Radical changes planned for SunRail, LYNX services if penny tax passes
A lot of work has gone into transforming Orange County from a community dominated by citrus groves and cattle, to a world-class destination for visitors, businesses and people who call Central Florida home.
But where we differ from other major metropolitan meccas is in our mass transit. Our buses and trains just don't compare.
But they could, if the transit tax becomes reality.
"You don't have really the roads to accommodate all these vehicles," Brian Gittens said.
He came to Orlando from New York about three years ago and is not driving.
"I don't want to hear nobody in Florida, telling me about New York traffic. Nobody! It is worse down here than in New York," he said.
Getting There: A look at how transportation is changing in Central Florida
So Gittens uses public transit.
First getting on the bus.
"I take LYNX transportation, back and forth to work every day," he said.
And then the train.
He's one of the thousands of people that could be in for a big change if Orange County's penny sales tax to overhaul LYNX and SunRail becomes a reality.
MAP: Click here to see the proposed LYNX changes
MAP: Click here to see the proposed SunRail changes
"I think it certainly has the potential to be a transformational opportunity for transit in the community. And this is a community that very much needs that transformation," Jim Harrison, CEO of LYNX said.
The penny sales tax is slated to raise $600 million a year. And 45% of that, $270 million, is earmarked to remake bus and commuter train travel.
"What we're looking at here is essentially doubling the size of the bus fleet in Central Florida. Here, right now, there's about 240, 245 buses that are dedicated to Orange County, we need twice that to accomplish the frequency goals that we are looking for," Harrison said.
Under the county proposal, the LYNX fleet would more than double to about 700 buses.
More buses means LYNX can tackle riders' biggest complaint: the number of bus routes and the frequency of service.
That could help eliminate those long wait times riders complain about.
"About 7% of our fleet is 15 minutes or less. Then 93% is more than that. About half of our frequency right now is an hour or more between buses," Harrison said. "What we would look at and making the difference is to really turn that ratio on its head where the vast majority of our routes, the vast majority of those links are running at that 10 or 15 minute frequency."
How will LYNX do it?
"One of the goals is to make it so that folks no longer have to come downtown to get their transportation across the county. There will be transfer centers, what we refer to as transfer centers, placed around the county on essentially a grid system that will allow people to make that transfer much closer to their home or their destination," Harrison said.
Getting riders closer to where they're going is another item on LYNX customers' wish list.
Convenience on commuter rail is also a part of this transit overhaul plan.
If passed, the long-awaited expansion of service hours to nights and weekends is tops on SunRail's to-do list.
That's something Rollins College student Sergio Valera would welcome.
"Right now, this semester, I'm just taking it on Wednesday, because it's the only day I can take it. The other days, I'm out of school like at 9 p.m. So, at that hour, the trains not working anymore from the Winter Park station," Valera said.
SunRail runs Monday through Friday, stopping at 16 stations across 49 miles of Volusia, Seminole, Orange and Osceola counties.
With this transit sales tax proposal, SunRail service wouldn't just expand hours of operation, it would expand locations to places like Apopka in northwest Orange County, plus the intermodal station at Orlando International Airport.
"It's always been a very important component of SunRail, to have a route to have a linkage to the airport. And this plan does include a direct link from SunRail to the airport," Harrison said.
Ditching the drive to OIA and that bumper car fiasco that happens outside arrivals and departures. It's the stuff travel dreams are made of.
"It will be perfect to just go to the Poinciana train station and they just go straight to the airport. Because every time is I have to deal with that, you know, I have to ask people to take me to the airport, like just a whole thing. It's kind of far and then, the traffic. So if this extends to the airport, it would be perfect," Valera said.
Of all the transformations in the plan for SunRail and LYNX, which could we see first?
"The very first thing to do because it's the quickest and easiest to do is to add that evening and weekend service. And to run the trains more frequently during the day. The connection to the airport is a high priority has always been a high priority for this region. And it's one that we would certainly focus on and get done as quickly as we could," he said.
Harrison reminds this a multi-year project.
"There are things that can be done very quickly, you know, just in the first, the first several months, the first year or so such as building new shelters, adding some new buses and things like that. Some of the other things like a new track, train track construction, or something like that, obviously takes a bit longer," he said.
It will take time but also money.
Dollars, which would come from the Orange County penny sales tax, if it ends up on the November ballot and passes.
Christian Watkins: "Do you think the money that's put set aside in this proposal is that enough to get all of this done?
Harrison: "That's always the challenge. But I do think that this amount of funding has the capacity to be completely transformational for transit in the region."