An update on the OIA's attempt to fund a train station and garage on their property for AAF.

full article: http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/...,2820400.story

Seems like Orlando's the holdup for AAF.

http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/05/2...of-at-new.html

Fix for design goof at new Miami airport central train station to cost millions, delay opening

Guess, they won't be open for this year. They pushback to early 2015. They want to reconstruction new MIA central airport station.

Miami's airport central stations has nothing what-so-ever to do with FEC!
Why did you include this bit of news in this topic? Wouldn't this bit of news be more appropriate with the "Miami: MetroRail expansion to the airport begins construction" thread?

The FEC project appears to be stimulating TOD talk in Downtown Miami already. From the Metro Jacksonville discussion boards:

The hotel design looks great and glad their will be skybridges connecting the All Aboard Florida train station & this convention center. My issue is that the MDM company were the one was that were supposed to develop the MET 3 Highrise that was going to be Miami's tallest and that project fell through.

This project is still moving forward. I've also been informed that after the Orlando-Miami link comes on-line, studies will start on connecting that line to Jacksonville. Evidently, their development arm is interesting in several downtown Jax properties around the old rail terminal.

State, All Aboard Florida sign deal for Miami-to-Orlando train

full article: http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/...,5236088.story

Thanks for posting this, Lakelander.

According to late updates in the Sentinel, the Expressway Authority also signed off on the deal. ;)

Miami-Orlando train plans gain steam
http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/07/2...lans-gain.html

what about the Orlando airport station ??
any new news.......

All Aboard Florida Seeks Downtown Miami train Hub
 

http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/08/2...-downtown.html

new news
 

the Florida Trend has new news !!!
excellent stuff about All Aboard
also SunRail and The Wave........

A link might help...
Ticket to ride on FECI's 'All Aboard Florida'
http://www.floridatrend.com/article/...aboard-florida

And info on the local projects
Snapshot: Local Rail in Florida
http://www.floridatrend.com/article/...ail-in-florida

Megaproject Revealed: All Aboard Florida's elevated grand central station
http://exmiami.org/index.php/aboard-...-office-space/

^ this is going to be a massive boon to the west side of downtown Miami. It's going to be crazy seeing a passenger train pull into a station 40+ feet above the ground!

If the FEC is working with SOM for the development of the train station, I have no qualms about how the end result will be: stunning!

Orlando airport is a go go
as of Oct 2nd

anybody got any pics/plans of the new
airport train station?????

Do you have a official release?

More AAF news. Tampa is worried that the second phase will be to Jax instead of them. Looking at this logically, they are probably right. FEC already owns existing track to Jax. It's much cheaper and quicker to add passenger trains on it than building something new down the middle of I-4 (I can't imagine CSX allowing them on their line).

full article: http://tbo.com/news/business/tampa-w...-way-20131003/

Here you go!

full article: http://www.bizjournals.com/orlando/n...rida-will.html

Here the video:

http://www.orlandoairports.net/meeti...1002_video.htm

MCO Board approves $1.1 billions expansion
 

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/busin...,4042699.story

Orlando Airport board has been approves today for airport expansion.

Let the speculation begin.

^I would say this seals the deal. Great news for my former State.

AAF confirms ownership of recently purchased land in DT West Palm Beach. An AAF station and TOD will be built there:

http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/bu...acres-f/nbPxz/

http://media.cmgdigital.com/shared/l...-purchases.jpg

Will all the building to be demolished?

Yes, I believe those numbered in the photo will be demolished. (1) and (2) will be the station location, while (3) and (4) will be needed to provide parking and possibly other uses, residential or commercial, above the parking garages.

I'm I looking at that right seeing a single track for the FEC line?

Hows that gonna work with AAF AND TriRail?

Since the AAF project hasn't yet begun construction, they're going to add another track and create grade separation for much of the line. Right now, most of the FEC line is a single track.

Double-track: yes.
Grade separation: no.

The only exception is in downtown Miami, where several blocks of the rail line will be elevated to form a terminal station.

Tri-rail runs on the CSX track further west. There's talk of extending it onto the FEC line, but that hasn't gotten anywhere lately that I'm aware of.

was there new news?
they picked a site for Fort Lauderdale......

Yes:

AAF announced their plan for the new Ft Lauderdale station and associated development.

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/fl-all-a...,2083396.story

http://www.businesswire.com/news/hom...ation-Location

http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/bu...station/nb2Wj/

http://media.cmgdigital.com/shared/l...stationmap.jpg

see link above for full article.

Also, Tampa isn't happy....

