(The following column appeared on the Miami Herald website on May 8, 2009.)
MIAMI, Fla. — Faced with a Hobson’s choice, state legislators balked at the all-or-nothing option in a bill that would have provided funding for the Tri-Rail commuter service and the proposed Sunrail commuter-train system in Orlando. There was so much wrong with this bill from the Sunrail aspect that it wasn’t passed. But that meant leaving Tri-Rail, whose 7,000 ridership has doubled in the last year, without dedicated funding and facing drastic service cuts, if not worse.
The bill would have paid the CSX Inc. $150 million for 61.2 miles of track for Sunrail and $496 million to upgrade CSX facilities, including tracks for freight trains near the Sunrail system. The main critic of the deal, state Sen. Paula Dockery, R-Lakeland, said the $646 million total cost would place it among the highest prices every paid for U.S. rail service — about $10.5 million per rail mile.
Even worse, the bill would have made the state liable for accidents caused by CSX employees, putting Florida taxpayers at huge risk of giant payouts because of a private company’s negligence.
So, while Sunrail is a great idea, just as the 20-year-old Tri-Rail turned out to be, its cost was way out of line. That said, something has to be done to keep South Florida’s Tri-Rail running its 50 trains daily. A late funding request by a group of legislators to the GOP’s legislative leadership fell on deaf ears.
Tri-Rail’s annual $47 million budget comes from federal, state and local funds. It has fought to find a dedicated source of funding as its three funding counties — Broward, Miami-Dade and West Palm Beach — are increasingly reluctant to pay their share of its budget. Included in this year’s rejected bill was a $2 surcharge on rental cars in the three counties as a dedicated-revenue source.
With the surcharge proposal dead and Tri-Rail’s funding counties on the verge of bolting, things look bleak.
First, the number of trains per day will be reduced, then the train service will shut down.
Local and state officials can’t let that happen. Tri-Rail is a success that has been nurtured first by its supporters’ stubborn vision and now by a combination of the recession and last summer’s high gas prices. To let an efficient transit alternative die as a nascent new national energy policy is emphasizing more mass transit is simply unconscionable.
In the short term, the counties Tri-Rail serves must fill in the funding gap. If the Legislature meets in a special session, as is likely, Tri-Rail’s dedicated-funding source — with no CSX bailout baggage attached — should be approved.