From: DOCKERY.PAULA.S15

Sent: Monday, April 13, 2009 8:38 AM

To: !ALL LEGISLATORS & STAFFs

Subject: Orlando Magazine and Ten Florida Newspapers say "No" to Sunrail

Florida Newspapers Say No to SunRail Deal

Excerpts from Miami Herald, The Tampa Tribune, The Ledger, St. Petersburg Times, Palm Beach Post, Gainesville Sun, Sun Sentinel, Ocala Star-Banner, The Polk County Democrat, Osceola News Gazette and Orlando Magazine

Miami Herald – This Train Has Too Much Baggage:  Commuter trains can be a great way to move a lot of people from one place to another…this is why the idea of a Central Florida commuter line between Deland and Poinciana which would pass through busy Orlando is so appealing. However, the appeal of the project…loses much of its luster because of its high sticker price and its over-generous indemnity provisions.  At roughly $10.5 million per mile the $646 million price tag ranks among the highest prices ever paid for rail in the United States…Legislation (SB 1212 and HB 7009 under consideration in the Legislature) deals primarily with providing insurance protection for train operators…The problem is that the legislation assigns the greater responsibility to the State for any accidents that occur and shields CSX from some of its own mistakes.  The protection would extend to CSX even if is found to have been negligent or irresponsible.  The deal should be amended or scrapped altogether.

The Tampa Tribune – Shadowy Rail Deal Needs Good Scrubbing: It’s disappointing that Governor Charlie Crist has thrown his full support to the $1.2 billion deal between the State and CSX Transportation that could bring commuter rail to four counties near Orlando.  CSX would reap … a windfall.  The benefits to taxpayers are less clear. Lawmakers rightly rejected the deal last year and this year’s proposal is not much better as they approach another vote.

The Ledger – CSX-SunRail Deal: Price Tag Grows Unaffordable: The numbers being used to justify building a 61-mile rail commuter line for metro Orlando just keep getting more confounding.  Questions already swirl about the enormity of the project’s price tag.  … $795 million in state money - $432 to CSX for acquisition of its A-line and to make improvements on CSX’s other Florida tracks…Orange, Volusia, Seminole and Osceola counties are on tap to kick in another $764 million towards the project.  .Add that to federal money and start-up and operational costs  and the DOT’s own estimate for the total tab for getting SunRail up and going comes to about $2.6 billion.  The DOT projects that by 2030, that’s right - two decades from now – an estimated 14,500 passenger a day would use SunRail.  That from a metropolitan area whose population is forecast be about 3.5 million in 2030.  Dr. Steve Polzin, director of mobility policy for the Center of Transportation Research at the University of South Florida, pointed out in an interview with the Ocala Star-Banner last week that, based on the DOT ridership figures, SunRail would serve about 1 percent of greater Orlando’s 2030 commuters.  He then asked, “The important issue is, what else is being done to meet the needs of the other 99 percent of commuters?” Cost per rider; just under $180,000…The SunRail plan is overpriced and under vetted…

St. Petersburg Times- Put Commuter Rail on the Right Track: This is the most ambitious effort outside south Florida to begin fashioning a rail line to serve major cities (SunRail).  But the deal with rail carrier CSX has major financial and legal flaws and the Florida Legislature needs to fix them.  Managed right, the $1.2 billion system could ease congestion on Interstate 4, curb the spread of urban sprawl in Orlando’s bedroom communities and serve as the initial leg of a cross Florida commuter rail system.  But none of these goals are served by a deal that pays hundreds of millions of dollars in freight improvements for CSX that have nothing to do with moving people.  The Legislature needs to trim the cost and shift CSX’s liability back to CSX. 

Palm Beach Post – No Windfall for Orlando without Help for Tri-Rail: SunRail boosters in Orlando should know that paying for Tri-Rail has become a perennial crisis.  To fix that, Tri-Rail wants a $2 per day increase in the rental car tax that would raise $50 million.  If it doesn’t pass this year, Tri-Rail is basically dead.  Legislators need to make sure that Tri-Rail has a permanent source of operating money before starting a new rail service with no clear plans on where the money will come from to operate it.  If an over-priced rail line is worth building in Orlando an existing rail line is worth saving in Florida.

