MVB True Believers Club: Things that give us hope...

despite living here:

The electric car. CBS' Sunday Morning show had this exciting and hope inducing story on next generation electric cars. GM's Volt looks so promising and we wish them and the entire American auto industry luck.

Because the Republic of Singapore experiences one of the worst traffic congestion problems in the world, it has come up with an enviable solution that portends what other governments may find themselves doing in the near future to reduce the number of cars on the road:

• Anyone who wants to buy a car must bid for a "Certificate of Entitlement" (COE). Bid prices vary depending upon the number of units available for bidding and the size of the car. Unless someone can show proof of owning a COE, that person cannot buy a car. The COE is valid for ten years and the bidder pays the lowest successful price for that category. COEs are not transferable. COEs can be re-evaluated after ten years for an extension of another five or ten years. However, if one bids and wins an extension, no further extensions will be entertained, i.e., after the extension, the COE no longer becomes renewable. You can bid for a COE via an ATM, phone banking or online banking facilities at participating bank and new car dealerships. The money raised by selling COEs helps fund public transportation-- from building new mass transit lines to maintaining and improving infrastructure. There are three car sizes.

• Category A: Cars up to 1600 cc.
• Category B: Cars above 1600cc.
• Category C: Used cars.

COEs are further broken down into:

• Regular (365 days)
• Weekend

Price then for a COE is determined by the size of the car, the number of units available, market demand, and length of use. But this creative funding model for public transportation doesn't stop there. Singapore also imposes an ANNUAL ROAD TAX on every car based on the size of its engine:

• 600cc = $400.00
• 601-1000cc = $400.00 + 0.25 cents for every cc above 600 up to 1000.
• 1001-1600cc = $500.00 + 0.75 cents for every cc above 1001 up to 1600.
• 1601-3000cc = $950.00 + $1.50 for every cc above 1601 up to 3000.
• Over 3000cc = $3050.00 + $2.00 for every cc above 3000. As an example, if you own a big monster with 6000cc (366 cubic inches), you pay $3,050.00 PLUS $2.00/cc above 3000 which is an extra $6,000.00 or $9,050.00 PER YEAR. The fabled American muscle car 427 engine (7,000cc) would set you back an extra $11,050.00 PER YEAR.

We like the idea of taxing drivers to pay for mass transit. Using a graduated scale based on engine size and the amount of use seems fair and appears to be viable proven way to wean Americans off the car while raising money for mass transit. Now if we could only come up with a way of taxing rude drivers. Since we live in a community recognized as having the rudest drivers in the U.S., its incomprehensible how much money could be raised for local mass transit projects such as the... Baylink monorail.

UpDate (9/19): According to today's Miami Herald, south Florida drivers spend over a work week (50 hours) each year idling in rush hour traffice, costing the local economy $2.7 billion in lost worker time, etc, or $903 per driver in Miami-Dade, Broward, and Palm Beach counties.

MVB's BayLink Monorail Solution: It's half the cost we thought it would be!

The Internet is a wondrous place for ideas. Like-thinking individuals or groups can easily find each other because of key words. "Monorail" brought a retired engineer with over 40-years of building monorails in the Far East to MVB. He likes our concept of connecting Miami to Miami Beach with a monorail that runs at grade along the MacArthur Causeway and then along the sand of Miami Beach. He likes it so much that he took time to give our conceptual solution real world numbers. And we're glad he did. For one, our estimate to build a monorail BayLink connection is about $10 million less per mile than we thought it would be. This is what he came up with:

• It's 8.6 miles long,
• The Miami run is a 4.4 mile one-way single beam rising from and returning to the Watson Island station (for system costing it is considered equivalent to 2.2 miles of dual-beam two-way run),
• The MacArthur Causeway at-grade run is 3.1 miles long,
• The Miami Beach run is a two-way dual beam 3.3 miles long.


• Estimated cost: $370 million.
• As structured under the original BayLink plan, the Feds pick up half the cost ($185 million)
• State picks up ¼: $92.5 million
• County picks up ¼: $92.5 million
• Cost per mile per county share: $10.8 million.
• Construction time: 30-36 months with an additional 6-months for testing.

