Brightline Trains Florida discussion

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Are there any plans to go beyond even 1tph?
This is a complicated question. Notionally, the plans are only for 1tph (or thereabouts), but those have never aligned with ridership projections (witness my breakdown earlier).

Let's work this backwards: Say that Brightline goes to 10-car trains, as follows:
-8 cars, Smart, 66 seats
-2 cars, Premium, 50 seats

Each of those trains would have 628 seats. Alternative configurations with 9 Smart/1 Premium (646 seats) or 7 "standard" Smart/2 Premium/1 half-cafe/half-Smart (600-ish seats) are plausible, but this feels like a useful middle case.

628 seats times 32 one-way trips (16 round-trips) gives 20,096 seats per day, or 7,335,040 seats per year. After this point it's a choose-your-own adventure game as to your preferred "maximum feasible overall load factor" between South Florida and Orlando. Going by Brightline's projections, WPB-MCO's expected load factor is about 80% of that of FLL-BOC's (FLL-BOC being the peak load segment). If you assume that 80% is the maximum load factor on the busiest segment and scale down from there, you're looking at about 65% of seats being fillable. If you use 70%, then the share of seats you can fill is about 57%.

65% of the total seat count would be 4.768m. 57% of the total seat count would be 4.181m.

Brightline's ridership projections for the northern/long haul segment in the current report indicate hitting a "run rate" of 4.181m riders sometime in 2025 (4.29m riders estimated in 2025) and 4.768m riders sometime around 2028-29 (4.76m riders in 2028, 4.89m riders in 2029). Other reports have varied on this quite a bit, but this seems like the best data we've got.

[Obviously, this depends on actually having the equipment to hit these numbers. If those demand numbers were to hold but they're only at 7-8 cars, adjust the need for additional trains accordingly.]

Having said this, I would add two caveats:
(1) Adding Cocoa and Fort Pierce will alter the traffic pattern, possibly moving the "peak of the bump" in ridership both higher and further north (possibly to BOC-WPB). Absent ridership estimates, the best I can do is spitball those numbers...but some of this ridership won't be entirely "billed" against the capacity limits since folks traveling within the MCO-WPB segment (in particular) would be filling at least some seats that would otherwise be both empty and "blocked out" for folks coming from further south.

(2) Stations in the ballpark of Disney Springs/I-Drive, Tampa, and (potentially) Lakeland or somewhere else will add more ridership, at least some of which will be "through" ridership from South Florida. This is moreso the case for the "tourist areas" of Orlando than elsewhere. Of course, some of this ridership will simply be transferred from MCO, but a good share of it will be new ridership

With this in mind, my best guess is that going past 1tph (and not as a stray added frequency) would come about sometime around further westward expansion. It is, of course, possible that Brightline might opt to increase frequencies rather than add cars at some point before getting to 10 cars - somewhere at or above 7 cars seems possible (8 feels "about right" for this) but if not that's about where things seem likely to land.
 
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I would also add to this discussion of future increase in ridership and what that means for train length and/or frequency, that we must remember the limitations placed on train frequency by the drawbridges in Ft Lauderdale and Stuart especially. Without the ability to close either bridge for more than 30 minutes out of every hour, there will be a forced limit of trains per hour. That is a Coast Guard rule and is why I think they went with 18 round trips maximum each day since they announced the project back in 2012.

I suspect we will see 10 car trains long before added frequencies. At least until new bridges or tunnels are built that avoid disrupting boat traffic.
 
How much time do they add in the schedule for stopping at Aventura, two minutes? Same for Boca Raton, just with fewer trains?
Currently 3 minutes is added for Aventura and 5 minutes for Boca Raton. The time at Boca Raton may be reduced when the second platform is built.
This is what the bond pdf says: "stations at Aventura and Boca Raton add approximately two to three minutes each to travel time, offset by approximately five minutes of travel time savings resulting from the switch to the I-ETMS signaling system. . . ."

And I made a ridership chart.BL Monthly Ridership.png
 
Or concurrently ... perhaps using existing tracks and running at the same speed as Amtrak until new tracks are built.
That is extremely unlikely. Brightline is unlikely to operate on trackage where they do not control dispatching, and they are also very unlikely to run just a couple of trains a day.
 
That is extremely unlikely. Brightline is unlikely to operate on trackage where they do not control dispatching, and they are also very unlikely to run just a couple of trains a day.

I fully understand that - but it still doesn't stop me from "wishing" it would happen :cool:

As it stands now, I cannot try Brightline. If they came to Jacksonville, I could give it a try.
 
And I made a ridership chart.
BL Monthly Ridership.png
Nice!
 
I would also add to this discussion of future increase in ridership and what that means for train length and/or frequency, that we must remember the limitations placed on train frequency by the drawbridges in Ft Lauderdale and Stuart especially. Without the ability to close either bridge for more than 30 minutes out of every hour, there will be a forced limit of trains per hour. That is a Coast Guard rule and is why I think they went with 18 round trips maximum each day since they announced the project back in 2012.

I suspect we will see 10 car trains long before added frequencies. At least until new bridges or tunnels are built that avoid disrupting boat traffic.
Ft. Lauderdale will be interesting given the commuter rail proposals. Stuart could be more of a sticking point - but some extra frequencies might be doable with some limited fleeting (i.e. two trains 15 min. apart).
 
