Transit Miami

Like many on their Thanksgiving holiday, I had the arduous task of traveling in order to meet up with the family. Only this time I decided to travel to Tampa, Fl by train rather than car. The Amtrak experience was more interesting than what I thought. For starters the Miami station was a bit of a disappointment, it looked dilapidated and in need of an upgrade. Then again, it probably won’t get one since Amtrak will be moving into the MIC, Miami Intermodal Center, once it finally gets completed.

The Miami station has only two trains leaving a day, the Silver Meteor at 7:50 a.m. and the Silver Star at 8:50 a.m., and both end up in New York-Penn Station. Of the two the Silver Star connects to Tampa while the Silver Meteor travels directly to Orlando.

The train was quite comfortable with ample room for your carry on bag, your luggage and still had room to spread your legs. Also, every row of seats had its own power outlet which came in handy during the trip. During the five hour and twenty minute trip the only annoyance was the constant stop and go in the urban areas of South Florida and Tampa. I have to believe that these stops where for dispatching in order to get permission to access the track and/or other trains where ahead of it. If these stops where eliminated or kept to a minimum I believe at least one hour would have been saved on the trip.

I was impressed to see that the train was sold out to Tampa, and it was evident when the train stopped at the historic Tampa Union Station in downtown Tampa.

Let’s just say I was glad I was able to keep my luggage with me. In such a populous state as Florida the need for its own rail system is obvious. Rather it’s on a high speed train system or not the demand is there.