Our consultant wants it known that "the proposal has given thought on how to mitigate the impact of construction on existing road traffic. It is suggested that serious consideration be given during the design stage to evaluate the feasibility of using single large bored pile foundation and column as a contiguous structure. The columns could be clad externally to better embrace some art form that befits the local ambiance."

The 3.1 mile MacArthur Causeway run and the 3.3 mile long north-south run along the sands of Miami Beach takes advantage of a unique set of conditions found only here. Instead of disrupting the lives of hundreds of thousands of people over many years while tearing up miles and miles of streets to lay trolley car tracks and to realign underground utilities, 80% of our solution runs where none of the aforementioned problems exist: on the south side of the MacArthur and over beach sand. Unlike the current default BayLink plan, archaic, lane-hogging, slow-moving trolley cars with their ugly overhead power lines will not be forced onto narrow streets with stations every few blocks. Our approach is to get people from one side of Biscayne Bay to the other as quickly as possible with a minimum of stops. Of course, besides stops at Lincoln Road/Beach and the Convention Center/Live Nation Theater, our monorail stops at Carnival Center, American Airlines Arena, Museum Park and, although it doesn't currently exist, the "Grand Central Station of the American Pastime." Our design makes it possible to take a commuter train on the FEC tracks all the way from Palm Beach to the Miami Beach Convention Center with only one transfer.

Although it isn't cheap, we are suggesting sharing the costs to build and maintain it through a joint venture between public and private enterprise. We are also advocating directing the $200 million allocated for building a downtown Miami streetcar towards the BayLink monorail.

All it takes is a little vision on the part of the people and their elected officials. MVB from the get-go has seen itself as a gadfly (or roach) regarding our community. Not content just to post ideas, we are pro-active in trying to get others to see things our way. Most elected officials have been contacted and, believe it or not, we may have actually convinced at least one Miami Beach commission candidate to see it our way. Only time will tell.

Until then, remember the MVB rallying cry: Free our streets! Grab the Vision and lets Monorail!

Take the MVB BayLink monorail between Miami and Miami Beach solution poll!

Found this on the Net and haven't a clue what it's all about because it's been disconnected from its original series of posts? Click here for info and then please come back and vote.

Budget Boy: A BayLink monorail could be had for $20 million-a-mile (Give or take a million)

According to Miami-Dade County's Budget Boy, estimated costs for building a monorail link between Miami and Miami Beach is $20 million-per-mile. Now some might question this figure considering Budget Boy works for a government famous for cost overruns ranging from the half billion dollar Carnival Center for the Performing Arts to MIA, but at least his estimation won't cost taxpayers a multi-million dollar consultancy fee since it's free-- try to get your money back from a consultant who under estimated costs-- which they invariably do-- and this begins to look like a pretty good deal. According to Budget Boy, his numbers are the result of factoring in:

• The fact that 95% of the BayLink monorail is built on utility-free space. Relocation of buried sewer, water, gas, and electric lines are not a factor-- where most traditional construction costs are accrued. The MVB BayLink plan calls for attaching the monorail to the bridge from Miami to Watson Island and then running it at grade (no need for elevated concrete runways) along MacArthur Causeway to the Beach. The run becomes elevated at Terminal Island. When it meets the beach, it makes a hard left and runs north and south on the sand all the way to 17th or 19th Street with its northern terminus at the Convention Center with stops at "5th West," "5th East/Beach." "Lincoln Road/Beach," and, of course, the Convention Center and the Live Nation Theatre.
• The Miami run will be the most expensive since it will be built on land with existing utilities-- but it affords connections to Carnival Center, the Miami Megaplex ("The Grand Central Station of the American Pastime" with MetroRail and FEC commuter rail connections), American Airlines Arena, and the Museum Park MetroMover station.

With these kind of figures, the $200 million the City of Miami wants to throw at an antiquated trolley line could pay for ten miles of track!

