Amtrak will offer train service from Cleveland to Florida starting in November

CLEVELAND – Thanks to Amtrak’s work on New York’s East River Tunnel, rail enthusiasts from Cleveland will be able to travel to Florida without changing trains starting in November.

As a result of the work, Amtrak is temporarily combining the Capitol Limited and Silver Star trains to form the Floridian, which will run between Chicago and Miami via Washington, DC, beginning November 10.

“Our members have long had a dream to reinstate transfer service from the Midwest to Florida, and we are thrilled that a new generation of American passengers will be able to experience this service for themselves,” said Jim Mathews, president and CEO of the Rail Passengers Association. “This move will free up much-needed equipment while taking pressure off the Northeast Corridor infrastructure during the ERT project renovation. We believe passengers will flock to this new service.”

Because it’s in some ways an extension of the current Capitol Limited line through Cleveland, passengers here still have to ride it in the middle of the night. Still, Ohio rail enthusiasts say it’s a welcome addition.

“It’s actually a pretty good thing. I mean, I’m already seeing a lot of excitement, at least from people I know who ride Amtrak a lot,” said Stu Nicholson, a board member of the Rail Passengers Association. “A train ride from Chicago through Ohio and on to Washington DC and then down to Florida is possible.”

But the most significant impetus for actual rail expansion came last December, when the Federal Railroad Administration awarded Ohio grants of half a million dollars each to study routes, including the long-discussed 3C+D route to restore commuter rail service between Cleveland and Cincinnati with stops in Columbus and Dayton, and another in which the Midwest Ohio Regional Planning Commission is studying a route between Chicago, Fort Wayne, Columbus and Pittsburgh.

“We’re preparing for the next step on these projects, a service development plan that will answer all of your viewers’ questions: how fast, where will the stations be, what kind of service will there be and how will that affect freight,” said William Murdock, executive director of the Mid-Ohio Regional Planning Commission.

Gov. Mike DeWine has long told News 5 that he wants these questions answered before the state fully commits. Speed ​​is one of the biggest questions for potential drivers.

“They’re not going to use it, they’re not going to do it, if they can’t at least get from Cleveland to Cincinnati in the same amount of time it would take them to get in their car and drive,” DeWine said in 2022. “If we can find a way to make that financially possible, we’d be happy to do it.”

“The governor is right, of course,” Murdock said. “And that’s what our business community is interested in; that’s what our mayors and our citizens are asking. We need to know if this is a good deal, if this is the right deal, and we believe it is, but this study will help answer the really important questions of when and where we can move forward.”

So how long could we talk if the answers are positive?

“I think it’s safe to say it’s going to be in the next decade,” Murdock said. “Depending on what the study shows, it could take maybe 5 to 10 years, maybe a little longer, but if you compare that to a freeway interchange, a road widening or a bridge, those things can take some time.”

Nicholson said the city’s restoration would be of tremendous importance to Columbus, as there has been no passenger rail service there since 1979.

“At least here in Columbus, we have an opportunity to build two major corridors through Columbus and go from zero trains a day, as we have now, as we do in the rest of central Ohio, to six, seven, maybe eight trains a day. And that’s not even counting the long-distance routes that the Federal Rail Administration is currently considering. At least two of them will go through Ohio, one of them will go through Cleveland,” Nicholson said.

However, Nicholson believes trains on existing routes through Cleveland could run earlier and at more reasonable times.

“We’re pretty optimistic that when all this gets going, there will be trains actually running through during daylight hours,” he said. “What a concept.”