Brightline Opens $6 Billion Florida Rail Line, Sets Sights on Las Vegas
Photo Credit: Brightline begins running passenger trains between a new station at the Orlando airport and Miami on Friday. (Brightline) Brightline
Skift Take
America is not known for its fast or nice trains. Brightline wants to change that with its new train to Orlando.
Speeding through central Florida's flat scrubland east of Orlando is America's next big passenger train.
That scrubland is where Brightline trains begin carrying passengers between Miami and Orlando on Friday. The 235-mile trip, which is roughly the distance between New York and Washington, D.C., takes as little as 3 hours and 15 minutes in trains running at up to 125 miles per hour — higher-speed but not high-speed rail by global standards — and with no risk of traffic jams. Fares between the cities start as low as $79 one way for adults.
“We believe this is the blueprint for intercity passenger rail around the country," Brightline President Patrick Goddard said. "We’ve said that many times but now the evidence is there.”
The $6 billion rail line is the first newly built private intercity passenger rail service in the U.S. since before the formation of Amtrak some 50 years ago. And it comes in one of the country's bastions of car culture:
