Trains, buses, subways and all things mass transit will be the hot topics in Orlando this weekend at the American Public Transportation Association's annual conference. These may seem ordinary to the average person, but the quality of infrastructure like mass transit can be the sinew that binds an urban community into a cohesive metropolitan area.

Three of Florida's big urban centers -- Jacksonville, Tampa-St. Petersburg and Orlando -- want to build commuter rail lines like Tri-Rail which serves the Miami-Fort Lauderdale-West Palm Beach corridor. Yet Tri-Rail is in peril because the Florida Legislature has yet to approve a dedicated revenue source to match the federal government's $500 million investment in the state's lone commuter rail service.

That funding is an urgent priority because the state needs to prove it's worthy of more federal transportation dollars to build a much vaunted bullet train between Miami, Orlando and Tampa. The Legislature can't afford to dither on Tri-Rail funding any more.

You would think that with the state's largest population centers pushing for money to build commuter train systems they have the clout to persuade lawmakers to get on board. So far, however, no dice.

Now federal authorities have put the state on notice that it needn't expect more federal transit dollars unless it funds Tri-Rail. U.S. Reps. Corinne Brown, D-Jacksonville, and Ron Klein, D-Boca Raton, recently warned Florida's lawmakers of the very real chance of missing out on coveted federal stimulus money for high speed rail if Tri-Rail continues to go wanting.

When Rep. Brown invited state lawmakers to a meeting with U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood in Orlando on Monday as part of the transportation conference, the legislators declined. Urgent meetings in Tallahassee, they said.

What a mistake. Florida transportation authorities are counting on federal money to build the high speed rail line, and the federal government has said that it wants to cooperate.

But if the Legislature can't muster the will to back Tri-Rail, a link to the proposed bullet train, why should the feds award more tax dollars to the state? The Legislature needs to prove it will pay its fair share to support mass transit and high speed rail to put Florida's mass transit firmly in the 21st century.

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