Journal of Undergraduate Research
Volume 4, Issue 3 - November 2002

Florida's High Speed Rail

Pedro Allende

The present In 1539, Hernando De Soto having been named Governor of Florida, landed at Tampa Bay. He spent the next four years exploring much of Florida and the parts of what is now the Southeastern United States. His only means of transportation was on foot, often marching long distances through heavy brush in his explorations of the state.

Almost 360 years after De Soto, transportation in Florida had not changed much. In 1898, Theodore Roosevelt and the Rough Riders and the Fifth Army Corps prepared a force to embark for Cuba during the Spanish-American War. They found that the point farthest to the south that could serve as a launching point for such a force was Tampa. Transportation infrastructure below that point was virtually non-existent, therefore, rather than sailing 90 Miles to Cuba the trip was almost 4 times as long.

Modern transportation in the state of Florida has been evolving ever since Henry Flagler first expanded Florida's rail system in an attempt to create a dependable system of transportation to support his tourist and agricultural ventures in Florida. Flagler realized, like many others after him that for commerce to occur, a reliable of infrastructure needed to be in place if commerce come from tourism, agriculture, or industry, were to thrive. In 1912, Flagler proudly rode the first train into Key West, Florida marking the completion of the Florida East Coast Railway.

Before 1949, Florida was a free-range state where public lands, including right-of way, where grazing lands for Florida's powerful agricultural interests. As automobile travel increased, so did the number of animal &endash; automobile accidents and injuries. Amid rising concerns for the safety of drivers and animals grazing on state roads after witnessing one such accident, Governor Warren stood against the free-range policy, challenging the powerful agricultural interests in the state and putting transportation safety first and ultimately succeeded in keeping all livestock behind fences though it cost him his re-election. This was only the first of many incursions by politics into Florida's transportation system

Building on the accomplishments of Gov. Fuller Warren, further improvements came in the form of the Florida Turnpike Authority under Governor LeRoy Collins. As the need for accommodating higher volumes of traffic and faster travel, the construction of the initial 110 mile section of the toll-funded Florida Turnpike was spearheaded by Thomas B. Manuel (Chairman of the Florida Turnpike Authority) and opened in 1957. After several expansions, the Florida Turnpike now includes over 443 miles of limited access toll-highways spanning from Homestead to Wildwood, consisting of bridges that allow the unimpeded flow of traffic on the thoroughfare as well as on other roads that cross the Turnpike's path through separating traffic. The Florida Turnpike currently handles the majority of intrastate traffic leading from Central Florida to east coast destinations in South Florida. As always, the government's involvement in the state's transportation system stems from the need to keep pace with Florida's growing population, importance as an emerging mega-state, and increasing international commerce.

Under the Eisenhower administration, the Federal Aid-Highway Act if 1956 was signed authorizing an interstate highway system consisting of 41,000 miles of high quality highways that were to tie the nation together, in an effort to improve interstate commerce and travel. The interstate highway system carries a much larger share of the nation's land based transportation; than any other means of transportation "approximately 26 times as much as all other roads including rural roads, and 22 times as much as intercity rail and urban rail." [Wendell and Cox, 1996] Its effect in Florida was a great complement to the Florida Turnpike, creating a vast network of highways that carry 99.6 percent of all intercity travel, and reducing average intercity travel times by over 20 percent and creating a safer and faster means of transporting both people and goods. [Wendell and Cox, 1996]

While transportation improvements such as highways have reduced travel times and improved safety, they've also had negative side effects. As a result, many urban areas have sought to alleviate traffic in their heavily populated urban centers though alternatives such as the Miami-Dade Metro Rail. It is a 21 mile system elevated rapid transit system with stations approximately one mile apart that combined with a public bus system; forms Miami-Dade's public transportation system.

As land based public transportation created options for mass transit in a local scale, exploration into the possibility of a statewide system also developed. The first study to determine the feasibility of a high speed rail in Florida was first mandated by the 1976 Florida Legislature for a project joining St. Petersburg and Daytona Beach. It was determined that the project would be economically feasible if constructed in stages utilizing the existing highway corridor but the project was abandoned.

In 1986, the legislature again created a commission to design and plan a system spanning from Miami to Orlando to Tampa emphasizing a public-private partnership for funding. The cost was estimated between 2.3 and 2.7 billion dollars, by 1990, the requested amount of public funding was 5.35 billion dollars a price tag that was seen as too high by then Gov. Lawton Chiles.

By 1992, the Florida Department of Transportation had been given "oversight and execution responsibility" [Cox, 2001] over the high speed rail project. The proposal submitted by the Florida Overland eXpress groups of firms was selected in 1995 by the FDOT to further investigate the possibility of a high speed rail in Florida and research studies continued well into 1999, when Gov. Jeb Bush cut the funding mechanism for the initiative stating that "the benefits did not justify the expense"

What seemed to be the next phase in the development of the State of Florida's transportation infrastructure was placed on the November 7, 2000 ballot after proponents organized a multimillion dollar citizen's petition campaign. The referendum for the constitutional amendment; stated on the ballot as the Florida Transportation Initiative for statewide high speed monorail, fixed guide way or magnetic levitation system, passed by a 52.7 percent to 47.3 percent vote margin.

