MIAMI BEACH, Fla. – The latest attempt to implement a water taxi connecting downtown Miami and South Beach appears to have sunk in short order.
On Wednesday, Miami Beach commissioners are set to vote on a consent agenda item to end the city’s agreement with Poseidon Ferry, which re-launched on June 30, charging Miami Beach residents $5 and non-residents $12 each way to cross Biscayne Bay between Maurice Gibb Memorial Park and the Venetian Marina & Yacht Club.
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Miami Beach City Manager Eric Carpenter, in a memorandum to commissioners, cited constant service interruptions; service had been interrupted since Aug. 20 because of mechanical concerns with Poseidon’s vessel.
According to the document, when the ferry was operational, ridership was paltry: From June through July, the service averaged roughly 60 passengers per day. By August, on the days the ferry was running, ridership had dwindled to an average of just 15 per day.
The company’s previous attempt at a South Beach-to-Miami route was shuttered in 2022, also due to low ridership.
Miami Beach officials had hoped the program would help relieve traffic on the MacArthur Causeway, which sees an annual average daily traffic count of 78,000, according to the Florida Department of Transportation.
The city was contracted to pay $50,000 per month under the one-year, $600,000 agreement. The city is citing a section of the agreement considering any failure to operate the service for more than two days to be a default.
“(T)he water taxi service has experienced multiple operational issues, including persistent air conditioning breakdowns, as well as customer service complaints with the cleanliness and appearance of the vessel, among others, all of which have been brought to Poseidon’s attention by City staff on multiple occasions since the onset of the service,” the memo states.
Owing to those numerous service interruptions, taxpayers ended up paying Poseidon a pro-rated sum of just under $66,000, according to numbers shared by a city spokesperson.
In an interview with Local 10 News on Tuesday, Miami Beach Mayor Steven Meiner said he was “not a fan” of the latest Poseidon plan from the start.
“It’s disappointing to see how it didn’t operate in the way that was represented to us,” he said. “I guess we had the foresight to make it a pilot program to terminate it quickly, as we’re doing.”
Meiner said he’s still all-in on the concept of a water taxi, however. His vision is instead that of a free service, not only connecting South Beach to downtown, but connecting points along the bay within Miami Beach.
Meiner said the city is preparing applications for federal funding for a water taxi service that meets that ideal.
Regarding Poseidon, he said, “It’s a private enterprise. There’s a fare that’s not that cheap and just, in my opinion, people are not going to utilize something that they’re going to have to spend some money on, when they can take an Uber that’s probably similar pricing.”
Meiner said the second failure of the Poseidon water taxi “does concern me” when it comes to public perception of the viability of future water taxi service in Miami Beach.
But, he said, “Part of the application for funding is to prove the need for ridership and I don’t think this is reflective of that. Also with the location where (Poseidon) was, was not optimal.”
Regarding his vision for a water taxi, he said, “I firmly believe that it would be a game-changer.”
Local 10 News contacted Poseidon via email Tuesday seeking comment and had not heard back as of the publication of this article.
Despite rapid transit referendum, city backing for Metromover remains doubtful
As the second attempt at a water taxi appears to have fallen far short of expectations, Miami Beach commissioners have opposed another prominent proposal aimed at alleviating traffic: Miami-Dade’s plans to expand the Metromover automated train over the MacArthur Causeway to South Beach as part of its Baylink corridor.
In the August primary, Miami Beach voters, including those living in the area around Fifth Street, where the train would run, joined other parts of Miami-Dade in voting overwhelmingly in favor of a straw poll asking voters whether they supported expanding Metrorail and Metromover service in the county.
While the non-binding referendum did not mention the Baylink or any other specific projects, advocacy group Better Streets Miami Beach hailed the vote as evidence that the commission’s view wasn’t reflective of residents at large.
“The overwhelming support should serve as a wakeup call to elected officials at City Hall,” it proclaimed following the vote. “The main opposition (to Baylink) came from board members of neighborhood associations in the South of Fifth and West Avenue neighborhoods. Yet, residents from these neighborhoods voted 77% in favor (of the ballot measure).”
Meiner, when asked whether that support would translate into the commission changing its mind on the Baylink, told Local 10 News, “I doubt it.”
He told Local 10 News that “it’s hard to read into” the vote, owing to the lack of specificity in the measure.
“Of course, it gets down to the details,” he said.
He added that commissioners still have concerns over whether the county’s Rapid Transit Zone would pre-empt the city’s ability to regulate density on the island, allowing the county to add more density than citizens desire, and said that commissioners are also concerned that the Metromover uses “outdated” technology.
Meiner, additionally, said in-person meetings, particularly in the South of Fifth neighborhood, showed vocal opposition to the plan. But he said he and city commissioners are willing to discuss transportation alternatives into Miami Beach with county officials.
“We’re interested in something,” Meiner said. “We’re ready to be at the table.”
Miami-Dade County does not require city officials’ approval to construct the Metromover extension and in August, Miami-Dade Commissioner Eileen Higgins told Local 10 News that the county was moving ahead with the Baylink project, which was “in process to finish the engineering.”
Higgins spoke with Local 10 News on Tuesday, saying the county continues to move ahead, working with the Florida Department of Transportation to bring the train to the beach, and that the results at the ballot box “absolutely” reflect support for Metromover expansion to South Beach.
“People in these neighborhoods were not tricked that this is not some other thing we’re talking about,” she said. “It was pretty clear: they want rapid transit on the beach.”
Miami Beach commissioners, she said, are “spending a lot of time trying to avoid the solutions that we know work, which would be an expansion of Metromover to the beach.”
“We (county commissioners) are not going to be the commission that leaves our residents trapped and stranded in traffic forever,” Higgins said.
Higgins said concerns over zoning are a “red herring” and said only one property on South Beach, a county-owned health center, qualifies for the Rapid Transit Zone.
Meiner said he and other officials are serious about the city’s traffic problem and said public transportation is “vital.”
In the meantime, he said the city has employed traffic control specialists and worked with the FDOT to implement real-time traffic monitoring.
Water taxi memorandum: