The question is if whether or not saving ten minutes is worth the amount it would cost the company to do the required upgrades. The answer is, at least right now, not yet.
It's a brand new regional train yet barely reaches the speed of your average euro commuter train from the 60s (not joking: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SNCF_Class_Z_5300 has a top speed of 81mph).
We are also talking about rail service where none previously existed, in a sprawled out, auto-dependent metropolitan area. High speed rail was not built in a day.
It's also worth noting that all rail has to be at this point is faster than its competition, which it is. Cars are slower and this is far too short of a distance for airplanes.
The area has had commuter rail for over 20 years. This express service is using previously freight-only lines. What's really going to be impressive is when it connects Orlando.
Especially considering you can fly Orlando to Miami, possibly in less total time.
Granted, flying is not a cost effective means to commute, but I don’t think rail service from Orlando to Miami will have too many true commuters on board compared to less frequent travelers.
You're basically talking the equivalent of Boston to New York City although you don't have the same potential for downtown to downtown travel. That's definitely not a daily commute sort of thing. I don't know enough about Florida travel patterns to know how much sense that city pair makes.
If you have the market for an HSR (a real one) it's feasible, thought not great and you'd really need better downtown public transport. Assuming direct it'd be a ~1:45 trip, possibly 1:30 on the really modern 350km/h (~220mph) lines, and if you don't have trouble falling asleep you can usually sleep/nap, you can work, and you could have a meal service.
Not cheap though, HSR tickets are not $10 (though it's not that far if you're using a high-frequency subscription thing, especially if you're using it daily).
That's about 75 miles per hour. Acela (our high-speed intercity train) makes the 39 mile Washington to Baltimore trip (with a single stop in-between) at 68 miles per hour. The non-express intercity train makes a two-stop trip at 49 miles per hour. The commuter train is under 40 miles per hour.
Acela does the trip between Boston and Providence (43.6 miles by rail) in 33 minutes: that's just about 80mph, which includes one stop along the way. The Northeast Regional does it in 38 minutes- about 69mph on average.
The Acela hits 150mph along some stretches in New England.
> Acela (our high-speed intercity train) makes the 39 mile Washington to Baltimore trip (with a single stop in-between) at 68 miles per hour.
That's not necessarily a fair comparison, as IIRC Amtrack shares rail tracks with cargo trains. Cargo trains are far slower and occupy tracks for longer stretches of time, while passenger trains require longer stretches of track to be reserved for their passage to ensure higher circulation speeds. Thus, having to share tracks with slower trains limits how the track can be allocated to passenger traffic.
To put it differently, that would be like stating that a bus is slow because in some stretches of road it is forced to wait cargo trucks to pass.
As a comparison, the TGV connection between Paris and Brussels may be a high-speed track, but train speeds grind to a halt way down to 20km/h when passing through track sections used by commuter and freight trains.