Miami Beach: AKA Nimbyville

Now that 30 Miami Beach civic organizations have banded together into a unified force, it appears that any futuristic vision of connecting Miami to Miami Beach with a Disney-style monorail will only occur with the ingestion of large amounts of hallucinogens. Some may say that MVB's plan was conceived on them anyway but after reading The SunPost's story about their efforts to come together to affect "the most important (election) in recent Miami Beach history (which will) determine what the city looks like for the next 25 years," it looks entirely hopeless as "the 30" gangup against change.

Why, you may ask?

1. Because most Beach activists can't see beyond the monorail's concrete which they equate with "development." They can't see that it negates tearing up 95% of the streets because most of it runs on beach sand. Or that it will remove cars from the roads including all light rail and trolley car concepts which share and congest traffic lanes by their mere presence. If you would like to see our solution, please click here, here, and here.
2. It has been determined that a Miami Beach election can be won on as little as a thousand votes. The new Beach 500, a political action committee, has been formed to get 1,000 people to sign an oath promising to vote only for the committee's chosen few.
3. Visionaries with a sense of the future aren't running. The ones that are running are already towing the line when it comes to "development," treating it as a pejorative when in reality it's just another word for "change" which can be good or bad and is, in fact, inevitable.
4. The current antiquated "default" BayLink solution is a result of a second vote forced onto Miami Beach residents. When Miami Beach Mayor David Dermer didn't like the outcome of the first county-wide vote in 2002 where its citizens voted to tax themselves a half-cent on sales for mass transit projects including some form of Baylink, he led the commission in calling for another vote on the subject. The fear of living through years and years of torn up streets seemed in the end only to be his fear because again, Miami Beach said bring it on. Only this time, BayLink has been diluted of its visionary grandeur and, in fact, is everything Dermer dreamed it would be: a fixed-rail trolley car system with overhead electrical wires that will require streets to be torn up for years and years to come.

How sad. What could have been a project that was inspiring, aesthetically pleasing, and removed the main objection of the inconvenience of its construction, will now be replaced with ugly high maintenance catenary lines feeding power to light rail trolley cars that will contribute to traffic congestion instead of solving it.

MVB Big Idea Award Goes To Jorge Gonzalez & Richard Steinberg!

Click the button for Enzyte theme music.

We believe in the power of the "Ether-Net," getting ideas "out there" through the Internet. MVB is basically built around that concept of actively using the Internet as an electronic gadfly to lobby ideas and opinions. Positive feedback on these efforts happen when we see MLB insisting on a downtown Miami baseball stadium (hopefully our chosen site) and now through a little tidbit found deep inside today's Miami Herald's Business Monday section. Miami Beach City Manager Jorge Gonzalez suggested to a meeting of the Miami Beach Chamber of Commerce that the city put the $55 million set aside by a county bond fund to refurbish the Convention Center toward subsidizing building a new hotel instead. This "Big Idea" was "ridiculed by tourism trade groups backing the renovations." The next day at a City Hall meeting, Commissioner Richard Steinberg backed Gonzalez up and "warned against dismissing it so quickly."

The article reminds us that the Loews and Royal Palm hotels were built on public oceanfront and with government loans. So the idea isn't that revolutionary, but it does remind us of our own Big Idea-- getting Disney to build a hotel or hotels on the beach and the mainland in exchange for public land, a port on Watson Island for their cruise ships, and a Disney partnered BayLink. Disney is currently looking to build "stand alone" hotels. With the right inducements from a handful of visionaries (and $55 million isn't something to sneeze at), perhaps someday we'll see Disney hotels anchoring both ends of a Disney BayLink. The Mouse gets what it wants and the people of Dade County get what they need. Of course the biggest hurdle here is getting enough elected officials from the Beach to embrace the Disney BayLink to make it reality, but every big idea has to start somewhere.

For those wondering about Bob Enzyte, MVB's official award giver, please note that Bob officiated at the ceremony at Churchill's Pub in Little Haiti in a black Speedo, socks, and shoes. At first we were leery about letting him attend the ceremony like that until he explained it was a symbolic gesture toward honoring "those Beachites." Yes, it wasn't the prettiest thing to see and, yes, he silenced all background chatter at Churchill's when he rose to speak at the dais, but it sure beats the alternative and more jail time.

