Sunrail ridership Up, Looks like an Epic Success!! (Orlando: living in, vs)

[0nyxStation]

Originally Posted by smarino

I wish it did some good here in Daytona. Sunrail looks very promising, but we were totally left out of the loop. To get to Sunrail from here, you have to take a bus to the downtown Votran terminal, then board a #60 bus to Deland. That bus takes about an hour, plus your initial bus ride to get to the downtown bus terminal. From the #60, you get to go to the prison!!!, then back onto the hwy to Deland. From there, I can catch a Votran #31 that goes from Deland to the Debary Sunrail terminal, but that bus only runs at peak hours. Meaning it stops running before 5AM, and doesn't pick up again until after 3PM. You can't get to Deland on the #60 as early as 5AM, and if you were to connect w/ it at 3PM and go to Orlando, you would have to stay overnight and catch an early morning Sunrail train back to Debary and hopefully catch the #31 in the afternoon back to Deland in the slim chance of getting back to Daytona on the #60, and by then you have probably missed your last bus from the downtown Daytona terminal and would have to cab home!

We just take a Dots Shuttle from Daytona to Orlando. It's more money, but they leave at all hours of the day and night, and for a small fee will pick you up and drop you off at your home's front door. Sunrail......pfffft.

ive read your county was supposed to get another station, but your current one is a ghost town. Are the any plans to build anything near Debary at all?

[PDF]

Originally Posted by idr591

The Winter Park station is very nice. Right off Park Avenue.

Yup absolutely. It couldn't be in a better area. And an easy walk to Winter Park Village where Trader Joe's and Shake Shack is.

[kyle19125]

Originally Posted by smarino

I wish it did some good here in Daytona. Sunrail looks very promising, but we were totally left out of the loop. To get to Sunrail from here, you have to take a bus to the downtown Votran terminal, then board a #60 bus to Deland. That bus takes about an hour, plus your initial bus ride to get to the downtown bus terminal. From the #60, you get to go to the prison!!!, then back onto the hwy to Deland. From there, I can catch a Votran #31 that goes from Deland to the Debary Sunrail terminal, but that bus only runs at peak hours. Meaning it stops running before 5AM, and doesn't pick up again until after 3PM. You can't get to Deland on the #60 as early as 5AM, and if you were to connect w/ it at 3PM and go to Orlando, you would have to stay overnight and catch an early morning Sunrail train back to Debary and hopefully catch the #31 in the afternoon back to Deland in the slim chance of getting back to Daytona on the #60, and by then you have probably missed your last bus from the downtown Daytona terminal and would have to cab home!

We just take a Dots Shuttle from Daytona to Orlando. It's more money, but they leave at all hours of the day and night, and for a small fee will pick you up and drop you off at your home's front door. Sunrail......pfffft.

Originally Posted by BlackPeach2

ive read your county was supposed to get another station, but your current one is a ghost town. Are the any plans to build anything near Debary at all?

For someone who has pretty much appointed themselves an expert on SunRail this cracks me up beyond words. The northern terminus is in fact in Debary and of all the stations is about the busiest in terms of park-ride from my understanding, with a significant number of parked cars there. It's hardly a ghost-town.

[PDF]

Yeah even I know the route ends in DeBary and I've only looked at the map a few times.

[jambo101]

I'd like to hear the itinerary of a Sunrail user who lives some distance from their nearest station and works some distance from the Sunrail station at the other end of their commute. Do you take buses as part of your daily commute, rely on others to deliver you to the station and yet others to give you a lift to work from the station?
What time if any is saved by using Sunrail as opposed to just jumping in your car and driving to work?

[kyle19125]

Originally Posted by jambo101

I'd like to hear the itinerary of a Sunrail user who lives some distance from their nearest station and works some distance from the Sunrail station at the other end of their commute. Do you take buses as part of your daily commute, rely on others to deliver you to the station and yet others to give you a lift to work from the station? What time if any is saved by using Sunrail as opposed to just jumping in your car and driving to work?

It's probably going to be difficult to find one of the 3600 per day who utilize it for that kind of a commute, unless it's one of the few cheerleaders who are going to have nothing but great/hopeful things to say about it.....and zero legitimate chance the process is saving them any time in the scenario you've outlined.