The cover of this weeks TBJ says "On Track to be Left Behind" with another called "All Aboard or Out of the Loop". They dragged Hussein Cumber of AAF over to town to give more details, though he said he had no information on any future plans in any location.

Tampa Bay Business Journal:
http://www.bizjournals.com/tampabay/....html?page=all

http://www.bizjournals.com/tampabay/....html?page=all

Thanks for the updates Lakelander, very interesting.

I hope AAF does in fact happen. Will be awesome for the state of FL if it does.

Oh, this is definitely happening. This is OLD money (by Florida standards) at work here, and they know exactly what they are doing.

There is absolutely a market for this.

Rick Scott screwed Tampa so hard.

Really? Even FEC desires transit near their planned stations. What transit does Tampa Bay have connecting all its cities together, for example Tampa with St. Petersburg? Orlando, Kissimmee, and Sanford will have Sun Rail, while Miami, Ft. Lauderdale, and West Palm Beach already have Tri Rail.
Additionally, FEC's AAF will be privately financed, I wish I could say the same for the ex-HSR proposal from Tampa. Tampa should look at establishing fast mass transit lines before expecting faster intercity trains than the existing Amtrak service.

The ill-fated HSR project between Tampa and Orlando was supposed to funded and operated with private dollars for the first 30 years. I believe it would have failed as proposed but I still would have taken the free infrastructure. There was no reason, that infrastructure could not have been used by conventional commuter rail or as a new Central Florida freight corridor. However, I also agree that the Bay area needs to get its transit act together. There's a lot of potential there if the politicians stop tripping over their own two feet.

We must be talking about two different HSR proposals. The one that Scott killed wasn't using state or local dollars. The only thing we did was send the federal money to other states for their rail projects. So we failed if the goal was to save "tax dollars."

That very stupid. He didn't do it. Shame on him!! He should have a chance. He won't be re-elected in 2014. He will not going to be governor anymore.

You have absolutely NO idea of what you are talking about. The HSR project that was proposed was all about being a Federal demonstration project. As far as no need, just how recently have you navigated I-4 between Orlando & Tampa?

California will have a surplus this year. Look it up.

Rick Scott is a complete idiot, and is a total disaster as Governor of the 4th largest State in the country.

And AAF is not HSR. It will be faster than Amtrak at about 90 mph and will be successful, but don't kid yourself into thinking this is privately funded HSR. It most certainly is not. It is higher speed rail than we are used to.

Since when has 125 mph train speeds not been considered high speed rail? NEC regionals achieve 125 mph on the speedway in NJ. Acela only achieves 135 mph on the same speedway. Does that 10 mph make that much a difference to you?
125 mph is faster than HSR trains from Chicago to St. Louis, and from Chicago to Detroit. 125 mph is faster than the original Tokyo to Osaka "Bullet" trains, which I believe most would consider the original HSR train. :)
125 mph Orlando to Coco Beach, a distance of ~40 miles
110 mph from Coco Beach to West Palm Beach, a distance of ~124 miles
79 mph West Palm Beach to North Miami, a distance of ~54 miles.
60 mph from North Miami to downtown Miami, a distance of ~11 miles.
Over 2/3rds of the entire route is proposed to be faster than Class 4 tracks will allow.

^Acela goes 150mph in Rhode Island.

What about rail travel in Italy...
or Germany or France or Japan or Spain or London England...

Thanks for proving my point. These speeds are not true HSR. The proposal that was killed from Orlando to Tampa was HSR. What California wants to do is HSR. The above speeds are not.

x1000! :cheers:

I believe AAF is a more logical step for Florida (operational-wise) than the dead HSR project that would have connected Tampa and Orlando. Nevertheless, Rick Scott screwed this state over big time by rejecting that HSR money. It was a demonstration project being funded by the feds and private companies were willing to operate it on their own dime for the first 30 years. Opportunities like that don't happen every day. Even if it fails after 30 years, that's infrastructure not paid for locally that could have been used for freight and conventional passenger rail movement.

No money was saved on Florida's end, since we can't get the cash back for all the studies. If any thing, we subsidized FECI's decision (all the HSR studies we paid for) to create AAF, which is essentially covers the path of the dead HSR project's phase 2.

Having DT Tampa, Ybor and the cruise terminals directly tied to Disney, OCCC/Seaworld and OIA with a 35-45 minute ride would have been transformative. Especially since the Tampa end was the end with lots of land to develop near the station. Add a station at the Hard Rock Casino (which gets 20,000+ weekday visitors, many of them tourists who drive from Orlando), and ridership would have been plenty.

I agree. So why is Rick Scott so stupid???

^He's not stupid, he's a self serving asshole.