Brightline Trains Florida discussion 2024 H1

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jis said:
Fortunately by the time any real money will be needed DeSantis will be history as he is term limited. Also, it is not clear why this money was requested at this point anyway. It is not Brightline that asked for it as far as I can tell.
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Yeah. It seems to have been a random idea Tampa came up with. It isn't even clear what the money is /for/, either.

Edit: It sorta calls into question FL getting picked for Corridor ID...but as you said, DeSantis is about to term out.
 
Orlando Business Journal, as mirrored by WFTV, reported this morning that the Sunshine Corridor extension to OC Convention Ctr and Disney area, and to be shared by SunRail, could open by 2035 with the aid of the proposed Orange County transportation sales tax.

Unfortunately, later in the day, the proposal for the transportation tax was dropped due to lack of support, as reported in the Orlando Sentinel. The next possibility for trying again for the tax would be in 2 years.

Here is the article on the WFTV site:
https://www.wftv.com/news/local/her...proposed-tax-hike/3RPFWZ6LPNDW5BMJS7VYFB3X2E/

Here's the full story, updated, on the OBJ site, but it may be paywalled:
https://www.bizjournals.com/orlando...nshine-corridor-brightline-florida-debut.html

And here's the Sentinel article on the death of the transportation tax:
https://www.orlandosentinel.com/202...rtation-sales-tax/?share=naonsldocoio0ryta2tt
 
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bonzoesc said:
Just put myself in a situation where I want this (booked a premium round trip for May, received Uber vouchers, realized I picked May instead of April, and now I want to see if I can get them reissued) so let's see how long it takes and if I get what I want.
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Got it resolved as of last night, almost exactly four wall clock days or two business days.
 
There is interesting bit of information from an usually reliable source on Brightline Florida. Apparently Brightline Florida and SunRail are close to agreeing on Brightline taking over maintenance of SunRail equipment. Presumably this will be Brightline taking over responsibility for what Amtrak is doing at Sanford for Brightline. Stay tuned for verification and more details as they become available.
 
If Brightline takes over maintenance that might mean a change in early and late train schedules? That would also mean start of trackage rights from Sun Rail to maintenance facility.
 
west point said:
If Brightline takes over maintenance that might mean a change in early and late train schedules? That would also mean start of trackage rights from Sun Rail to maintenance facility.
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No reason for any schedule. The stuff that is done today in the DeBary Yard will continue to be done there. Most likely only the major work and inspections done at Amtrak Sanford will move to OIA facility. That has no effect on daily schedules. Equipment for day to day operation will still be dispatched from DeBary Yard like now.
 
That's quite an impressive learning curve for Brightline staff. Going from being a new facility just a few years ago and hiring people, many of who had presumably never done train maintenance before, and thus having to hit the ground running, to now having sufficient proficiency and reputation to be taking on maintenance work for a third party. Kudos to them.
 
cirdan said:
That's quite an impressive learning curve for Brightline staff. Going from being a new facility just a few years ago and hiring people, many of who had presumably never done train maintenance before, and thus having to hit the ground running, to now having sufficient proficiency and reputation to be taking on maintenance work for a third party. Kudos to them.
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My belief is that it's like lower-stakes aviation maintenance; a good shop is going to have manuals, equipment, and more concern for getting it right than fast, but without the need for "Airframe & Powerplant" certifications or a fear that the vehicle will fall out of the sky in whole or parts.
 
My train this morning has dots 😭
image.jpg

chrsjrcj said:
Doesn’t Siemens do maintenance for Brightline? At least they did pre-Covid.
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There are probably different levels of work that gets done; daily, weekly, monthly, annually, that sort of thing. Any transit agency is going to have people for dailies (check for safe operation) and weeklies (fluids), but monthly checks may be cheaper to outsource, and annual stuff below national scale is definitely cheaper to outsource.
 
bonzoesc said:
My train this morning has dots 😭
View attachment 36547


There are probably different levels of work that gets done; daily, weekly, monthly, annually, that sort of thing. Any transit agency is going to have people for dailies (check for safe operation) and weeklies (fluids), but monthly checks may be cheaper to outsource, and annual stuff below national scale is definitely cheaper to outsource.
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It is monthlies and annuals and such that SunRail currently outsources to Amtrak Sanford. Those will likely move to Birghtline if this deal goes through.
 
