trip. He dropped me off at ORL last night (where there's a 45-minute baggage policy (I was unable to check a bag because we got stuck in traffic...even though we got to the station about 20-25 minutes before departure [1]) and hand-wringing about "If your baggage wasn't delivered to the station by an hour before departure it may be delayed" versus Brightline's 10-minute requirement). HIs reaction was basically "Wow, this is night and day..."

I'm beginning to think that Brightline may do some very serious damage to Amtrak simply by making Amtrak look bad.

[1] Funny, the Conductor had no problem checking it...

 

[chrsjrcj]

Apparently Brightline has been testing 79 mph operations on the east main between Fort Lauderdale and Deerfield. I believe they updated the signal systems last week.

Starting Monday: northbound trains are scheduled 5 minutes faster between FTL and WPB and southbound trains are scheduled 3 minutes faster between FTL and Miami.

 

[Anderson]

They also seem to be adding two round-trips (11 M-R, 12 F).

 

[jis]

https://www.bizjournals.com/southflorida/news/2018/06/07/brightline-announces-new-executive-leadership.html

 

[cirdan]

Any idea how the service is developing in terms of OTP and ridership?

 

[neroden]

I'm beginning to think that Brightline may do some very serious damage to Amtrak simply by making Amtrak look bad.

Arguably Amtrak has been making itself look bad all along, at least to those who've been to Europe or China. Brightline is simply exposing Americans who've never travelled overseas to what "normal trains" are like. But yes, I'm agreeing with you.

 

[Anderson]

Any idea how the service is developing in terms of OTP and ridership?

I don't know about ridership, but I believe that OTP is pretty close to 100% on a 5-10 minute standard.

 

[jis]

They claim they had carried over 100,000 riders before they extended service to Miami.

I also learned that they have yet to suffer any in service failure of any of the Siemens power heads since inception of commercial operations.

 

[Anderson]

I remember that...Fort Lauderdale-West Palm was doing about 30,000 pax/month per their statement. I would love to see results for June (since that should, at least in theory, be a good bit higher with Miami in the mix).

 

[user 1215]

Any idea how the service is developing in terms of OTP and ridership?

I don't know about ridership, but I believe that OTP is pretty close to 100% on a 5-10 minute standard.

It's getting better, but two SB trains yesterday were over 9 minutes late. A NB was nearly 30 minutes late. That's looking at endpoints, designed to absorb schedule pad, which, arguably there is 17 minutes of. They claimed a 60 minute ride from WPB to MIA and it's schedule is for 77 minutes. That's a 28% pad.
In other words, to be a premier service-first business, they should be looking to keeping timetables like they do in Europe or Japan. Apologies for being 60 seconds late. THAT's what will bring loyalty.

 

[jis]

No the pad is much less than 17 minutes given the realities of track work and lack of certain speed codes in ATC until it is upgraded to eATC as part of PTC deployment completion later this year. The pad is more like 5-7 minutes I am told.

I actually talked at length with the Chief of Operations at the FECRS Annual Convention, who had come to Patrick Goddard's Keynote Dinner event in West Palm Beach. He mentioned the various items that are yet to be completed including a couple of additional crossovers, PTC and upgrading of all main line tracks to 79mph before they can meet the planned 60 mins schedule. But he surmised that they will get there late this year or early next.

Nate Asplund (CEO FECR) in his Dinner Keynote address the following day mentioned the trackwork and PTC deployment that remains to be completed too. He also talked some about the work involved for Phase II which starts construction this summer.

 

[Anderson]

Brightline sent out an announcement today that they're implementing the hourly schedule on August 6. WPB-MIA time will be at 73 minutes each way at that point, with SB departures at :00 from WPB and :43* from FTL, arriving at MIA at :13 (except for a "screwball" 0530 departure from WPB to position the earliest departure from MIA, which will retain the 75-minute schedule). NB times will be at :10 from MIA and :45 from FTL, arriving WPB at :23.

SB departures will start from WPB at 0530 (the aforementioned screwball departure) and run hourly from 0600 until 2100; NB departures from MIA will start at 0710 and run until 2310. Note that this means that Friday will have the same schedule as Monday-Thursday. Weekend timetables are, as far as I can tell, unchanged.

*I think. The website isn't loading smoothly.

 

[Brian_tampa]

Great news! Now just get to Orlando by 2021. And then Tampa... lol since I live here in Tampa I would love to not drive anymore to WPB or FTL.

 

[cpotisch]

Great news! Now just get to Orlando by 2021. And then Tampa... lol since I live here in Tampa I would love to not drive anymore to WPB or FTL.

Why don't you take the the Star or Meteor? It'll no doubt be cheaper...

 

[jis]

Great news! Now just get to Orlando by 2021. And then Tampa... lol since I live here in Tampa I would love to not drive anymore to WPB or FTL.

Why don't you take the the Star or Meteor? It'll no doubt be cheaper...

And much more unreliable and slower.

 

[MattW]

But without the pseudo-tsa nonsense.

 

[me_little_me]

But without the pseudo-tsa nonsense.

By that time? Are you sure Amtrak won't be as bad or worse?

 

[MattW]

Amtrak has made no moves toward having permanent checkpoints at all stations. The tsa and their ilk come and run a circus every now and then, but that's it, and I haven't even heard of anything nearly as intrusive as brightline on Amtrak in quite some time.

 

[Caesar La Rock]

Great news! Now just get to Orlando by 2021. And then Tampa... lol since I live here in Tampa I would love to not drive anymore to WPB or FTL.

Why don't you take the the Star or Meteor? It'll no doubt be cheaper...

Amtrak would take over 3-4+ hours from Tampa to those end points (provided the train isn't delayed). Megabus would be able to do the trip quicker. It's not really fair to compare Amtrak long distance trains to Brightline. If Amtrak had state supported trains in this state, it would be a better comparison IMO. That's another thread though.

 

[chrsjrcj]

Mega Bus takes just as long as Amtrak between South Florida and Tampa. Actually, Amtrak is just as fast as driving between WPB and Tampa, because there is no direct interstate connection (either take the Turnpike to I-4 in Orlando or to SR 60 at Yeehaw Jct). Now if only the Star was reliable.

 

[brianpmcdonnell17]

Great news! Now just get to Orlando by 2021. And then Tampa... lol since I live here in Tampa I would love to not drive anymore to WPB or FTL.

Why don't you take the the Star or Meteor? It'll no doubt be cheaper...

Amtrak would take over 3-4+ hours from Tampa to those end points (provided the train isn't delayed). Megabus would be able to do the trip quicker. It's not really fair to compare Amtrak long distance trains to Brightline. If Amtrak had state supported trains in this state, it would be a better comparison IMO. That's another thread though.

Megabus is not necessarily faster than Amtrak. Megabus advertises Tampa to Miami in 5 1/2 hours, whereas when I rode the Silver Star there it took under 5. From Tampa to West Palm Beach, the Silver Star is even more competitive as there is no direct interstate route. However, there is still a major difference in the fact that Megabus is more reliable, cheaper, and has more frequencies. Other than the cost, Brightline will be an improvement in all of these areas (as well as time savings). I would definitely use the Silver Star over other methods of transportation if I go to South Florida from Tampa again in the next few years, but it is somewhat of a niche market given all of the transportation options. If Brightline does eventually reach Tampa, at that point I would use it instead of Amtrak unless the prices were much higher, mainly due to flexibility. While the route is covered by the Silver Star at what would be considered relatively good times, for my uses they fail to maximize time as it doesn't arrive into Miami until relatively late and returns to Tampa at a time that takes up a large part of the day as well.