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President Barack Obama is bringing the beginnings of a national high-speed-rail network to Tampa, Florida, with the announcement Thursday that the state will get at least half what it requested to open fast-train service between Orlando and Tampa by 2015.  Rail backers say the project will bring 23,000 jobs to Florida over four years and create 600 permanent jobs.  The train would allow commuters to travel the 85 miles between the two cities in less than an hour.

The Obama administration did some penny pinching in trying to spread around the $8 billion in fast-train stimulus to 31 states.  Florida had requested $2.6 billion but will get only $1.25 billion. North Carolina was expected to receive $520 million for a Charlotte-Raleigh connection.  The state had asked for $5.3 billion, with most of that money, about $3.7 billion, earmarked for a new rail shortcut between Raleigh and Richmond.  Georgia, which has lagged on rail development, was expected to get a mere $750,000.

U.S. Rep. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) gushed that the Florida project will be “one of the largest boosts to the state’s economy since Disney, since the interstate highway system.”  The only high-speed train operating in the United States at the moment is Amtrak’s Acela, which runs from Washington, D.C., to Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York and Boston. Still,  U.S. trains running 120-150 mph are no match for the German-built maglev rocket running the rails between downtown Shanghai and Pudong International Airport at an average speed of 250 mph, reducing the commute time from 45 minutes to 7 minutes, 20 seconds.

Elizabeth Edwards has had enough: The Associated Press reported that long-suffering Elizabeth Edwards has separated from her “hick” husband, two-time presidential candidate and former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards.  AP quoted one of her friends as saying “Elizabeth is moving on with her life and wants to put this difficult chapter behind her.”  There are apparently many bad chapters to come, however.  The Wall Street Journal cites excerpts from the about-to-be-released book by former Edwards aide Andrew Young indicating that John Edwards tried to persuade his mistress to have an abortion and once had her over to the house to help entertain the kids while Elizabeth was away.

Tebow hanging tough: Departing Gator quarterback Tim Tebow, getting ready for the Senior Bowl, expressed surprise at the furor caused by the ad he and his mother did for the upcoming Super Bowl touting the value of not aborting a future Heisman winner.  “I know some people won’t agree with it, but I think they can at least respect that I stand up for what I believe, and I’m never shy about that,” Tebow told reporters.  The Palm Beach Post noted that “everyone from the Wall Street Journal to CNN to Sarah Palin dedicated coverage to the commercial.”  The ad became one of Google’s 10 most-searched items on Tuesday.

Dew Droplets: In Louisiana, the Broussard City Council has granted a Super Bowl Sunday exemption for bars in the city to allow for alcohol sales on a day that is normally dry … A Hollywood, Florida, policeman has lost his job and his role on HGTV’s Design Star after Rope Rituals, a 1996 gay porn video, turned up featuring the officer in a bondage scene … The Oak Ridge, Tennessee, “Manhattan Project” site is being considered for national park status … Georgia Department of Natural Resources officers put down two wild turkeys after residents of an Athens subdivision complained the turkeys had been attacking them for a month.

Check out our News and Opinion Feeds for a lot more Southern happenings.

1. Gita says:

   January 28, 2010 at 3:00 pm

   These rapid rail networks are like the unobtainium in Avatar.
   About a decade ago, I wrote a couple of stories for the AJC about fast rail plans for the Atlanta-Chattanooga corridor. There was talk about intermodal commuting between Birmingham and Atlanta for several years. All kinds of gorgeous plans were made. Sketches by planners and engineers. Money had a weird way of disappearing, though.

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2. Keith Graham says:

   January 28, 2010 at 8:16 pm

   Gita is right about all kinds of gorgeous plans and not much to show for them, but I’m glad to see this step toward high-speed rail. I’ve ridden that Shanghai train, and it’s a great experience. Would love to have that option from Atlanta to Athens and/or Birmingham, Chattanooga, Nashville, Charlotte, Mobile, New Orleans, etc. And the train I’d most like to ride would be one that took me from Atlanta to the Georgia coast. Maybe, someday, people in the U.S. will have that kind of opportunity. We really have fallen far behind some other countries in offering decent passenger train service.