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I came across this interesting artists impression of what the fully built out Terminal C and Terminal D according to the MCO Master Plan, will look like with the Brightline and SunRail Orlando International Airport station in their middle. You can get a good idea how SunRail will be served by a separate set of terminal platform tracks to the East of (towards the right lower corner) and distinct from the Brightline run through platforms. The current Terminal A & B are towards the top right corner.

fhgMi5W.jpeg
 
chrsjrcj said:
Doesn’t Siemens do maintenance for Brightline? At least they did pre-Covid.
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It is often a practice for equipment manufacturers, in various industries, to provide technical assistance to customers when new equipment is delivered. Usually factory techs will train customer’s own techs aboard equipment or at customer’s facilities until customer techs can handle on their own.

Of course, some purchases may include an ongoing maintenance contract beyond that period…
 
railiner said:
It is often a practice for equipment manufacturers, in various industries, to provide technical assistance to customers when new equipment is delivered. Usually factory techs will train customer’s own techs aboard equipment or at customer’s facilities until customer techs can handle on their own.

Of course, some purchases may include an ongoing maintenance contract beyond that period…
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I understand there is also a tendency among especially smaller operations to de skill and and contract out maintenance to specialist contractors (who are often identical to the manufacturers, but need not necessarily be). This is often a necessity in view of the increasing difficulty of hiring technicians as there are fewer and fewer young people choosing that career path, whereas many highly skilled and experienced technicians are approaching retirement.

With everything being digitalized these days, a lot of diagnosis and monitoring can be done remotely from Siemens offices or using AI, and Siemens could inform Brightline for example that this bearing or that switchgear cabinet is in need of attention and is at risk of failing in the next couple of months or whatever, and can ship over complete and tested modules rather than individual parts, thus decreasing the amount of troubleshooting local technicians need to do.
 
I did not realize this until I came across this article:

Brightline will begin implementing S3 Passenger, the inventory, ticketing, and reservation system offered by Sqills, a Siemens Mobility subsidiary, beginning with revenue service connecting Orlando. Brightline currently operates in Florida between Miami, Aventura, Fort Lauderdale, Boca Raton and West Palm Beach with its Orlando station beginning service in 2023.

The latest in inventory and reservation software, S3 Passenger, will support Brightline as the company scales up operations to begin long-haul service to Orlando. The new system will allow Brightline to optimally manage and maximize seat utilisation, for higher capacity and yields.
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Brightline to implement State of the Art Inventory and Reservation System

So the inventory management and ticketing system is provided by a Siemens subsidiary.

railiner said:
It is often a practice for equipment manufacturers, in various industries, to provide technical assistance to customers when new equipment is delivered. Usually factory techs will train customer’s own techs aboard equipment or at customer’s facilities until customer techs can handle on their own.

Of course, some purchases may include an ongoing maintenance contract beyond that period…
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Brightline has a relatively tight relationship with Siemens on the equipment maintenance side of things too. The "maintenance" relationship between Brightline Florida and Siemens is explained in the following PDF document:

Siemens helps keep Brightline on time

But apparently Brightline maintains its own staff to carry out the FRA mandated inspections and certification and related repairs too, and it is likely that precisely that sort of work needed by SunRail will be done under contract by Brightline for them. At present those are done for SunRail by Amtrak at Sanford.
 
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railiner said:
Looks like Siemens can provide a full “turnkey” operation for anyone desiring to begin a passenger railroad…🙂
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I don’t know what the relationship looks like now as I haven’t been with Siemens in a while now, but Brightline originally had a 30 year agreement with Siemens for maintenance of the equipment. It was actually separate (considered Customer Service) from the equipment manufacturing/delivery side (Mobility). There was a lot of interest from Siemens Germany in getting it right since it was the first such contract in the US.

I’m a little surprised to learn Brightline staff does daily inspections now, as Siemens techs originally did those and Brightline only had upper management on the maintenance side. I stopped working for Siemens shortly before Brightline began revenue service, so of course things have no doubt evolved substantially since then.
 
chrsjrcj said:
I’m a little surprised to learn Brightline staff does daily inspections now, as Siemens techs originally did those and Brightline only had upper management on the maintenance side. I stopped working for Siemens shortly before Brightline began revenue service, so of course things have no doubt evolved substantially since then.
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I am not sure what the Brightline Staff does exactly, and also I am not sure what role the Siemens Staff might play in the SunRail contract if any. Things will become clearer as we learn more about it, I presume. What we do know is what Amtrak does for SunRail and that is the major inspections like the 90 days and beyond.
 
bonzoesc said:
My train this morning has dots 😭
View attachment 36547


There are probably different levels of work that gets done; daily, weekly, monthly, annually, that sort of thing. Any transit agency is going to have people for dailies (check for safe operation) and weeklies (fluids), but monthly checks may be cheaper to outsource, and annual stuff below national scale is definitely cheaper to outsource.
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Tonight's train has the Princess Cruises wrap which has just the odd swishes of dots, not the complete window covering of the Kissimmee wrap.
 

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