Shows that All that Glitters is Not Gold
Earlier this year, I rode an Amtrak train from Chicago to Miami, an epic, 52-hour journey through ten states that I wrote about in this post. Part of my goal in going to Florida was to take a ride on the Brightline, which has been described as the first new passenger rail line in the United States in the 21st century. (Wide-awake readers of this blog have been quick to point out this isn't in fact the case: Amtrak's Downeaster service, which carries passengers from Boston to Brunswick, Maine, started operations in December 2001.) Brightline was the brainchild of Wes Edens, one of the founders of the private equity firm Fortress Investment, who was inspired by reading Les Standiford's book Last Train to Paradise (a great beach read, by the way!), which documents the building of the Florida East Coast Railroad, at the turn of the last century, by Standard Oil co-founder Henry Flagler. In 2018, Brightline began to run its first trains from Fort Lauderdale to West Palm Beach; the service now connects Miami to the Orlando airport.
When construction began, it was welcomed as the return of rail's golden age, when Gilded Age entrepreneurs (later reviled as "Robber Barons") laid a quarter million miles of track across the U.S. The Wall Street Journal set the tone when it announced the project: “The high-speed intercity line is privately funded, built and operated. None of the $1.3 billion cost of the first phase of the operation—laying track and building bridges, stations and complete trains—is coming out of taxpayers’ pockets.” In California, the Brightline West project, between Las Vegas and southern California, is seen as being far more likely to reach completion than the beleaguered California High Speed Rail project, which was originally meant to link L.A. and San Francisco. (The ground-breaking for Brightline West happened last year, in the presence of Pete Buttigieg, though as of this writing construction still hasn't begun, raising doubts that the line will be completed in time for the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles.)
Look, you know me: I'm a sucker for trains. On our car-addicted continent, there is just far too little passenger rail. I'm willing to give any new service the benefit of the doubt. So, as I approached the multi-story Miami Central station in the Overtown neighborhood, I had some serious concerns about the Brightline model, but I was willing to give it the benefit of the doubt.
The first impression: this is nice. Through sliding doors, I wheeled my suitcase into a soaring, sun-drenched lobby. Attendants wearing polo shirts stood at podiums, helping passengers register larger pieces of luggage.
