High-speed rail deal for Tampa-Orlando run off table Feb. 25
he lawmakers won the agreement from Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood in a meeting Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Orlando, organized after Republican Gov. Rick Scott said Wednesday he would reject $2.4 billion in federal funding for the high-speed rail project. Scott said the project would cost the state too much and wouldn’t attract enough riders.
Lawmakers and LaHood now will work to convince an agency or a private company — options include Amtrak, non-state transit
authorities and metropolitan planning agencies — to invest $280 million in the rail project. They hope the promise of private or local-government financing will convince Scott to allow the project.
“That should meet the governor’s requirement,” Nelson said. “But the governor is going to have to cooperate if this is to happen. There is too much at stake for us to lose this. We’re going to give it everything that we have.”
Florida holds the right-of-way along Interstate 4, and state officials would have to sign off on any deal for the matching funds.
“The cart is in a ditch right now, and we’ve got to figure out a way to all pull it out together,” said Rep. John Mica, a Winter Park Republican who heads the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee. “I’m very disappointed.”