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3. Cliff Green says:

   January 28, 2010 at 10:06 pm

   In the early 1970s, I wrote dozens of articles about the West Georgia Tollway, which was to generally follow the route of U.S. 27 from Chattanooga to Florida. The object of the road was to relieve some of the pressure on I-75. There were dozens of community meetings from Rome to the Florida line build support for the idea, and some gorgeous plans were drawn up and displayed in cities up and down the western side of the state. GDOT even went so far as to create a “tollway authority,” or something like that, to promote the road and build out the plan. It, in turn, hired a guy from Kentucky with experience in running toll roads to oversee the project. Not one ounce of dirt was ever turned over. Don’t hold your breath for high-speed rail.

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4. Brenden says:

   January 29, 2010 at 10:07 am

   You guys need to watch the “Monorail” episode of the “Simpsons.” Or read any of the CBO reports on Amtrak, insolvent for nearly all its history.

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5. Charles says:

   January 29, 2010 at 12:10 pm

   There will probably never be a Maglev train in the USA, nor should there be. Attempts to make it work in Europe haven’t been successful. China has a short line operating but they don’t have to deal with the kind of environmental or litigation isssues that we do.

   That doesn’t mean we can’t or shouldn’t have high-speed rail. The Acela can reach 150 mph on the Northeast Corridor, which is the only stretch of track that Amtrack acutally owns and therefore the only portion that is maintained to allow such high speeds. By expanding this infrastructure, we can have quality high-speed trains like the ones that are already common in Europe.

   Rail service is superior to flying or driving for regional travel – say from Washington to NYC, where Amtrak has more market share than all of the airlines. Also better for the environment. Finally, as Obama noted, building this infrastructure will create good jobs.

   Based on the grants announced this week it appears that the Northeast Corridor will be extended from Washington through Richmond and on to Charlotte. Over the past decade, North Carolina and Virginia both took the initiative in providing rail service while Georgia did nothing. This failure to act might have long-term consequences.

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6. Brenden says:

   January 29, 2010 at 1:01 pm

   From wikipedia:

   “The Eurorail (informally known as Eurail) Group G.I.E. is a Netherlands-based company, registered in Luxembourg, that sells passes and tickets for European railroads to residents of Europe and other countries. It is owned by a group of European rail carriers and shipping companies.”

   Good God! Even those wretched European socialists recognize passenger rail IS A BUSINESS!

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7. Cliff Green says:

   January 29, 2010 at 11:41 pm

   Those of you who don’t read through all the strings on The Dew may be surprised, but the character “Brenden” and I agree on some things occasionally. This high-speed rail stuff is one of those.
   Having not worked through a comprehensive transportation plan for Atlanta, I will just throw out some random thoughts.
   I love London, Amsterdam, Paris and Rome, but Atlanta will never be like either one of them. Atlanta was founded in a different time and in a different place. We must accept history, as distasteful as it is sometimes.
   My wife Linda and I live in an intown neighborhood named Candler Park. As much as we may wish it was like the Paris of old, Linda will never be able to walk a block to the greengrocer, the dairyman, the butcher and the baker, then come home to prepare a fabulous meal with locally grown, perfectly fresh ingredients. In turn, I will never bicycle home from work and share with her a glass of an interesting little wine produced by the vineyard next door.
   We need to give up on such fantasies.
   Having said that, I believe MARTA should be expanded to outlying counties so that people can get to their jobs no matter where they work in the region. Plus, the rail system is good for the convention business. It allows people who are not familiar with our area to get around easily. I am a hugh supporter of MARTA expansion.
   I understand how Amtrack can work in the Northeast Corridor, but I fail to see how this relates to Atlanta. For instance, if I have business in Birmingham, by driving, I can be on I-20 in less than 10 minutes and in B’ham in two hours. If I want to fly…please! The trip is too short to even be considered.
   A high-speed train? First, I have to get to the station. How? By car? Cab? MARTA? Once there, I ride the train. Then what? Rent a car? Does Birmingham have rapid transit? I don’t know. Bum a ride? Big carbon footprint for a trip to Alabama!
   I love New Orleans and San Francisco and their streetcars. I’ve never been there, but that trolley stuff in Portland looks interesting, too. However, I fail to see what any of this would do for Atlanta, other than cost us a ton of money.
   Yes, I know the question: How much money does I-285 make every year? Not a dime. In fact, it costs Atlanta taxpayers millions of dollars to maintain and police. But it also allows thousands of people to get to work each day, and it efficiently moves million of tons of freight. There is a trade off here; I just don’t know what the trade-off would be by building a high-speed rail line to Chattanooga, say.
   Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely love the IDEA of high-speed rail and trolley cars and all those really cool things, but (here we go “Brenden”) we have many more important things to worry about, like healthcare, education, etc…

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