Gainesville Sun – The CSX Deal: A recent study declared the Orlando commuter project (SunRail) the costliest railroad acquisition in US history.  It is outrageous that the state of Florida would allow teachers to be laid off, poor people denied access to health care and other support services, infrastructure to be neglected and universities to turn away qualified students in order to have access to $795 million… The Legislature faces some $3 billion in new budget shortfalls. Before cutting education, healthcare and public works more lawmakers should cut back the CSX deal.

Sun Sentinel – And Where is Tri-Rail?:  State Senator Mike Fasano R-New Port Richey, earned his reputation as a steely enforcer going back to his days of as the House Majority Whip who’d sit in the committee meetings in stony silence to make sure his fellow republicans voted the right way.  (Recently) State Senator Durrell Peaden, Jr. R-Crestview…drew Fasano’s ire by bringing up Tri-Rail before … (a) panel that would allow the state to pay more than $2 billion to use a stretch of CSX tracks in Orlando area for a new commuter line called SunRail.  Peaden, staring out at an audience of lobbyists, local politicians and representatives of various business interests who had come to Tallahassee two weeks previously to support SunRail, worried that the state’s seven-year commitment to pay to operate the rail line would take money away from other worthy programs, like educating school children or caring for the sick and elderly.  But Peaden apparently crossed the line when he mentioned Tri-Rail and then offered an amendment that would create a designated funding source that would take the financial burden to pay for commuter rail lines off local governments.  Fasano wasn’t having it…He, in essence, went on to declare that if the residents of south Florida wanted Tri-Rail they’d have to pay for it.  If SunRail becomes reality, its operators will discover the hard truths of running a commuter rail line on a wink, nod and an annual appropriations from state and local governments, something their counterparts in south Florida have known for some time..

Ocala Star-Banner – A Capital Railroad Job: It’s no surprise that Florida lawmakers are questioning why railroad giant CSX is being given $491 million in taxpayer dollars especially given the state’s budget crisis and the company’s $1.3 billion profit last year.  What is surprising is that it took more than two years after a massive allocation was quietly slipped into the state transportation budget before anyone raised a fuss.  What has many of the lawmakers irked about the deal…is there was never any discussion about it in any legislative committees or on the floors of the House or the Senate.  The money, which lawmakers approved is part of a large growth management bill a few years back was supposed to be used for critical transportation projects at DOT’s discretion but without any public discussion the project was slipped into the 2006 DOT budget that was hundreds and hundreds of pages long where it went unnoticed. The enormity of the project which some critics have called pure corporate welfare and it’s timing…begs the question; what could have been done with that kind of money. 

The Polk County Democrat - Subsidy to CSX is Needed in Other Places:  Perhaps this project (SunRail) would be the boon that Winter Haven government leaders think it would be (where a ILC would be built).   Perhaps it would be so good the taxpayers of Florida should assume the legal responsibility for all lawsuits brought against CSX.  Perhaps the additional rail traffic wouldn’t impede highway traffic.  Perhaps the additional truck traffic would not add to congestion on Polk’s highways.  Perhaps Orlando is doing Polk County a favor by trying to give us what it doesn’t want.  Perhaps there was no need for public scrutiny until the negotiations with state government were completed.  Let’s see, that’s six perhapses, one for every one hundred million plus of state dollars that would go to support this private endeavor.  There’s another “perhaps” in these times of financial stress; perhaps subsidizing CSX to the tune of a third of a billion dollars is more important than all those lost positions for students in the state universities; more important than keeping the courts fully staffed; more important than keeping libraries open.  But we’re not convinced. 

Osceola News Gazette - Answers Needed on Rail Project: The local cost share for the project (SunRail) is estimated at $427 million with Osceola County’s portion set at $17.6 percent of that or $75.2 million based on track mileage within the county.  We still do not have a dedicated source of funding to cover that cost and that is troubling.  Plus there’s apparently no federal money earmarked for this specific project despite what some elected …officials are saying…CSX continues to insist on transferring almost all liability to the state for anything that might happen on the commuter line regardless of fault.  That is unacceptable.

Orlando Magazine – My Train of Thought: Let’s Derail SunRail: Building a commuter rail system for the Orlando area is as environmentally responsible as driving alone in an Escalade Hybrid. No firm case has been made for SunRail. The political argument for the system has gone from calling it a feel-good solution for our environment to labeling it as a desperately needed stimulus for our economy.  SunRail is neither. And it should be derailed before another tree is wasted on printing yet another finding that disproves heavy commuter rail as a cure for traffic problems and pollution.