MVB's Grand Central Station of the American Pastime Meets Cirque du Soleil

Maybe we should cut back on the mojitos, but we're beginning to think MVB may be having some influence on shaping Miami's future. From the beginning we saw MVB as a digital gadfly/cockroach of ideas and criticism of the local scene. In that regard, we made sure our ideas were made known to those involved with the topic. Now, for the first time, we learn in Miami Today that Glenn Straub, owner of the Miami Arena, is interested in speaking to Cirque du Soleil about making his arena a permanent home for Cirque. Although he admits Cirque has not contacted him, we made sure he and Cirque knew about our vision for the Miami Arena through numerous emails with links to our posts. The same goes for MLB and the Florida Marlins. We are excited about the Marlins insisting on a downtown site. Although their first choice is very close to our site which we lobbied for since 2003, perhaps this is the time for the city and the county to step in and bring all the parties together to choose a central, unified site that connects the Miami Arena and a downtown baseball stadium with existing commuter rail (FEC tracks, MetroRail) and a future BayLink (monorail). We call it the "Grand Central Station of the American Pastime." We think it is the best idea of any of them that have been thrown out there because it is built over existing mass transit. This fact alone will supply the downtown baseball stadium and Cirque with a lifeline of fans who will be more than happy to give up their cars to get downtown to see a game or the latest Cirque show. Fans from as far away as Palm Beach will be able to hop a commuter train and travel to a game without ever fighting traffic or searching for parking. Best yet, they'll never have to pay an exorbitant parking fee again. If it's raining, they'll never know it because they'll get on and off the train inside the enclosed atrium connecting the stadium to the arena. BayLink will offer the same hassle free trip to the ballpark for the thousands of fans living on Miami Beach. All it will take is a little vision on behalf of everybody. Perhaps Miami's Mayor Manny Diaz or County Mayor Carlos Alverez would like to step up to the plate and make this happen. Oh, yeah, you can rest assured that we have forwarded this posting to them.

Become an MVB FACILITATOR! For those who also think this is the best solution for the survival of a downtown stadium and an arena based attraction, feel free to let our government officials know by emailing your thoughts to them through our handy-dandy email contact list found on the right side of our home page.

UpDate (4/27/07): The Miami Herald reports that the plan to help build a downtown Miami baseball stadium which was passed in the House won't be heard in the Senate, basically killing any chance to see a $60 million tax subsidy spread over 30 years. Instead the Senate is considering a watered down allocation to be split between three professional teams netting the Marlins a one time payment of $32.6 million.

The MVB Miami Megaplex Manifesto: Build It Here and They Will Come

The Miami Megaplex is seen as a practical, cost saving solution to building a baseball stadium in downtown Miami. By engaging the Miami Arena and bringing in a hotel, it spreads the enormous cost of building such a structure. Instead of giving away valuable public land which is in short supply, this plan needs only street closures. Success is ensured because of the symbiotic relationship between the five major players (including government and the FEC railroad): the stadium and the Arena can be used for everything from baseball games to tractor pulls and concerts. The hotel can book rooms and conventions based on the unique location and ability to tap as much convention space as needed by using the Arena and the stadium. Since it is built over a major transportation nexus, attendance will rise and rooms will be booked because everything is easy to get to-- no more fighting traffic-- and inexpensive-- no exorbitant parking fees . Finally, the Miami Megaplex will someday help us land the Summer Olympics, where access to gymnastics, basketball, baseball, surfing, and boating events off of Bicentennial and Bayfront Parks are all within walking distance. Can’t you just see a parade of nations marching along Biscayne Boulevard into the Miami Megaplex for the opening and closing ceremonies? The boys at MVB sure can.

If you are as fired up as we are with our idea, please let your elected representatives know. We like to think of the Miami Megaplex as "the Grand Central Station of the American Pastime." Right now, it sure beats out the county commission's latest idea which is building the stadium at the Orange Bowl. Besides being in a dreary, boring part of town, the location has no access to mass transit.

For a more detailed examination of our proposal-- which includes Disney's involvement and some really cool roofed stadium renderings-- click here.

