Bombardier North America – High Speed Rail

Situation:  In late 2003, a month before the Florida High Speed Rail Authority (FHSRA) was to award a contract for the state’s first high speed rail project, Bombardier Transportation was one of only two bidders still in contention.    Despite voters approval of the project in the state’s 2000 general election, high-speed rail had become controversial as critics attacked both its cost and effectiveness.  Bombardier had less than 30 days to shift attention among the public and state officials to its innovative JetTrain locomotive, the world’s first and only non-electric, high-speed rail locomotive powered by a jet engine, and convince the FHRSA Board that its train was the right solution to Florida’s transportation problems.

Program:  Bombardier’s objective, and thus the goal of the public relations campaign, was to win the contract from FHSRA.  In order to reach this objective, the intangible debate over high-speed rail had to be converted into a meaningful high-touch experience for voters and decision makers.  The strategy, aimed at building understanding and acceptance of the locomotive, was to take the actual product to the people and let them climb aboard, listen to its whisper-quiet engine and ask questions about its operation. The firm decided to tour the locomotive to the state’s proposed rail hubs of Miami, Orlando and Tampa. 

Each stop included an interactive experience for local citizens and a more comprehensive media program designed to bring JetTrain into the living rooms of people all over the state.  The tour provided a platform for timely news briefings for local media as well as national transportation trade publications that were covering the high-speed rail story. Each city visit was kicked off with media briefings near the tracks where JetTrain was on display.  These provided an opportunity for Bombardier to explain its proposal along with the new propulsion system.  The briefings also offered the chance to respond directly to critics’ charges by explaining Bombardier’s ability to implement a high-speed rail solution without excessive costs to the state or taxpayers or significant environmental impact. The communications team conducted one-on-one outreach to key members of the Florida media before, during and after each stop and released media advisories and photos of the JetTrain featuring Florida constituents.  Members of the media were given B-Roll video of the locomotive in motion and a private tour by the technology’s chief engineer on board the train.  In a final display of technological wonder, the engineers fired up the jet engine to demonstrate the technology’s remarkable quietness. 

The team also orchestrated public tours and VIP briefings and receptions at each stop.  Constituents were invited to tour the train through advertisements placed in the local newspapers, through the media outreach building up to the events and through live media coverage during the public events.  On each stop, members of the transportation community, including the FHSRA members and government leaders, were invited to tour the train with the chief engineer and attend a special briefing on the proposal.  The communications team also arranged VIP receptions near the locomotive, coordinating a complex series of logistics involving the municipalities, track owners, lighting and production vendors and caterers.

Results: Twelve days after the final reception for the Jet Train in Miami, the Florida High Speed Rail Authority voted to select Bombardier Transportation as the vendor for the $2 billion high-speed rail project.  The objective was reached because hundreds of thousands of Florida residents either toured the JetTrain locomotive and spoke to the chief engineer, or learned about it from media coverage in broadcast, print and trade publications across the state.  In one week, the campaign generated 35 television stories, 11 newspaper and trade articles and eight radio interviews.  In fact, based on Bombardier’s analysis of coverage in the final quarter of the year, media mentions of the locomotive technology were three times as frequent as those in the first three quarters of 2003 combined.