The FEC's architects have narrowed down their search for 'All Aboard Florida' station locations to a few possibilities and put together very preliminary schematic massing studies for each of them. Miami's station will be outside Government Center and the Metrorail - no big shocker - but that station could come in either one of two flavors, and there are two options each for Downtown Fort Lauderdale and West Palm Beach's stations. All are extremely centrally located within their respective urban cores, but Miami's downtown station indubitably has the most wiz-bang awesomeness.
The first Miami option, with at-grade level trackage, puts the station entrance at the southern edge of the site, where it would be the most centrally located to Flagler Street, the courthouse, and the rest of the heart of downtown. It would also open out to a pretty, but currently very underused, public plaza, with skyscrapers directly on top of the station. The second option places the station about three blocks farther north, behind the new Federal courthouse, and elevates the tracks and platforms above cross streets and the Peoplemover, with an entrance facing the courthouse. That option sets aside the entire lower three blocks to development (skyscrapers).
The FEC's lead architect for the project is the New York office of international mega-firm Skidmore, Owings, & Merrill, which just completed a proposal for an absolutely insane project around Manhattan's Grand Central Terminal. It includes two giant towers connected by a 'halo' skywalk/bridge/elevator thing over the station, and deep underground chasms and concourses. But since that's not actually getting built, SOM's assigned the same team of designers (who's imaginations must be freshly fired up) to do the All Aboard Florida stations. Hey, maybe Miami's will get its own halo, or at least a train station 40+ feet in the sky.
· All Aboard Florida coverage [Curbed Miami]
· FEC Downtown Miami Station [exMiami]
· A Pedestrian Halo For The Grand Central Of The Future [Curbed NY]
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