Apparently, my recent gushing rant about the Miami Intermodal Center, sparked one hell of a discussion over on CriticalMiami. In any case, I’m going to elaborate on the Center and reaffirm my stance and views of the problems we will continue to face until it’s completed. An excerpt from the MIC website:
“In 1989, Miami-Dade County accepted the Miami International Airport Area Transportation Study recommending implementation of a multimodal transportation access facility. It was conceived as the means to link commuter rail (both heavy and light) and public and private bus service, thereby providing needed regional connectivity and improving access to Miami International Airport. In the early 1990s, the State of Florida implemented transportation policies to encourage users to use high occupancy vehicles.”
Honestly, this thing has been in some sort of planning since 1989 and this is the best we could do? It’s Kinda like watching the credits roll on Nacho Libre and wondering: “How can so many people see nothing wrong with putting this into production?” except instead of the $10 ticket and popcorn, it’s $1.3 Billion. They’ve had a decade and half to plan and it is still horribly behind a schedule which is continuously being pushed back. I’d also like to get a copy of those extremely useful policies implemented to encourage high occupancy vehicle use, so that I can wipe my (well, you know what) with them. A lot of good those policies have done, the complex is still at least another 5 years away from completion and our airport is plagued with unbearable traffic. What a great way to effectively cripple Miami’s Business and tourism sectors while continuing to give passengers a reason to head up to Ft. Lauderdale.
With the $1.3 billion price tag, one would expect this structure to be extremely innovative and filled with cutting edge technology. Just take a look at how innovative the integration between it and the airport is; after you hop off one of the airport’s two independent people movers, walk across the airport baggage claim, you hop on another 1.3 mile long people mover (its price isn’t included in the original figure, btw) which will finally take you to your array of transportation options (Sidenote: did you know the now defunct Florida High Speed Rail was also slated to arrive at the MIC?)
I recently experienced a system similar to this at Madrid’s Barajas International Terminal. Beautiful terminal. Absolutely stunning design. It’s such a terrible pain however to travel from the gate to the baggage area; it takes an approximated 30+ minutes of walking/riding, not including the multiple security checkpoints.
Anyone else get the feeling that Miami planners are completely oblivious to what happens in other parts of the world? I certainly do. This is going to be an ongoing saga folks, like the PAC, so hold on for one heck of a disaster…
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