Between 1981and 2011, the State of Florida and private corporations, sometimes jointly, sometimes alone, made four different attempts to implement very high speed rail lines between Miami, Orlando, and Tampa, on which trains would run at very high speed, between 150 and 220 miles per hour. Yet, at present, the only new passenger line that is likely to begin operations between these cities is not very high speed, and will not run on dedicated track. Why did all the earlier attempts at very high speed lines fail, while a moderate speed line appears likely to succeed? This report shows how neoliberal ideology and policies in the 1980’s caused a private consortium to plan a line based on credit from private investors and rents and profits from real estate development.