Don’t kill the Wave streetcar, but don’t rush it, either
Fort Lauderdale city commissioners will be asked Tuesday to accept an amended cost-sharing agreement with Broward County that would put the Wave streetcar project back out to bid, the cost of its accoutrements cut by tens of millions of dollars.
Given the many concerns about the proposed downtown rail circular, commissioners should table the decision and let their successors decide. In just five weeks, Fort Lauderdale’s five-member commission will have four new faces, including a new mayor. Every candidate running stands opposed to the Wave as is.
Concerns about this throwback project — which would place rail streetcars, powered by overhead lines, in a lane of traffic with cars and buses — extend well beyond the first-round construction bids, which came in $75 million over the $195 million budget.
You’ve got to wonder what all was cut to bring the costs in line. Were all those upgrades to the SE 3rd Avenue Bridge really not needed? Wasn’t that vehicle maintenance facility supposed to accommodate future expansion?
And speaking of future expansion, why isn’t the Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport on the Wave’s map for Phase 2?
As it turns out, the much-touted airport extension — long used to sell the Wave — faces significant obstacles. Ridership projections are low, federal funds are unlikely and a tunnel or bridge would be needed to cross the FEC’s railroad tracks, and the FEC is resisting giving up aerial rights.
In other words, an airport extension appears iffy, at best. More likely is an airport stop for the new Brightline longdistance passenger train, which would undercut a key promise made by those selling the Wave as is.
Mayor Jack Seiler, who faces term limits after nine years in office, should model how best to pass the baton from one era to the next. That means not handcuffing the next mayor and commission to a project enthusiastically embraced when unveiled 14 years ago, but which has lost community support after years of delay and scrutiny.
If the popular mayor harbors further political ambitions, which we believe he does, he’d be wise not to tie his legacy to what’s dubbed The Train to Nowhere. Traffic experts say the Wave will have negligible effects on relieving congestion and could delay cars behind it. Its chief purpose is to foster growth and development along the 2.8-mile route, which travels Andrews Avenue from Southwest 17th Street to Sistrunk Boulevard, with a cut-out to Southwest Third Street and a loop near Flagler Village. It will require a $6 million annual operating subsidy from the county.
Seiler’s political equation certainly must include the downtown developers who conceived the Wave and contribute to political campaigns. By that, we mean no disrespect to those who’ve built the city’s sizzle and who, we truly believe, care about smart growth and economic development.
From what we’ve seen, good people reside on all sides of this heated controversy, even if those without power sometimes shout too loud and those with influence sometimes disparage critics as “a vocal minority opposed to everything and anything new.” other federal projects and relationships,” he said, “what does that do to Port Everglades funding, to future transportation projects, to airport expansion funding, to courthouse funding? You have to recognize that, yes, there are issues with the Wave, but the concept has to survive. The concept has to move forward.”
“I don’t have a problem delaying it for a better version without wires, without rail infrastructure,” he added. “Once you get rid of the in-ground tracks and overhead, the price could drop 35 percent. There’s better products out there.”
The Wave would be far more attractive if it could totally shift to off-wire battery power, which it’s currently designed to use to cross the 3rd Avenue drawbridge. But to go farther, we’d need American manufacturers to offer batteries with significantly more power. In the meantime, everyone’s watching China, where supercapacitors — which store energy in an electric field, not battery chemicals— are running a futuristic tram system and electric buses. But only American-made products can be used in federally funded streetcars, and this exciting innovation is not yet made in America.
And the problem is that Tuesday, the city commission will be asked to sign an agreement that would begin work immediately.
If commissioners approve the amended agreement, they are committing the city to an antiquated system. For their successors, the only way out will be if the bids come back more than 125 percent over budget, or aren’t opened and a $760,000 penalty is paid the bidders.
Broward Mayor Beam Furr agrees the timeline is quick and understands our concern about approving a rush job. He says he wouldn’t have started the rail line where it is, and acknowledges the Wave is about economic development, not congestion relief. He also wishes an American company made a different product “and this wasn’t our only option.”
“My hope would be that if everything is passed and everyone decides to go forward, we’d have put enough stuff in motion that we can say, ‘We’ve got the drawing plans, the engineering plans, and all that costs a lot of money.’ They recognize that. I would love for there to be an extension if there needed to be.”
As for extending the Wave to the airport, he says a Brightline airport stop appears the better option. “That’s a short-term way of doing it. If we end up doing an expansion of the Wave to the airport, that’s more of a long-term.”
But the Brightline scenario would require Wave riders to buy a second ticket and wait for the private passenger train. Would downtown residents really do that, given the ease of Uber and taxis? Regardless, it appears disingenuous to continue selling the Wave as the first leg of a county rail system that will extend to the airport in the second phase.