For two years now, state Sen. Debbie Mayfield has seen her bill, the proposed “Florida High-Speed Passenger Rail Safety Act,” get derailed in committee before fellow lawmakers could vote on it.
Had it not died in committee – again – the bill would have sought to get high-speed passenger rail operators to shoulder a greater proportion of costs for needed fencing and upgraded intersection crossings.
The bill would have required fencing and upgraded intersection crossings, and, in a bit of an apparent power play, would have stressed the state Department of Transportation’s jurisdiction over that. It’s often left to the Federal Railroad Administration’s control, Mayfield said. She pointed to Florida Statutes Chapter 351, which places safety at railroad crossings under the authority of the state DOT, while the federal agency oversees the rest of the track.
While the bill is dead, Mayfield, R-Melbourne, isn’t giving up. “We’re looking for recommendations that we can forward to the Legislature that will ensure the safety of the citizens,” Mayfield said last week.
So when Gov. Rick Scott last month approved an $88.7 billion budget for the year starting July 1, it included new language Mayfield submitted through the Legislature. It calls for an independent study of the existing state passenger rail system, plus any plans for expansion, and to make safety recommendations by Nov. 1.
All Aboard Florida, owner of new Brightline passenger trains, is working on an estimated $2.25 billion project connecting tourists in Orlando and Miami by high-speed rail.
Plans call for sending 32 Brightline trains a day, 16 in each direction, from Miami north to Cocoa on a new passenger track alongside the Florida East Coast Railway’s existing freight track, and then on an all-new track from Cocoa west to the Orlando International Airport.
Brightline started in January on partial service between Fort Lauderdale and West Palm Beach. All Aboard Florida spokeswoman Ali Soule said the company is finishing the extension to Miami and hasn’t yet announced a start date for construction on the segment that eventually will take the high-speed track into Brevard County.
But in a few years, Space Coast residents may see Brightline trains heading through Brevard and making the westward turn in Cocoa. When fully operational, the train service has said it expects to carry 4,800 people each day, if all seats on the 240-passenger trains are filled.
Mayfield said her efforts are especially needed now, days after police say a Delray Beach man was killed by a Brightline train traveling from Fort Lauderdale north to West Palm Beach. That was the sixth death on the same section of tracks since December.
Mayfield said she ran into frustration during talks on her original bill when she’d get differing information on the state of rail safety.
“You’d keep hearing All Aboard Florida say one thing, the state DOT say something else, and the U.S. DOT say something different,” Mayfield said.
And her bill depended on accurate information, she said. So now the budget asks the Legislature’s Office of Program Policy Analysis and Government Accountability to find an outside consultant to do an independent study.
Janet Teschner, general counsel for the analysis office, said her agency staff is still drawing up criteria for seeking the consultant.
Within the “next few weeks,” she said, she expects the staff to issue a formal Request for Proposals and review offers from various consultants. Then House and Senate staff officials would have to approve the analysis agency’s final selection before they could pay the consultant any state money.
Mayfield said she wanted to stress what often is ignored: the Florida Department of Transportation’s own authority over railroad crossings.
All too often, however, she said, Florida transportation officials defer to the federal agency, even on safety issues within their own jurisdiction. She said she hopes to prompt the state DOT to “do its job.”
“The state is responsible for the crossings,” she said. “At every gate crossing, state regulations are the authority.”
During talks on Mayfield’s bills, All Aboard Florida representatives criticized them for trying to encroach on an area already governed by the federal government.
But Soule said the company hails Mayfield’s new effort. “Note it’s not for Brightline, but all passenger rail systems,” she said last month in an email.
Further, in a company statement, Soule added, “Rail safety is our top priority, and a study that looks at key components of engineering, education and enforcement is important. Passenger rail is a key part of Florida’s future, and we applaud the Legislature for taking a positive position on the benefits it will bring to our state, residents and visitors.”