Please note, regarding the "commuter train." It's not here yet. The tracks are and negotiations are underway to lease them from the FEC railway. As for BayLink, it's a pipe dream being held hostage by obstinate nimbys and visionless elected Miami Beach officials. We believe BayLink will save Carnival Center if a station is built across the street from the opera house. We also believe it will save the planned art and science museums in Bicentennial Park. And, it will even save Miami Beach from itself-- traffic gridlock and a poorer quality of life by getting cars off the street (we advocate building the north-south run on the sands of Miami Beach). It will really save everyone if it's the people-friendly, proven Disney-style monorail most people can't wait to ride. Disney has licensed that design to Bombardier. They built one in Las Vegas to connect the major casino/hotels. With a little vision, they could build one here too.

First MVB posting re this idea (8/24/06), MLB's first choice for a downtown stadium looks a lot like ours (9/15/06).

Hey, Mickey! Miami has a deal for you!

Disney announced yesterday that it is considering creating smaller theme parks and stand-alone hotels, retail, dining and entertainment centers. Well, does MVB have a deal for you! In exchange for sharing the cost of building, running, and maintaining a Disney-style monorail connecting Miami with Miami Beach, the county will be happy to lease you public land in both cities to build two hotels, one at both ends of the run.

Plus, the Miami site will allow you exclusive rights to dock your cruise ships. With Miami becoming a port of call, you will be able to offer your passengers a day on trendy SoBe and a night at the opera, the ballet, or a symphony at our new half-billion-dollar performing arts center-- with an ease of transit between everything just like it is at Disney World.

Your proven monorail system will run at grade along MacArthur Causeway saving millions of dollars in construction costs. Rising on both ends, it will run along 5th Street and head north along the beach. On the Miami side, it will loop around the new Carnival Center for the Performing Arts and connect to MetroRail and the MetroMover.

Who knows, by then we may even have a downtown baseball stadium where Disney guests from the hotels or the cruise ship can opt to take in a baseball game-- as well as catch a Miami Heat game or a concert at the American Airlines Arena. Miami is the only city serving cruise ship passengers that can offer these many choices.

So, little mouse dude, is this a great idea or what?

Nix The Trolley and Put The 200 Mill into BayLink

What's wrong with this picture? As far as MVB is concerned, nothing. Recent talk about building a $200 million trolley car system in Miami is getting some mixed reactions from Miami commissioners-- and well it should. We're against the trolley car for a host of reasons which can be found here. We're for a Disney-style monorail system linking Miami and the Beaches which can be found here. That $200 mill could help make a high-speed link between Miami and the Beaches a reality much sooner than later-- especially if some forward thinking visionaries could lure Disney in to co-build BayLink with the promise of land for a hotel on the beach and a port on Watson Island. Getting a Disney cruise ship-- or any cruise ship for that matter-- to make Miami a stop instead of only a point of departure will benefit everyone in the county-- especially when tourists and locals can get back and forth between Miami and the Beaches quickly and with little hassle.

I Want My Monorail!

Today Las Vegas Monorail launched their "Ambassador Program." Nearly 20 showgirl ambassadors were paraded before the media in classic outfits "reminiscent of old-time Vegas cocktail hostesses." They will be working around Vegas to answer questions regarding the monorail and other aspects of "Sin City."

In 2004, seven stations opened on the 4-mile long route. According to the press release, the system includes nine Disney-style trains with four cars each on a single rail line traveling up to 50 mph. The system can handle 3,200 people per hour. Since the monorail is electric, experts believe it has "reduced traffic by more than four million automobile trips and improved air quality by reducing carbon monoxide output by up to 135 tons each year."

MVB has advocated making the BayLink between Miami and Miami Beach a Bombardier/Disney-style monorail for a host of reasons which can be read here by clicking the web page on the right. Dade County probably would have had a rubber tired monorail today if it hadn't been for the fact that its consultant, Kaiser engineers, pushed steel rail in 1974. We think all of us are in agreement that MetroRail is an ugly, noisy, monstrosity compared to the sleek, futuristic Disney monorails. With MetroRail extensions planned west and north, we would hope that someone with a little vision might want to take another look at the 30+ years proven solution in Orlando-- if not for the whole building program, at least for the BayLink extension.