TrainsOfDisney
Well-Known Member
They said 18 of the trains last weekend were 100% sold out.
Did you actually walk through the entire train and count seats each time you rode?
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Rumor Higher Speed Rail from MCO to Disney World
- Thread starter UCF
- Start date
Did you actually walk through the entire train and count seats each time you rode?
Rich Brownn
Well-Known Member
That doesn't surprised me - I saw that at least 2 runs ORL-MIA had sold out and many were nearly full in the Smart section. One of the local news stations figured out that if you were going roundtrip solo, the train was cheaper than driving with everything figured in.
Rich Brownn
Well-Known Member
Most of the subsidies were for mass transit, not specifically Brightline. Brightline used bonds, which would only cost taxpayers in case of a default
DisneyCane
Well-Known Member
Flying from Miami to Orlando makes little sense time wise. When you add the drive to the airport and getting there 1+ hrs before departure and then ground transportation on the MCO end it takes at least as long as driving. Train will take longer because you have drive to the station, get there some amount of time before departure and then take some kind of vehicle to the ultimate destination. Driving with at least adaptive cruise control is the way to go. More advanced autonomous driving makes it even more of a no brainier.
TrainsOfDisney
Well-Known Member
And yet people fly that route everyday.
And yet people have been taking Amtrak from Orlando to Miami everyday for the past 40+ years and now Brightline is seeing good ridership.
It’s always good to have options - and it’s even better to have new and modern options like Brightline.
Vegas Disney Fan
Well-Known Member
I’d think this would depend on traffic, I’m not familiar with the Miami to Orlando route but I frequently drive from Vegas to LA and it’s a similar situation, flying makes no sense for me, by the time I drive to the airport, park, check in, fly, and then Uber to my destination it’s a 4-5 hour trip… or I can just drive and get there in 4.5 hours on average.
On average being the key phrase though, I’ve had that drive take as little as 3.5 hours and as long as 9 hours due to traffic.
The Brightline west train is supposed to take a couple hours but once you factor in parking, etc, and an Uber in LA I suspect I won’t save any time over the average drive either… but the ability to take the risk of a 7-9 hour drive out of the equation will be worth every penny for me.
Miami to Orlando at night using the FL Turnpike and cars are flying 80-90mph , 3 1/2 hours one way.
bmr1591
Well-Known Member
I can’t imagine Disney wanting the train to go to Disney Springs and EPCOT. That would only fuel the ‘park at DS and go to parks’ people.
TrainsOfDisney
Well-Known Member
At one time Disney had planned a monorail from Epcot to Downtown Disney.
There are certainly solutions to that issue.
I used to do that all the time. When factoring in Miami rush hour traffic on a Friday vs taking the metro to MIA and hopping on a 30 minute flight, it was a no-brainer.
Disone
Well-Known Member
I think you were being sarcastic but I did walk 3 of the four cars. I was in the premium car and walked all the way up to the vestibule between cars 1 and 2.
On the way back I was in car one but I boarded on car four and walked through the train to car one.
But even if I hadn't honestly you don't need to walk the distance of the train to get a sense for how full it is. Especially in Orlando when the next stop is more than two and a half hours away after the train leaves Orlando, and there just isn't that many people boarding it. When there's a few hand fulls of people in the station waiting for the train in orlando, you kind of get the sense it's not going to be full.
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It serves a much bigger area if people would actually consider time to and at the Airport as a part of the Journey. (Admittedly Crossrail from Heathrow and TGV from CDG are fantastic services and help a lot with this aspect but the point stands, for dropping you off in the middle of Paris/Amsterdam, for most of the South East and a tad further for trains that go directly into St Pancras /Kings Cross)
Twirlnhurl
Well-Known Member
Most people who fly from MIA to MCO are probably doing so because MIA is a primary airline hub, especially for flights to South America and the Caribbean. So Brightline isn't that much of a substitute.
However, most is not all. The people I talked to at work about this are very eager to use Brightline between the two cities.
Simply driving at night isn't necessarily an option if your business in South Florida is on a week night. Drive tines between Miami and Orlando are highly variable. Flying is much more reliable, but Brightline will be more reliable still.
Not exactly relevant to the topic at hand. Also, Miami's rush hour traffic is worse than DC's.
But with that out of the way, Miami to Orlando is a 3-4 hour drive in normal circumstances. With Friday rush hour though, that can be closer to 6 hours. This is why IME, most Miamians who drive to Disney, either leave Friday after lunch or leave Saturday before dawn, and have a very long day.
Meanwhile, in my case, because I lived in Downtown Miami, it was very easy to hop on the metro to the airport, take a 20 minute flight to MCO, and just use a rental car (which I would've done leaving from Miami anyway to save mileage on my lease)
TrainsOfDisney
Well-Known Member
Extremely easy. Walkable from parts of downtown, but also accessible via the peoplemover/Metro. I took it previously when I lived in Miami to Palm Beach.
TrainsOfDisney
Well-Known Member
Lots of complaints about that service, since it's Uber connected. Namely that Ubers never are there.