Our Observation

Commuter rail will make the same amount of noise and shake the ground just as well whether it stops in Central Park or passes it by. The City Commission just needs to decide whether it wants to pay the ticket price. In the meantime, let's not blame some commissioners for checking their pocketbooks and striving for a better deal.

In the face of some impassioned opposition, Commissioner Beth Dillaha has been cast in the role of comptroller for the city's rail spending, acting as an almost singular voice against the city throwing itself onto the SunRail tracks without asking for a better deal.

Blanket assumptions have transcended reason in lieu of favor curried with impassioned words. In the minds of some, "We need to seriously consider renegotiating" looks like "I want to kill commuter rail," and they'll keep repeating it until they believe it's true.

But commuter rail will not die. It's an idea whose time has come and in many ways, passed us by for more than a century, as we've rushed to embrace emerging technologies that have kept us apart.

In the late 1940s, America invented the expanse of novel suburbia that would redefine how we lived and traveled. Cars got us out of the city. Like a trapped dog in a tiny Brooklyn apartment who's then let out into the country, given free range, we ran, heading south and west, and we just kept running.

Where we found space, we expanded far and wide. Levittown in New York taught us a new way of living, with acres of identical homes exploding into the distance. And within sight there was nothing else to be found. No offices. No factories. No train stations. We could spread all those out because we could afford to drive between.

But half a century later we're rapidly realizing our folly. We built permanent lifestyles based on an impermanent resource. In a little more than 10 years, from 1995 to 2005, gasoline prices shot up nearly 400 percent. Don't let the recent lull in prices fool you: Gasoline is going to get very expensive. So will cars.

For some, cars already are too expensive. Truck-based SUVs that dominated the market in the early 2000s have all but disappeared from the showroom floor, as consumers demand more fuel efficient vehicles. Hybrid vehicles have in the last decade gone from eccentric eco-fashion to mass acceptance. We want cheaper transportation, and we want it now. Commuter trains could be just the ticket.

But the irony of Winter Park's conundrum is the price itself. Last year, amid cries to negotiate a better deal, the Florida Legislature inked SunRail as the most expensive rail system per mile in the history of the country. Many in Winter Park continued to cheer, though there were fewer voices in the chorus.

Now Winter Park is asking Orange County to make it cheaper for the city to enter into a combined commuter rail funding agreement so that the city isn't double taxed in a few ways.

Some are saying that we don't need to renegotiate anything. "The people have already spoken on commuter rail," former Commissioner Karen Diebel said.

But with so much money on the line, a little extra haggling couldn't hurt. Just because the people said they want to ride the train doesn't mean they want to write a blank check for the ticket.