Gears shifting from buses to rail for East-West Transit corridor
Published On: April 18th, 2023
Original Article: https://www.miamitodaynews.com/2023/04/18/gears-shifting-from-buses-to-rail-for-east-west-transit-corridor/
Plans for East-West Corridor rapid transit in Miami-Dade County, which since 2020 had officially been targeting express buses in partnership with the Miami-Dade Expressway Authority (MDX), now are focusing again on an older plan to use CSX tracks and run rail instead.
The topic is on today’s agenda (4/20) of the Miami-Dade Transportation Planning Organization and was the sole focus of last week’s meeting of the county commission’s Transportation, Planning and Mobility Committee.
“At least on the East-West it’s time to begin looking at the CSX tracks as they’ve become more flexible [on cost],” Chair Eileen Higgins told the committee. “It used to look line Choice Number 2 for us, not Choice Number 1, and now it’s looking like it might be Choice Number 1.”
She asked county transportation director Eulois Cleckley to have his team fully evaluate and make recommendations that the committee can act on after the Transportation Planning Organization takes the next step today. His reply: “absolutely.”
She then asked Mr. Cleckley if that evaluation “won’t just include East West – it will include other parts of the county, further west and further south?” Again, he concurred.
Talks with CSX about the county using for rail or buying its 26-mile rail corridor from the Oleander Junction south to Homestead, with a branch that goes into the western part of the county for the East-West Corridor, go back for years, said Jose M. Gonzalez, executive vice president of Florida East Coast Industries, which owns the FEC rail service that runs south from Jacksonville. FEC and the CSX rail operations connect in Jacksonville although they are under separate ownerships.
“I remember when commissioner [Esteban] Bovo [Jr., now Hialeah mayor and chairman of the Transportation Planning Organization] was here we met with him about the county actually purchasing the rail line,” Mr. Gonzalez told the committee. “It was cost prohibitive – not a secret – and one of the things was that that was the mindset of the CSX the time.
“Now with the expansions of rail throughout the county and changing leadership at CSX there’s an opportunity to have those discussions – in fact, we’ve had those discussions and we want to continue to have those discussions.”
“A lot has changed with CSX,” Commissioner Higgins said, “because when we were negotiating with them originally several years ago … CSX was trying to price its tracks like the last Coke in the desert. It was very, very expensive to look at. But times have changed, the commitment to our county has changed, and just this very week” she held Sunshine meetings with two other county commissioners about the topic.
“The design that’s using the MDX in the middle of the highway – we thought it was very innovative but it is beginning to look very – it just isn’t going to work, right?” Commissioner Higgins said. “We’ve got to be realistic. We can try innovative designs, but if they don’t work, they don’t work.”
The future of MDX was in legal limbo when in 2020 the plan was sealed for the corridor linking West Miami-Dade to Miami International Airport and downtown Miami along the 836, one of five toll roads MDX oversees. It includes commitments by MDX to fund part of the East-West Corridor’s construction and $25.6 million in yearly operations.
MDX’s continued existence had been in question for more than a year when the Transportation Planning Organization chose “gold standard” rapid bus as the preferred upgrade for the 14-mile route.
In July 2019, Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a bill dissolving MDX and replacing it with the Greater Miami Expressway Agency (GMX). That issue is still in the courts.
Looking at the possibility that MDX could be permanently dissolved, Miami-Dade County was working on “a plan B and a plan C” to ensure the transit is built, county Chief Operations Officer Jimmy Morales said in April 2021. “We need to see what happens just in case GMX decides not to step up to the table,” he said. “We need to have contingency plans.”
Construction of the East-West Corridor, one of six commuting routes Miami-Dade has targeted for rapid transit upgrades through an initiative now called the Smart Program, was to have two phases. The first was to cost $265 million before the past two years’ runup in construction and materials costs, and to include two routes, one from Tamiami Station in West Miami-Dade to Miami International Airport, the other from Tamiami Station to the Government Center Metrorail station in downtown Miami.
Phase two was to cost $153 million and add a route from the airport to a station near Dolphin Mall.
Other stops on the corridor, which then was to feature dedicated bus lanes, would be at or near FIU, Mall of Americas, loanDepot Park, the planned soccer stadium and commercial complex at the former Melreese Golf Course, International Mall, Magic City Casino, and three air-conditioned stations on the elevated 836.