What Brightline learned from its first year to Orlando

More to eat and drink, more baggage-handling ability and bigger trains are coming soon to Brightline’s higher-speed rail, which has established its riders’ favorite station as: Orlando.

Those conclusions are top of mind for Brightline as it marks completion of its first year of service from five stations in South Florida to Orlando International Airport’s Terminal C.

The Orlando Sentinel asked the privately owned passenger rail company to do a self-evaluation for its first yearly performance review, sharing which elements of its operations shined, fizzled and are ripe for upgrading.

Perhaps the biggest takeaway: Brightline trains consisting of two locomotives and four coach cars, each with 60 seats, no longer have enough room to handle demand.

In coming weeks, each train will get an additional coach car, and another soon after with perhaps yet a third later this year.

“The general appearance and comfort of the train is one of the things that we are most proud of,” said Mike Reininger, the company’s chief executive officer. “It elicits universally positive responses from our customers, who like the look and feel of the cabin, the light, the airiness, the quality of the seats and the convenience of having plugs available all over the place.”

What didn’t work out so well was Brightline’s now-defunct plan for a fleet of cars to deliver riders to and from train stations.

“Everybody has an Uber app, they know how to use Uber and they are fine with calling their own Uber,” Reininger said.

Brightline spent $6 billion in private funds to lay or rehabilitate 233 miles of track between Orlando and Miami, build stations in those cities and in Aventura, Fort Lauderdale, Boca Raton and West Palm Beach, and to design and manufacture 10 trains.

Service began between Miami, Fort Lauderdale and West Palm Beach in 2018, with a pause for the pandemic.

Trains to Orlando began last September, giving riders elevated, 79 mph views of Miami’s glitz and scruffiness, and a 125-mph journey through undeveloped ranchland and state preserve property east of Orlando’s airport.

Now running 16 daily round trips between Orlando and South Florida, Brightline trains have clicked off more than 5 million miles in the past year – as much as 200 times around Earth.

About 2.6 million rides were taken in that time. In recent months, more than half of the rides were by “long haul” passengers between Orlando and South Florida’s Miami and Fort Lauderdale stops.

Brightline says 65 percent of its passengers are Floridians, a quarter are from elsewhere in the nation and 10 percent are international.

Reininger said the company will focus on growing all three categories in part by joining the “global distribution system” that travel agents can tap into “to sell our tickets for us in a direct and efficient way that would probably be impossible for a company of our size.”

About 15 to 20 percent of travelers are on business trips. Another large portion that varies in size gets on board for events.

“We’re about to have a whole bunch of people on our trains on their way to South Florida for Taylor Swift,” Reininger said. “On Sunday mornings, the Orlando airport station looks like a Miami Dolphins tailgate party because of a bunch of people going down to the Dolphins game.”

The Orlando station contributes a modestly higher percentage of international travelers than the other stations. Another sizable group consists of students commuting to and from the University of Central Florida.

And, in general, the largest share of travelers lives in particular communities near stations: for Orlando that includes Winter Park, Windermere, Lake Nona and some associated with UCF, Reininger said.

One-way tickets between Orlando and Miami vary from about $50 to $150, depending on fare class and the BOGOs and other discounts often available.

“On-time performance is an industry benchmark,” he said. “We are absolutely on time. It’s remarkable for a startup company figuring this stuff out as we go.”

The trips of 3 hours and 25 minutes from Miami to Orlando include stops of 2 minutes at the other stations along the way, where passengers and baggage handling have to honor that window.

Along with its push for more riders, Brightline expects to expand capacity for the food and beverages offered in stations and on board trains, and for checked luggage.

“It turns out people really like the idea of just dumping their bags at the front desk and then picking them up on the way out,” Reininger said. “That has turned out to be more popular than we originally anticipated.”

Brightline built its system ultimately to handle trains with 10 coach cars. Reininger said adding a seventh coach car is in the works.

About riders’ favorite station among the six, Rieninger said that’s like answering which is your favorite grandkid.

“I think it’s the Orlando airport, because it’s the newest and because we were able to do everything we learned on the initial stations,” he said. “The Orlando station is probably the favorite overall, followed by Miami. There’s a lot going on and an enormous amount of energy.”