SunRail screwed Volusia out of DeLand train station

SunRail is running off the tracks.

Volusia County Council (county commission) members are ready to pull the plug on SunRail unless the promised DeLand SunRail train station gets built.

Who can blame them?

Mythical DeLand SunRail station

Nine years ago Volusia signed on to SunRail because they were promised a train station in DeLand – Volusia’s county seat.

The Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) currently operates SunRail. Orange, Seminole, Volusia, Osceola counties and the city of Orlando are supposed to take over the financial responsibility and operations of SunRail in 5 years when FDOT leaves the project.

Three new stations are currently being built in Osceola County – with the help of a special federal grant. A new spur is being planned to connect SunRail tracks to Orlando International Airport. But nothing is going on with the DeLand station.

Last year SunRail’s FDOT masters applied for a special federal grant to extend the SunRail tracks to DeLand. The grant was denied. This spring FDOT was preparing another application for the federal grant. In a surprise move, at the last moment, FDOT chose not submit the grant application to extend tracks to DeLand.

Volusia County deserves more than sweet words from FDOT. The county was promised a SunRail DeLand station. FDOT needs to deliver.

Currently SunRail tracks only go as far as the Volusia County city of DeBary – one of the busiest stations in SunRail.

We’re passionate supporters of SunRail. We’re also deeply disappointed in the defective SunRail product FDOT delivered. The train service is limited to weekdays. There are service gaps of up to 2 ½ hours. No late-night service. There’s no trains to DeLand, even though that service was promised.

No surprise SunRail is used by fewer than 2,000 daily because its schedule is so inconvenient. SunRail’s potential is tremendous. There are at least 10,000 people on the SunRail track corridor who could be use the train daily.

SunRail was pitched as a vital element in the I-4 transportation network. Unless our leaders wake up, SunRail will run off the tracks in 2021 when FDOT departs. We’re furious because FDOT’s poor leadership, poor planning, poor attitude and indifference to customer satisfaction are responsible for SunRail’s failures.

Please get this railroad back on the tracks.

SunRail needs a better boss

Central Florida’s Lynx public bus system should be running SunRail.

That notion may seem off the wall, but it makes sense because Lynx is in the mass transit business, and the Florida Department of Transportation – which built and oversees SunRail – is in the road-building business. Those are two completely different disciplines.

FDOT is top notch when it comes to building roads. They’re engineers. They care about things, but they’re not exactly warm and fuzzy when it comes to caring about living and breathing people.

A couple of weeks ago there was a tragic situation at SunRail when a dead body was found early in the morning on the tracks near the Sanford station. The public address systems at SunRail stations announced that SunRail service was canceled for the morning. “We apologize for the inconvenience,” the announcer added.

We were flabbergasted. SunRail announced service was canceled as though it was no big deal.

Lynx would have never done that, regardless of the tragic circumstances. They know people are counting on them to get to work. To their credit, SunRail did resume service that morning. But why did SunRail think canceling service was an option?

Customer service at SunRail is a joke. When SunRail launched they had station Ambassadors to answer questions from riders. But they got rid of the Ambassadors so there’s no one to talk to face to face when you have a question.

At Lynx Central Station in downtown Orlando there is a Lynx representative who answers questions and sells bus passes. Oh, and did we mention that customer service booth is in the bus system’s air-conditioned passenger lobby. That’s right, air-conditioned – something to think about next time you’re standing under the skimpy canopy on a SunRail platform in the blazing sun, or in driving rain.

In addition, Lynx has a platoon of supervisors in marked cars who patrol the bus routes checking on drivers and answering rider questions. When SunRail failed a few weeks ago and announced service was canceled for the morning, it was the Lynx supervisors who led a convoy of buses to rescue stranded SunRail riders.

Lynx runs 7 days a week, albeit abbreviated service on the weekends. SunRail provides 4,200 rides daily. Lynx provides 105,000 rides daily. And as we all know, SunRail doesn't run on weekends, or much during the middle of the day.

SunRail is new and sexy. Lynx is not.

The overwhelming majority of people on Lynx ride because they don’t have a choice. They can’t afford a car, or for one reason or another, they can’t drive. It takes a long time to get from Point A to Point B on Lynx because of traffic congestion and the Lynx bus fleet is too small. Lynx has 299 buses to serve Orange, Seminole and Osceola counties. Lynx really needs about 700 buses to provide more convenient service. The problem is that Lynx doesn’t get enough funding, but that’s a story for another day.

Central Florida won’t get the mass transit it deserves until bus and rail service is being managed under one roof. Clearly Lynx knows more and cares more about mass transit than our friends at FDOT.

Anybody home at SunRail?

Early Monday morning one of our favorite riders tweeted that there was a broken sprinkler head at the Sanford SunRail station spewing water like a geyser. She reported this on our Twitter feed, and on SunRail's official Twitter feed. Not a biggie, right? Read on.

Just for the heck of it, we rode up on the train and shot a photo of the geyser, which is right next to the sidewalk that riders use to reach the bus stops and parking lot. We posted the photo on our Twitter feed.

Monday night, the same young lady, on her way home 12 hours after she first reported the problem, tweeted that the sprinkler head was still spewing.