Ft. Lauderdale will be interesting given the commuter rail proposals. Stuart could be more of a sticking point - but some extra frequencies might be doable with some limited fleeting (i.e. two trains 15 min. apart).
With the Stuart Bridge, I think it's more limited due to the proximity of the US 1 highway Bridge. I can't see how they could gain elevation to clear the St Lucie River Channel to allow most boats to pass under. In Ft Lauderdale they can build a mile or 2 of viaduct north and south of the New River without clearance issues.

If I recall, Rep Brian Mast blocked support for federal funding of an elevated bridge in Stuart. Talk about politicians not doing the right thing for the people they supposedly serve! He could have supported the grant proposal but chose instead to oppose it. For that, I hope the people of Stuart never get a station. They elected this guy so they don't deserve it.
 
If I recall, Rep Brian Mast blocked support for federal funding of an elevated bridge in Stuart. Talk about politicians not doing the right thing for the people they supposedly serve! He could have supported the grant proposal but chose instead to oppose it. For that, I hope the people of Stuart never get a station. They elected this guy so they don't deserve it.
Martin County is a strange animal. They did delay the construction of I-95 by active opposition for many years too. Of course now they have a spectacularly wide ROW for it. Go figure!
 
Martin County is a strange animal. They did delay the construction of I-95 by active opposition for many years too. Of course now they have a spectacularly wide ROW for it. Go figure!
Yep. I worked on a project for the City of Stuart back in 2001. They seem to have an elevated level of importance they attach to their city. It is a very parochial view IMO. I used to be a commenter on the TC Palm website back in 2012-2014 trying to refute the opinions of the locals and of the Florida Not All Aboard group. Those were the days...

I can't imagine how they would oppose federal money to help resolve an issue that would benefit them. As I wrote back then, AAF is coming no matter what. But they chose to bury their head in the sand and ignore reality. For that, I can never support a stop in Martin County. I have made this clear to the people I know at FECI/Brightline as well. I would much rather see Brightline add a stop in Polk County, which actually supports Brightline, then on the Treasure Coast. They have actively opposed Brightline since the very beginning.
 
I think there’s one clearance issue that would require considerable work and basically close the busiest segment of Brightline a couple blocks north of the New River.
So, I'd note that one version of the commuter project demand from BL/FEC involved like a 4-track line. So the idea that they might press Broward/Palm Beach to pay for an additional, higher bridge there doesn't seem totally nuts on first glance.
 
What sort of vertical and main span horizontal clearances would be required for fixed bridges as these locations? For example, quite a few years ago now when "Family Lines" decided to run more east-west traffic through Pensacola and Tallahassee, they replaced the low level wood trestle and draw span across Escambia Bay with a high level fixed bridge, all concrete. I do not know what grades they used nor what the clearances were, but it is not unreasonable to build a high level bridge. Since the vertical change would be relatively small, even if it were to be say, 50 to 60 feet, with a relatively level and moderate to high speed approach, it would essentially be a momentum grade for freight trains, as well has having near no effect on passenger train run times. This is particularly true with elevations of track on both sides being about the same, since these would be go up and then down by the same amount of change in elevation, so that speed lost going up due to gravity would be regained due to gravity going down on the other side.
 
What sort of vertical and main span horizontal clearances would be required for fixed bridges as these locations?
According to The Okeechobee Waterway: From the Atlantic to the Gulf (huh, his trip started in my neighborhood!) and Okeechobee Waterway , 49' is the height limit for boats passing through Stuart to Lake Okeechobee.

Ft. Lauderdale is a more difficult bridge situation, since the ground-level Brightline station is only a quarter mile north of the drawbridge.
 
The first fixed bridge on the New River in Ft. Lauderdale appears to be the I-95 bridge, at 55 feet of vertical clearance, but that's inland from the rail crossing. Way up north in New Jersey, the Portal Bridge replacement is quoted as about 50 feet above the water, so that's probably typical. Unless Florida sees a lot of clipper ships.
 
According to The Okeechobee Waterway: From the Atlantic to the Gulf (huh, his trip started in my neighborhood!) and Okeechobee Waterway , 49' is the height limit for boats passing through Stuart to Lake Okeechobee.

Ft. Lauderdale is a more difficult bridge situation, since the ground-level Brightline station is only a quarter mile north of the drawbridge.
According to the EIS document the station won’t be at ground level if the high fixed bridge option is chosen. There are pretty detailed description of four different options including a tunnel option.
 
So, I'd note that one version of the commuter project demand from BL/FEC involved like a 4-track line. So the idea that they might press Broward/Palm Beach to pay for an additional, higher bridge there doesn't seem totally nuts on first glance.
Yes. I have read about either a tunnel or an elevated bridge over the New River. I haven't come across the EIS documents that @jis refers to. The Brightline station would have to be rebuilt obviously in either case.

In Stuart, I'm not sure how that would happen. I suppose they could rebuild and lengthen the US1 bridge so that it is higher on the southern approach to the St Lucie River. But the local opposition to anything related to Brightline makes that unlikely.
 
Yes. I have read about either a tunnel or an elevated bridge over the New River. I haven't come across the EIS documents that @jis refers to. The Brightline station would have to be rebuilt obviously in either case.
A tunnel might imply placing the station in a deep trench, which might not be a good idea in Florida's swampy and flood-prone environment.
 
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