The concept of a high speed rail in Florida is something that has been around for 26 years and has, time after time the efforts of a few proponents have been met with resistance by the Governor's office and parts of the Legislature due to the large financial commitment necessary to complete such an endeavor and the impracticality of implementing a high speed rail as a means of intercity travel within the state especially when considering current alternatives.

Proponents of the 2000 Ballot initiative spent over 1.3 million dollars in petition solicitations, and over 1.2 million dollars in Advertising and Public Relations expenses towards making the constitutional amendment a reality. The referendum passed by a relatively small 292,758 vote margin statewide. In the local impact areas however, the amendment, the purpose of which is to explore the creation of a high speed rail system linking the 5 largest urban centers of the state, fared differently, passing in those areas with higher population density and large cities most likely to benefit from such an amendment.

Proponents speak of the people's will, about a mandate handed up to the Governor and the Legislature in favor of the development of a high speed rail system in Florida. In fact, the results were less than a mandate; it was a last-minute petition drive that led to a ballot question in which people were asked to make an uninformed decision about a seemingly novel idea reminiscent of an episode of The Simpsons in which Springfield tackles a similar issue with the construction of a monorail system. The fact is that the High Speed Rail is not an issue of large political importance except to those proponents and business interests advocating its construction and certainly not one that we'll see as a platform issue in the 2002 gubernatorial race between Gov. Bush and former Attorney General Reno.

Support for the project in the legislature comes only from a handful of legislators humoring supporters of the proposal in hopes of obtaining additional campaign contributions, knowing full well that the possibility of such a proposal becoming a reality is extremely low. Even in its inception as a constitutional amendment it was not an issue that was publicized or that many people were informed about. Our research indicates that the reason most people voted for the proposal was the novelty of it. When presented with the potential economic impacts of the high speed rail and the possibility of potential tax increases in order to fund the construction and potential subsidies of the rail, survey subjects tend to choose against the high speed rail.

This constitutional amendment brings the idea of a high speed rail in the State of Florida closer to reality, but is that really what the citizens of this state need and want? For over 26 years, efforts to develop a high speed rail system have fallen short due to lack of funding, veto by the Governor, and numerous other reasons. In an attempt to bypass the traditional methods of achieving this goal, the proponents have attempted to force the issue by the easiest means possible; a referendum for a constitutional amendment placed on the ballot through a petition initiative campaign that cost over a million dollars. The assumption on the part of the proponents of this system that the uninformed voter will be captured by the novelty of a high speed rail and in fact vote in its favor was correct but only by a slim margin of 262,758 votes. When analyzing the actual feasibility of this project, taking into account the Interstate Highway system, Florida Turnpike and their efficiency in routing intercity travel throughout the state, it is clear that there is no need for an additional outlay of taxpayer money to create a system that will turnout much like the monorail in the episode of The Simpsons referred to earlier, used below expectations and in running at a deficit.

The benefits of such the high speed rail are projected increases in regional economies, as well as the improved mobility between the major corporate, industrial, and tourist centers of Florida. Indirect benefits are expected increases in property values throughout the corridor, as well as a boost to the state economy through the creation of approximately 5,000 to 8,000 new jobs as estimated by the FHSRA.

The passage of the amendment to the Florida Constitution in November 2000 brings up a myriad of questions. Costs of the high speed rail system are estimated by the Florida High Speed Rail Authority to be between 1.8 billion for a non electric rail with a top speed of 120 miles per hour, upwards of 6.1 billion dollars for a magnetic levitation (MagLev) rail with a top speed of 300 mile per hour. And will be paid for by a combination of public funding particularly in local municipalities and cities where stations are located, state funding, as well as Federal sources.

Though the wheels seem to have been set in motion, the viability of the High speed rail is still in question. One of the main concerns is whether this system is one that the state's current infrastructure can accommodate. Unlike in Europe where cities are much more densely populated and have major public transportation systems, Florida's population is less densely populated, and relies heavily on the personal automobile as the primary means of transportation. One concern is that people will need to acquire additional transportation once arriving at their destination on the high speed rail thereby raising the cost of the overall trip and making the price less reasonable.

Operating expenses for the Tampa-Orlando vary from approximately $30 million to $45 million per year as estimated by the FHSRA. In an estimate by the FHSRA, revenues from current ridership projections and ancillary revenue sources such as parking and concessions are projected $18 million to $37 million for 2007, and $43 million to $87 million for 2010. However, several sources speculate that ridership estimates are overly optimistic by as high as 30 percent in part due to the recent upgrades in the states transportation infrastructure and nature of transportation in the US is very different to that in Europe. It is calculated therefore, that the rail would operate at a deficit as the cost-benefit ratio of the project is less than one, making it an unfavorable economic investment for the state.

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