airrail NEWS reports this week on the topics that have come up in informational meeting held between bidders and Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) on 9th and 10th November 2010.

Interest in the programme from these private sector entities is said to be very enthusiastic with bidders showing major investments of time and money are already being undertaken to prepare for this competition. FDOT anticipate 7 or 8 high quality responses to this RFQ with teams representing the world industry leaders in High Speed Rail. Technologies being proposed all meet/exceed the threshold of being true High Speed Rail capable of achieving speeds in excess of 186 mph.

There was generally strong encouragement from the teams for FDOT to proceed with this RFQ procurement even with the uncertainty that prevailed. There was a general sense of confidence that this funding will arrive and a willingness to work with FDOT to find additional funding sources if it did not. Florida’s momentum and likelihood of being the first true HSR Express project in the nation were noted as strong catalysts for moving forward.

Risk transfer

To appear to incoming Republican Governor Rick Scott we imagine that transfer of risk in operations will be the key. The meetings revealed varying degrees of willingness to assume ridership risk expressed by teams, with some fully willing to take this risk on under the right circumstances. All teams intend to perform their own independent ridership studies, and requested as much information as possible from FDOT on this and any other aspect of the project be provided as it is available.

Made in the USA?

A common concern of the teams regarded the rolling stock approval, particularly the achievement of the Buy America requirement for rolling stock at 100%. This was deemed unrealistic, with a targeted maximum that generally ranged around 60% as being more realistic. Furthermore the small order of trainsets required for this Tampa-Orlando project would result in a prohibitive investment to set up a manufacturing facility specifically for this order. Timescales from trains order to operation was also of concern.

Stage 2 to Miami

Unsurprisingly there is generally great interest in the extension to Miami by all teams. Different ideas were presented on how some level of opportunity could be presented for the winning Tampa-Orlando team to be given for some right of first refusal or negotiation rights for the Orlando-Miami leg. Most teams did not anticipate there would be much success in being able to include such options and therefore expect to price proposals for Tampa-Orlando only.

We have previously stated our view that Tampa to Orlando will not convince the USA that there is a future on high speed rail. If Florida has the means to link the Miami extension to the initial line then there will be a hope of doing so.

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