shardoon

Orange county will fail again. They have not changed the wording at all. Just mention some various road improvements that are very vague. It's a bait and switch again. This tax money can only be used for transportation. Then take an equal amount of money previously earmarked for transportation and do what you please. What is the net result? Same money for transportation, but higher taxes. Now, if they really were truthful and wanted to have something on the ballot that I can support, then they should say this money can only be used for transportation and existing transportation funding prior to the tax must be frozen and not decreased.

OIA cracked 58 million. 12 months rolling through January is 58,034,076. We should easily top 60 million this year.

Not interested in your political diatribes. Just stopped in to talk about the people mover in Miami. Enjoy your time talking to an empty room about your Trump obsession. Carry on.

I guess there is. I simply brought up the Miami Beach voted against the metromover expansion which was short sighted in my opinion. Others then commented about the riff raff that they were trying to keep out. I mentioned how good of a job they did cleaning the city up as of late and that I do not think the metromover expansion would contribute to that. Then somebody who lives, breaths, sleeps, and eat all things with a topic of Trump chimed in. But you are right, it did veer off topic. Or maybe it didn't because what Miami Beach did with cleaning up their city is in fact a cool thing in another city.

I'm impressed that I personally took that much time out of your day for that post of yours. Back on point, which you tried so hard to ignore. The problem with some lefties, not all, but the ones in power in the big cities (and aparently you) is that you feel people have constitutional rights to loiter anywhere they want, block public sidewalks, sleep anywhere they want, litter everywhere, do drugs on the streets, piss and $hit out in the open on the streets, pan handle anywhere, refuse mental health treatment when it is very apparent they are a danger to themselves and others, commit crimes and not be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law ( or in some cases lefties changing the law to minimize consequences), gather as a crowd that becomes lawless and violent (ie the spring breakers in South beach). So lefty, tell me, those constitutional rights? News flash, those are not rights. If cities wanted to create ordinances and laws, or even simply enforce the ones on the books, the cities become more livable. It's not rocket science. Miami Beach has done a pretty good job and I commend them. Not gonna even get into your Trump histrionics because that will just distract you from the topic at hand. I know everything in life is about Trump for some people, but get a grip, there is more to life than Trump, whether he is in power or not. These simple ideas are done at the local level, not at the federal level.

Sorry, I guess I missed the part about me defending Trump or this post having anything to do with Trump. Go ahead, you can untwist your panties. I'll gladly have this country enforce the laws on all sides of the political and socioeconomic spectrum equally and forcefully. Is that better? Panties untwisted now? Now we need to clean our freaking cities up.

So about Miami Beach. I was there recently, and I have to say, I am impressed. For half a decade, SouthBeach degenerated into riff raff. I never strolled past Lincoln because of it. Last weekend, I decided to see it again. All I can say is...WOW. they cleaned it up. Sure, there is an occasional crazy from time to time, but at least during the day, it was great. They didn't even have a police presence, not did they need it. The street cafes on ocean were booming. No drama. The city is also rebelling against spring break. They are putting in curfews for alcohol and larger gathering at 12 pm. Closing the beaches at 6pm. Closing roads and making parking $100 flat fees. They have come away from the brink. Sure, they had to endure being called racists for the process of cleaning up spring break, but that's just noise from asholes if you ask me. As far as the metromover, it's short sighted. That's not the make or break for trash and urban outdoorsman. One can literally walk across the bridge in an hour. What will keep homeless and vigrants out are strict policies to prevent them from setting up shop there. No public sleeping or panhandling. Tough crime laws. No loitering. No drug use. Common sense things and they won't come. Things the ruling parties in big cities seem to have a problem comprehending (won't name the party as to not get a few panties twisted here). The metromover would be a great connection from Brikell.

So Miami Beach just went NIMBY and rejected the metromover extension. Now, the county can still ignore them, which personally I would....... but money talks

I would say our coach was about 80-90% full. The other coaches looked pretty busy as well. I will say, I could have paid half the price if I didn't do first class...... but I had to burn the credit or else the remainder would have expired.

Just an update. I utilized the $1000 credit from last month. Being that it was President's Day weekend and I bought at the last minute, prices were steep. I honestly didn't care because this was the only weekend that I would have been able to travel and utilize the credit before it expired. For 2 people roundtrip Friday to Sunday first class...... a little over $900 LOL. Both trains were on time and left literally on the minute. I enjoyed the Brightline included uber which probably would have ran for $40-50 since I went to a beachside hotel. The lounge was good. Food selection was better than the Club at MCO. Included food selection on the train was plentiful and pretty good. I had a caprese pesto sandwich on a Ciabatta bread. They try to keep feeding you and it was good food, even the snacks. The snacks included pringles, granola bars, pringles, fullsize M&Ms/Peanut M&Ms, Kind bars, and gummy bears. Drinks were unlimited too with Pepsi products, beer, wine, and full liquor.

Final 2023 stats are in. Unfortunately, fell short of 58 million. However, did add 7.5 million more passengers over the record breaking 2022 year, which is quite impressive. Should break 60 million this year, which was unfathomable even pre covid, and certainly during any near term recovery projections during the covid shutdowns. Final 2023 total: 57,735,726 passengers. Officially 15.1% increase over the prior year. December 2023 performance 12.85% increase over December 2022. Comparisons for airports that were ahead of Orlando in 2022. Las Vegas, not released yet. Miami, not released yet, but should be comfortably ahead of them. JFK not released. Madrid 60.220.984 Ne Delhi, seeing prelim numbers at 65 million Amsterdam 61,889,586 Based off of all of this, even though Orlando had a record breaking year........so did everyone else. I think when all is said and done, we remain top 20, but stay between 15-20, mainly because of everyone else getting busier, and China coming back online.

