The high-speed rail system, which is being rebranded as Virgin Trains USA, is adding a new northbound train from Miami at 5:15 p.m. beginning Jan. 1. Northbound trains from Miami will now depart on the 50th minute of the hour. There will be hourly departures from West Palm Beach and Miami, except between noon and 1 p.m. There will also be hourly weekday departures from Fort Lauderdale except between 12:20 p.m. and 2:15 p.m.Southbound trains from West Palm Beach will now leave on the 10th and 40th minute of the hour. Weekend trains will now depart hourly beginning at 7 a.m.Brightline is also adding a late-night train on Saturdays from West Palm Beach and Miami.

BOCA RATON, Fla. – Virgin Trains USA is pulling into Boca Raton. The City Council late Tuesday unanimously approved a proposal to allow for construction of a Brightline train station downtown. Brightline, which is being rebranded as Virgin Trains USA, wants to begin construction early next year. Miami-Dade County commissioners in October approved a plan for the construction of a Brightline station in Aventura. Brightline will pay to replace any library parking spaces lost in construction and make 64 spaces available to library patrons.

The first death involving a Brightline train, which officially launched in January 2018, happened in July 2017 during test runs. That’s the worst per-mile death rate of the nation’s 821 railroads. A full-speed Brightline train takes a quarter-mile to stop. The railroad shares tracks with Florida East Coast, a freight line that had one death for every 160,000 miles (258,000 kilometers) during the past two years, compared to Brightline’s one death per 29,000 miles (47,000 kilometers). The Tri-Rail commuter service that runs nearby had one death about every 110,000 miles (177,000 kilometers).