Brightline is considering five, not three, proposals for Treasure Coast station location

Think there wasn't enough intrigue surrounding Brightline's plans to put a passenger train station on the Treasure Coast?

Well, here's some more: The company has confirmed it received five proposals from property owners interested in hosting the station site, not just the three that have been previously reported.

The company isn't sharing details about the proposals submitted ahead of its Dec. 22 deadline. Two of them were submitted by government entities ― one a partnership between the city of Stuart and Martin County and another by the city of Fort Pierce.

A third proposal was submitted by Audubon Development, the company developing the King's Landing mixed-use project near the Fort Pierce City Marina.

Details about all three of those proposals have been widely reported by TCPalm and other media outlets.

However, I learned Tuesday there are two other proposals, presumably submitted by private property owners, that have thus far escaped media scrutiny.

In anticipation of the next several questions you might ask, I don't know.

I don't know where these sites are located. I don't know any of the relevant details about them (total acreage, railroad track frontage, parking spaces, development plans for adjacent parcels of property, etc.). And I don't know who the property owners are.

Not very helpful, I know. Assuming the two mystery sites are within Martin or St. Lucie counties, they could be located anywhere along the tracks Brightline uses between the northern Palm Beach and southern Indian River county lines.

They would need to be in Martin or St. Lucie County for Brightline to comply with a settlement agreement the company reached with Martin County and a group called Citizens Against Rail Expansion in Florida.

The agreement says Brightline will have a train station operational within five years of the company's launch of passenger service between West Palm Beach and Orlando. That service began last September, so the clock toward that deadline is ticking.

It's possible someone in Indian River County, or even some other county along the route outside of the Treasure Coast, submitted a proposal. However, if Brightline is sticking to its promises, then only sites in Martin and St. Lucie counties will be considered, because they were the only counties mentioned in the company's request for proposals.

Also, if the company is going to follow the parameters outlined in its request for proposals, eligible sites must meet certain specifications.

Brightline's request requires potential sites to be at least two acres, with the capability to accommodate at least 200 parking spaces. Potential sites must have at least 1,000 feet of frontage along the rail line, with at least 100 feet of spacing on either side from the nearest road crossings.

That does narrow the options considerably, but there are still a lot of possibilities.

For example, could a site somewhere near where the tracks go through downtown Jensen Beach be an option? At this point, I wouldn't rule that out.

Brightline's route passes through the eastern outskirts of Port St. Lucie, far from its most populated neighborhoods, but there have been people suggesting the region's largest city would be a logical place for the trains to stop.

The three proposals we know the most about are located in downtown Stuart or downtown Fort Pierce, which seem like the most likely locations. That doesn't mean there couldn't be other sites, within either of those cities.

What else?

For all I know, a cabal of Jupiter Island residents could have thrown their money behind a Hobe Sound station. Or the well-heeled residents of St. Lucie Village could do the same, although that would go against everything I think I know about that community.

Having adequate financial resources could be a limiting factor, at least if the people making the mystery proposals want to be taken seriously.

Can the proposers fund all or part of the construction costs associated with building a train station? If the answer is no, then they're already at a distinct competitive disadvantage to the other three proposals that would cover all (or, in Stuart-Martin County's case, half) of the station construction costs.

Do the two mystery sites have proper zoning? Because the proposals weren't coming from a government entity, we don't know the answer to that.

We're expecting Brightline to announce a decision about which proposal it prefers during the first quarter of this year, maybe as early as next month.

If one of the two mystery proposals isn't selected, then we may never know the details. As a private company, Brightline isn't obligated to share that information with us.

The property owners could voluntarily reveal their plans to the public, though. Since the deadline for submitting proposals has already passed, I don't see the harm in doing that.

If I was hoping people would use a train station on property I owned, I would want to make darned sure people had a chance to get used to the idea long before the station was operational.

The mystery site owners have nothing to lose, but politically much to gain, by trying to win public support for their plans.

Will they come forward, or will their proposals remain a source of endless rumors and speculation? Time will tell.

This column reflects the opinion of Blake Fontenay. Contact him via email at blake.fontenay@tcpalm.com or at 772-232-5424.

This article originally appeared on Treasure Coast Newspapers: Brightline is studying five, not three, potential TC station sites