That may be difficult once it pulls into the downtown Tampa area. Also, with a potential future into Jacksonville, would this prevent them from using their existing FEC line North of Cocoa?

Just think.....for the amount of money that we dumped into this craphole stadium, we could have had an NFL ready Dome not far off from Jerry world on I drive competing for CFP playoffs, NCAA final fours, super bowls, and even possibly and a NFL team. Same could have been said for a domed baseball stadium which would lure the Rays over here because no matter how many BS agreements they have to build a new stadium in tampa/st pete.....it will never get done.

Nobu update: They filed preliminary plans with the county. Plan is actually for 4 hotels totaling 1,934 rooms. This is a huge development within the 50 acres including a dining/retail/ entertainment center with 16 restaurants. The Nobu hotel is only 300 rooms, so gonna be I am assuming a boutique hotel within a larger hotel. I would assume similar to how they are in Miami with Eden Roc and Vegas with Caesars. Aslo gonna have a huge 26,000 sq foot spa. Can anyone track down the plans filed with the county? Disable java to view article https://www.growthspotter.com/2024/01/23/aic-hotel-group-files-plan-for-massive-nobu-resort-near-disney-springs/

When Brightline or Sunrail has a stop close to my house, I will be more than happy to take the train to the airport. As of now, an uber or taxi is $75 each way, which may be good for a long trip, but not for a short trip. I do like using Fast Park and relax for long trips, they are great along with the AAA discount. However, I occasionally do have to take short 2-3 day trips where I arrive home late at night and would rather just walk to my car.

Gotta call out OIA here again. So their solution to packed parking is offering a program to reserve a spot in advance at a price gauging rate of $32 a day. Are they insane? They already just raised parking rates across the board. They opened surface lots, which were a drop in the bucket and still a walk away. Why is it so hard for them to pull the trigger and build out parking garage C? It will pay for itself immedietely. I remember back in the day it Detroit, before the north terminal was rebuilt, they built out the humongous parking garage that was grossly oversized for the gates and traffic at the north terminal. They did this cause they needed parking for the huge McNamara terminal on the southern end that was just built. The garage next to the McNamara terminal just couldn't handle the traffic. They did it right. All this is gonna do is take away more parking spaces for people that were already getting price gauged. Now there will be even less spaces available when they close off level 4 of garage C for this BS venture. If successful, they are gonna do it at parking garage A and B. That's NUTS. It so hard to find a spot as it is. I get it, capitalism means trying to make as much profit as possible. This is a way for them to raise prices to $32 a day without admitting that they did. Problem is, publicly funded, owned, and subsidized entities should not be allowed to act like fully independent private companies. https://www.orlandoairports.net/press/2024/01/22/orlando-international-offers-reserved-parking-to-passengers/

I am quite surprised too. I was traveling with the family. Total of 2 adults and 3 kids. You get one kid free with each traveling adult and the 3rd child was a child fare price. Total for the 5 of us round trip was about $250. Not very expensive considering it was for 5 people. If I had my car, the hotel would have charged $50 bucks a night parking plus the gas and toll savings almost make it an even wash...... but I do not have to drive, so that's a plus.

Update from the cancelled train and delay from a little over a week ago. I got a random email thanking me for having patience with the delay and gave me and my family a $1000.00 Brightline credit for use expiring in 3 months. Not bad considering the delay really was out of their hands, but quite inconvenient arriving in Miami after midnight. I applaud them on that. Wouldn't that be nice if airlines behaved the same way?

Exactly, so the larger airlines get a pass and can merge away on a much larger scale because they already charge high prices?

Built by the mangos guy. Mainly for parking for Mangos when it just opened and was packed every weekend. Also built with the thought that skyplex was gonna be built, which never happened.

Honestly, it's complete bullcrap. I'm not for or against the merger per se...... however, how this merger on the small scale is unable to go through, but the govt allowed AA to eat American West and US Air. United and Continental merging was allowed. Delta and NWA allowed to merge. However, this much small merger isn't allowed is utter BS and smells of corruption. The Big legacy airlines were behind this lobbying to the govt. It's govt mixing with corporate corruption. You can't allow something to go through on a much bigger scale while at the same time making all those pertinent arguments to succeed on blocking a much smaller merger. Will be interesting to see if Hawaiin airlines is able to be bought by Alaska airlines. Will also be interesting to see if Frontier makes a renewed bud and if the federal govt allows that to go through since every one of the arguments cited by the judge would once again apply.

Maybe published, or even what is supposedly allowed. I rode brightline this past weekend. I had two independent speed apps open, both correlated to one another. We were blowing through intersections in the 90 to 100 range. South of brevard, we hit 110mph and there were a few rural intersections down there that we were well over 100mph. However, regardless of the speed that I clocked, even 75 mph comes at you pretty quick, and if one is assuming it is a freight train in a distance coming at you and you have time to jump the gates, that may be the last assumption you make.

Brightline goes through some of those intersections at 90 to 100mph. When you look down the tracks at a distance, all trains look similar with their one headlight. However, it's possible that these inpatient drivers see the train in the distance and assume it's a freight train traveling at 20 mph........when in reality it's coming at you at 100mph and before you know it, it's at the intersection. So by the time you attempt to drive around the gates, that bullet is hitting you.

I do not think extra signage would make a huge difference. The people driving around the barriers are well aware that they are there and what they are designed for. they are simply impatient and are looking to avoid waiting for a train. The joke is that the brightline is so fast that before you know it, it is gone already.

There can be other options, although expensive. They can install barriers that are impossible to go around, at least for cars........ but they will cost a lot of money and probably more to maintain as well.