But wait, it gets better! This morning another gentleman reported the same broken sprinkler head was still spewing. Imagine how much water has been wasted. And who pays that water bill?

There's a much bigger issue. Does anybody at SunRail, or the Florida Department of Transportation, even care? Do they care about the concerns of riders? Do they care what's happening at the SunRail stations? We don't see much evidence of their concerns.

They got rid of the platform Ambassadors. They blow off riders pleas for weekend and night service. They downplay complaints about malfunctioning ticket machines. They sell us 7-day tickets, but only provide 5-day-service.Now they're ignoring maintenance requests. "If you see something say something." Yeah, right!

Other than the outside contractors who sweep up at stations, and the train crews, does any SunRail or FDOT official even visit stations on a daily basis?

Mind you, the Sanford station is within a mile or two of SunRail's maintenance and operations base. Yet over a 24-hour period an obvious maintenance problem wasn't addressed. Do they need a pipe wrench? They can borrow ours.

And if they don't care now, just five months since SunRail was launched, what will the stations and trains be like 5 months, or 5 years from today?

Please, would somebody at SunRail or FDOT act like you care and fix the friggin' sprinkler!

UPDATE
At 9 a.m. on Tuesday, Sept. 9, SunRail posted this message on Twitter:
"SunRail operations is working to fix the problem in Sanford immediately. In the future, use our customer hotline 1-855-RAIL-411."

Stop panicking about federal agents patrolling SunRail

Every week somebody tweets about seeing armed Transportation Security Administration agents wearing body armor riding SunRail trains. Here's the straight scoop. The agents are members of TSA’s Visual Intermodal Prevention and Response (VIPR) team that works with transit systems throughout the country, including Lynx – our public bus system. (Click here for more details on VIPR)

A spokesman for the Florida Department of Transportation told us that his agency “has been coordinating safety and security issues with the Department of Homeland Security (TSA is part of Homeland Security) and the VIPR team in particular for more than a year now. They have been a routine presence on trains, platforms and the (SunRail track corridor) since service began May 1 and will continue to do so.”

So like the T-shirt says, “Remain calm and carry on.”

SunRailRiders - Orlando Amtrak station is a mess

At first glance the accompanying photo

 looks like it was taken in a bombed out village at the end of World War II. But no, the photo shows the eyesore SunRailRiders face every day at the Orlando Health/Amtrak station. The photo was taken May 2 and it was not altered in any way. The exterior decay at the Amtrak station is not just ugly, it’s unacceptable!

      Despite its current appearance this building -- constructed in 1926 as an Atlantic Coast Railroad station -- is a historical and architectural gem. For starters, this station needs to be pressure-washed and painted.

       SunRail has done its best and built new covered platforms immediately north of the Amtrak station. You think that would have shamed Amtrak into sprucing up? Well, you thought wrong! The Orlando Amtrak station has been in this condition for more than five years.

        To make matters worse, this is where Amtrak passengers arrive to visit the world’s most popular vacation destination. City Beautiful indeed! Just for the record, every year more than 150,000 Amtrak passengers board or get off trains at this station.

        Amtrak officials should be embarrassed. The exterior of this station needs urgent attention. Spare us the double talk about next fiscal year. The Orlando Amtrak station needs to be fixed next week. SunRail and Amtrak passengers deserve better.

       

SunRailRiders - Transportation boss tells riders to take a chill pill

Noranne Downs is a name you should know if you ride SunRail.

Downs is the Florida Department of Transportation district secretary for Central Florida. In that capacity, SunRail is one of many major projects Downs oversees.

Last week our friends at the Orlando Business Journal interviewed Downs. Some of her comments regarding calls to expand SunRail service to the weekends and late-night hours were very disappointing.

During the interview, Downs called weekend and late-night SunRail service “extras.”

SunRail, Downs explained, “was never set for weekends because it was primarily for the majority, which would be Monday through Friday, and we have tried to have our schedules – 3 hours in the morning and 3 hours in the afternoons – work around hospitals… we’re (SunRail) going through 2 hospital areas … so we need to kind of work around that schedule.”

Thanks Ms. Downs, you made a compelling case for running SunRail 7 days a week.

Those mega-hospitals operate 7 days a week, 24 hours a day, 365 days of the year. In addition to hospital staff, hundreds of other SunRail riders don’t work traditional Monday through Friday, 9 to 5 schedules. They depend on mass transit – buses and rail -- to get them to work. For them, night and weekend SunRail service is not an “extra”. It’s essential!

We’ve met Downs. Professionally she is very accomplished and deserves a standing ovation for launching SunRail. Yet we’re disappointed because the attitude Downs projected in the interview (click here to see for yourself) seemed almost condescending to the thousands of people who signed the petition calling for service to be expanded.

Maybe the problem is that Downs works for a road-building agency and doesn’t care about mass transportation. Regardless, Downs is a state employee. She works for us -- the taxpayers and voters. Loudly and clearly we have said SunRail service needs to be expanded – sooner rather than later.

Consider dropping Downs a line to let her know how you feel about expanding SunRail service. Write to her at Noranne.downs@dot.state.fl.us. Please be concise and respectful.