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Comment by softwaredoug | Hacker News Reader

There is a private train system in Florida that connects major cities. Sadly, my understanding is its financials are not great. Hopefully that changes.

https://www.gobrightline.com/

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The engineering is not stellar either. 96% of the line's crossings are at grade. Those intersections are undersignaled with barriers that are easy to drive around.

If you know anything about Florida drivers you won't be surprised to hear there have been 180 fatalities on Brightline since its inception in 2017.

No doubt the public blames the trains rather than the drivers

> you won't be surprised to hear there have been 180 fatalities on Brightline since its inception in 2017.

... Wait, _seriously_? That seems implausibly high, for one not-very-frequent train line. Are these just uncontrolled crossings, with no barriers, or something?

Yeah in Florida Brightline runs the deadliest railway in the country by a pretty good margin. In California they've pared back their grand plans dramatically because (surprise, surprise) even when you're cheaping out on the infrastructure railways are expensive.

They're also building the same thing between Las Vegas and SoCal: https://www.brightlinewest.com/

(un)surprisingly, this will be operational well before the California HSR (SF->LA) boondoggle.

  (un)surprisingly, this will be operational well before the California
  HSR (SF->LA) boondoggle.

Yeah, maybe. Even if Brightline succeeds in building something it's going to fall short of connecting LA to Vegas.

https://www.npr.org/2025/09/11/nx-s1-5495584/brightline-west...

I think they're burning capital faster than they're recouping anything. I think they have $5B on debt on $500m in revenue.

I think if they can hold out they could be successful, but thats a big if.

https://www.wlrn.org/business/2025-08-12/brightline-fares-pr...

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