Tri-Rail Dade County Expansion: Homestead and West

[Gilbert B Norman]

The Miami Herald reports that Tri-Rail is considering expansion Southward through Dade County to Homestead via a Seaboard routing

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/15176567.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

This appears to be part of the same ioniative of Gov. Bush and reported by Mr. Mallard at a thread regarding Central Fla rail service.

Pertinent "brief passage"

• The sources said CSX, as part of the Central Florida pact, will also grant Tri-Rail permission to run passenger service deep into Miami-Dade on a 32-mile spur known as the Homestead extension.
  
  The tracks run from Bird Road near 72nd Avenue diagonally southwest along State Road 874 toward Miami Metrozoo before heading south to Homestead. One spur could also serve residents who live near the Kendall-Tamiami Executive Airport.
  
  Miami-Dade Commission Chairman Joe Martinez has been pushing to develop a bare-bones service similar to the early days of Tri-Rail that would provide a commuting alternative for West Kendall suburbanites who could transfer to Metrorail in Hialeah or, someday, at the Miami Intermodal Center near the airport.

[Noel Weaver]

GBN and others, from what I read in the paper, it seems that the
Homestead Subdivision will be included as part of the section that will be
dispatched by Tri-Rail. I do not know what to put together from this but
it could be interesting.
It would seem to make more sense to me to run rail service down to
Homestead along the old Florida East Coast right of way which I think
serves a larger base of the population of that area. As of now, the old
FEC right of way is used by a busway from Kendall (Dadeland South
Station on Metro-Rail) to about Cutler Ridge and from Cutler Ridge to
Homestead it just lies unused. In my opinion, they should have built a
light rail system on this right of way and gone all the way to Florida City.
What happens in the future just remains to be seen at this point.
Noel Weaver

[Jeff Smith]

In the news: Curbed Miami

Brief, fair-use quote:

What if Tri-Rail Extended All the Way to Homestead?

State ownership of the CSX rail line to Homestead would mean the potential of a major commuter rail line, likely Tri-Rail, all the way to Homestead and passing through suburbs containing hundreds of thousands of people along the way. The southern interior of the county, a car-oriented country of suburban sprawl, would have a commuter rail line shooting down its middle, with a few destinations along the way. It could open up a large corridor for effective transit-oriented development and addition density for a growing metropolis. As Curbed commenter Kristian Toimil says:

I guess we could have stops at Tropical Park, MDC Kendall Campus, Metrozoo, and if we also take that swath of rail that lead to the Kendall Regional Airport, well we could put a stop there too.

Commenter Ghetto Urchin also points out:

It would definitely help boost the attractiveness of South Dade / Miami tremendously. From a practical perspective, we'll probably have low utilization for a long while (much like the existing Tri-Rail system). The real trick is not paying through the nose for a lackluster/useless system such as DART in Dallas.

[electricron]

Commenter Ghetto Urchin also points out:
It would definitely help boost the attractiveness of South Dade / Miami tremendously. From a practical perspective, we'll probably have low utilization for a long while (much like the existing Tri-Rail system). The real trick is not paying through the nose for a lackluster/useless system such as DART in Dallas.

Miami metro daily ridership is around 78,000 riders, Dallas DART daily ridership is aound 98,000, around 20,000 more daily riders. So again, which train is more useless?
Sources of ridership data: Wiki
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metrorail_(Miami-Dade_County" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;)
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/DART_Light_Rail" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Jeff Smith]

For lack of a better thread: MiamiTodayNews.com

CSX has approached the county, including two lines. Brief, fair-use snips, and cross-posting to CSX:

County looks at buying rail lines from CSX Corp. for transit

Miami-Dade’s business leaders should look again at a proposal to have the county buy 35 miles of rail line from the CSX Corp. for new commuter service, County Commission Chairman Esteban Bovo Jr. says.
...
The railroad has two lines that would tie into county transportation plans, one running 11 miles from near Miami International Airport to the west and the other running 24 miles from near the airport to Homestead in the south end of the county.

...The railroad, he said, has approached Miami-Dade County and is interested in selling the lines and then running limited freight service on those lines in pre-dawn hours, leaving the rails otherwise clear to establish new commuter service to both West Dade and South Dade.
...