Florida U.S. Senator Bill Nelson said today that the Tampa Bay area has taken a big leap in attempting to get high-speed rail to the region, and he placed great hopes on the Florida Legislature to conduct a special session on rail issues next month to show Washington that it means business about a a $2.5 billion federal stimulus request for high speed rail.
Speaking at the Columbian Restaurant in Ybor City, at an event hastily put together by the Greater Tampa Chamber of Commerce, Florida's senior Senator said that the state's chances of acquiring the funding "improve enormously" if it can successfully deal with the issues with SunRail and TriRail, which the legislature has contended with for the past couple of years, but has never reached a deal.
Nelson gave a shout out to former Hillsborough County Commissioner Ed Turanchik and his ConnectUs organization that has been formed to try to bring a Tampa to Orlando high speed rail line to Florida (though he did mispronounce Turanchik's name).
This article appears in Nov 4-10, 2009.