Amtrak Miami services through time

Amtrak Miami services have been dominated by trains from New York City. This included, at various times, the Silver Meteor, Silver Palm, and Silver Star. Additionally, at times, the Magic City has been served by its own section of the Floridian from Chicago and an extension of the Sunset Limited.

Amtrak’s current Miami station is located at 8303 NW 37th Ave. in the Hialeah neighborhood northwest of downtown. It replaced a former Seaboard Air Line station located in the Allapattah neighborhood closer to downtown. The new station opened in 1978 at a cost of $5.7 million and is built to a standard design shared with the former Midway Station serving Minneapolis-St. Paul. The station sits inside a balloon loop track for turning equipment, giving visitors a concrete example that this is Amtrak’s southernmost outpost.

Silver Meteor and Silver Star

The Silver Meteor and Silver Star were the two primary Amtrak Miami services at startup on May 1, 1971. The Meteorran directly from New York City to Miami. The Star split in two sections at Auburndale, south of Orlando, with separate sections serving both Miami and St. Petersburg, located on a peninsula west of Tampa. The Silver service names can be traced to the Seaboard Air Line railroad.

Florida Special

Seaboard Coast Line operated a seasonal, winter-only service between the Northeast and Florida. Amtrak continued this tradition for its first four winters, operating the New York City to Miami Florida Special. At the time, in the early 1970s, Amtrak was flush with equipment and facilities and such an operation was much easier to accomplish.

Floridian

Amtrak inherited the joint Seaboard Coast Line-Louisville & Nashville-Penn Central South Wind upon startup in May 1971. With its first new timetable in November 1971, Amtrak changed the schedule to a one-day, two-night operation and renamed the train the Floridian. Traditionally a Tampa train as the South Wind, the Floridian saw the operation of a Miami section until the train’s discontinuance in October 1979.

Silver Palm

Amtrak introduced the intrastate Silver Palm in November 1982 with state funding. It operated northbound from Miami in the morning, terminating midday in Tampa. The southbound schedule departed early in the evening, returning to Miami in the late evening. It was discontinued on April 30, 1984.

The Silver Palm gets a second look, however. In 1996, Amtrak expanded the role of the Palmetto to reach Miami and better serve intrastate Florida travelers renaming it the Silver Palm. Its expansion brought a new routing: the former SAL route via Ocala south of Jacksonville. At Auburndale (and later Lakeland) it would turn west to serve Tampa before retracing its route and turning south at Auburndale for Miami. In 2002, the train lost its sleeping car and diner and was renamed the Palmetto. In November 2004 it was cut back to a New York to Savannah, Ga., service.

Sunset Limited

Yes, this traditional Southern Pacific service entered Miami, albeit briefly. Amtrak extended the Los Angeles to New Orleans train to Miami with much fanfare in April 1993. This added a number of cities, including Florida’s capital Tallahassee, in the Panhandle to the Amtrak network. However, Amtrak truncated the Sunset at Sanford, north of Orlando, in November 1996 to consolidate maintenance of the Superliner equipment with the Auto Train fleet there. It was further cut back to New Orleans again in 2005 following Hurricane Katrina.

Amtrak Miami services today

In the 21st century, Amtrak Miami services include the Silver Meteor and Silver Star, both operating from New York City. The Meteor offers direct service while the Star makes a detour to serve Tampa as it has for decades. Both trains arrive southbound in the afternoon and depart northbound in the morning.