Every Kind of Fail

Does Miami need a light-rail line? In 1988, the Florida city built the Metromover, a 4.4-mile automated system that cost twice as much as projected and carried less than half the projected riders. Although Wikipedia claims this is a great success, the National Transit Database reports that it carried less than 31,000 riders per day in 2013 (less than a third of what Wikipedia claims and well under the projections).

In the same year, Miami also opened Metrorail, an elevated rail line that cost far more than projected and carries less than a third of the projected riders.

Then there’s Tri Rail, a commuter train between Miami and West Palm Beach that began service in 1989. Taxpayers have lavished around $600 million in capital improvements on this line, and spent $46 million subsidizing operations in 2013, for a commuter system that carried less than 15,000 riders (i.e., under 7,500 round trips) per day.
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Despite the hype from transit advocates, these are all expensive failures. But none of them are light rail. Naturally, this means Miami wants to build a light-rail line to Miami Beach. That way it can have a complete set of rail transit failures. As long as Uncle Sam is willing to pay at least half the cost, cities like Miami will keep spending money on more failures.

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About The Antiplanner

The Antiplanner is a forester and economist with more than fifty years of experience critiquing government land-use and transportation plans.

3 Responses to Every Kind of Fail

  1. metrosucks says:

    Well, has their transit authority also plunged headlong into over promising benefits to employees and cutting back service to customers (sic)? That is another potential failure they could look into.

  2. MJ says:

    …and spent $46 million subsidizing operations in 2013, for a commuter system that carried less than 15,000 riders (i.e., under 7,500 round trips) per day.

    An operating subsidy of $3/boarding is actually not that bad by the standards of U.S. commuter rail systems. Take that for what it’s worth.

  3. ahwr says:

    The wiki page doesn’t claim mover ridership three times higher than NTD. It says clearly that the number includes the Green and Orange lines. Probably better if they didn’t include ridership on other lines, maybe you should have edited it when you saw that? I’m not sure wikipedia says it is a great success. It says it’s more successful than the downtown people movers in Detroit and Jacksonville. Would you prefer it said less unsuccessful?

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