[Bellamouse]

Originally Posted by jambo101

I'd like to hear the itinerary of a Sunrail user who lives some distance from their nearest station and works some distance from the Sunrail station at the other end of their commute. Do you take buses as part of your daily commute, rely on others to deliver you to the station and yet others to give you a lift to work from the station?
What time if any is saved by using Sunrail as opposed to just jumping in your car and driving to work?

My DH works with two such people. As for exact timing, I can't tell you. But they drive to the station near their home (one lives in Sanford, one in Lake Mary) and when they get to the Sand Lake Station, they drive to work. One uses a company truck to get back and forth to the office (he leaves it there over night), the other has a cheap car he leaves at the station just to get himself to and from the station to work.

If my DH decided to use Sunrail to get to work, he would have to get up 1/2 hour earlier. Right now with driving to work, he gets up around 6:10, leaves the house at 6:40 and gets to work at 7:15 am, going down the I4. Since it's early, he says there isn't much traffic at that time. So it's not bad.

If he took Sunrail, the train leaves our station at 6:19 and gets into Sand Lake station at 7:03 and he could hitch a ride with the guy who takes the company truck to the office. He would get in to work around 7:20 or so.

So right now, driving is still faster/easier. If the I4 traffic ever gets really unbearable, he is considering switching to the Sunrail.

The Sunrail is very slow compared to the trains we had back home in Chicago.

I took it again the other day so we could meet some friends for dinner in Downtown Disney. I took the 4:19 train (so I left the house a little before 4 pm), it got into Sand Lake at 5:03, my DH picked me up and it took forever to drive from the Sand Lake station to DTD (traffic was bad). By the time we parked and walked over to Wolfgang Puck Express (the other side of DTD from where we parked), it was 6:15. So it took almost 2-1/2 hours to get to the restaurant from my house using the Sunrail. Not exactly fast. I could have driven it much faster in my car, even considering the traffic on the I4. Although some of the delay was the crazy congestion around DTD. Hopefully that will get better in the future when they've finished the construction.

The only good thing was not having two cars to drive home after dinner.

[MrKnight]

SunRail provides the most direct benefit for folks that work in the downtown core area as this area does not require additional transportation upon arrival, most of downtown area is extremely walkable and even for those that would rather not walk, the free Lymmo service is also available with in the downtown area.

An example of the "perfect commute" using SunRail would be something like this:

1. Commuter who lives in Lake Mary drives and parks at Lake Mary SunRail Station. (OR gets dropped off)
2. Commuter exits train at either Lynx Central or Church Street SunRail Stations in Downtown
3. Commuter walks to Downtown Office Building.. BAAM!

And vice versa for return trip.

[DavieJ89]

Originally Posted by MrKnight

SunRail provides the most direct benefit for folks that work in the downtown core area as this area does not require additional transportation upon arrival, most of downtown area is extremely walkable and even for those that would rather not walk, the free Lymmo service is also available with in the downtown area.

An example of the "perfect commute" using SunRail would be something like this:

1. Commuter who lives in Lake Mary drives and parks at Lake Mary SunRail Station. (OR gets dropped off)
2. Commuter exits train at either Lynx Central or Church Street SunRail Stations in Downtown
3. Commuter walks to Downtown Office Building.. BAAM!

And vice versa for return trip.

Here's another good scenario

1) South side resident drives from home in Southchase to the Sand Lake station, a 15 minute drive
2) Boards train and exits at Church Street
3) Walks to Graffiti Junktion for lunch...BAM

And the trip took 30 minutes...an equal amount of time which would have been spent burning gas driving up Orange Avenue from Southchase, and money spent on parking is spent on Sunrail tickets instead

[WithDisp]

Originally Posted by DavieJ89

Here's another good scenario

1) South side resident drives from home in Southchase to the Sand Lake station, a 15 minute drive
2) Boards train and exits at Church Street
3) Walks to Graffiti Junktion for lunch...BAM

And the trip took 30 minutes...an equal amount of time which would have been spent burning gas driving up Orange Avenue from Southchase, and money spent on parking is spent on Sunrail tickets instead

There's a Graffiti Junktion on Narcoossee, less than a 10 minute drive from Southchase.
Parking is free at the Thornton Park Graffiti Junktion.

The other downside of that scenario is that the rider MUST make it to the train by 11:15, as the next train does not leave until 1:45PM, perhaps a bit past lunch time. Their return MUST be by 1:21, or they are stuck another 2 and a half hours before the next train.

I'm sorry, but your scenario is a good reminder why SunRail is not at all intended for casual usage. It is merely a commuter rail.