A Lesson for JTA? Tampa's (HART's) 10-year bus plan

[thelakelander]

Szemeredy on the Tampa forum at SSC recently uploaded HART's 10-year plan.  Would it make sense for JTA to go to a similar grid-based route system in the near future?

Also, MetroRapid is Tampa's Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) system.  The first line (green) opened earlier this year.











http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showpost.php?p=107236929&postcount=232

[tufsu1]

No lesson here....HART is a disaster....and even though there is support for rail in Tampa, HART refused to even consider it in the plan

[Charles Hunter]

From what Nat Ford has said, he seems to be considering something like that.  However, we have a river with only 7 crossings, in the way of a true grid system.  Maybe there could be two or four semi-interconnected grids?

[thelakelander]

No lesson here....HART is a disaster....and even though there is support for rail in Tampa, HART refused to even consider it in the plan

You know a lot more about HART than I do.

1. Why won't they consider rail in their plans?  Is it because of the struggling TECO streetcar?

2. Do you believe their routing system is a disaster, their management or a mix of both?

3. What has been the public's response to their first BRT line?

[thelakelander]

From what Nat Ford has said, he seems to be considering something like that.  However, we have a river with only 7 crossings, in the way of a true grid system.  Maybe there could be two or four semi-interconnected grids?

Perhaps.  It would be interesting to see how other cities split by a river (ex. Pittsburgh, Nashville, Portland, etc.) have routed their systems.

[tufsu1]

No lesson here....HART is a disaster....and even though there is support for rail in Tampa, HART refused to even consider it in the plan

You know a lot more about HART than I do.

1. Why won't they consider rail in their plans?  Is it because of the struggling TECO streetcar?

2. Do you believe their routing system is a disaster, their management or a mix of both?

3. What has been the public's response to their first BRT line?

1. scared of the County Commission and a few of their board members...one is a commissioner and the other is Steve Polzin from CUTR...you know, the BRT people

2. management has always been the main problem....but service in some parts is weak too...I'm not a fan of their community shuttles (FWIW JTAs are better)

3. response has been good, but they had very low expectations (like 1500 riders a day)...and there is now talk of reducing service on the local route that serves much of the same corridor

Also note that they still have no $ for the second BRT line (east-west) much less any of the other proposed in their 10-year plan.

Their latest genius idea is partnering with the Expressway Authority to build bus toll lanes....if successful (which is debatable), FTA New Starts $ would build express lanes which buses could use...toll revenues would then be shared with HART so bus operations are funded

[Ocklawaha]

Y'all forget that in Florida, 'RAIL' is a 4-letter word.

[thelakelander]

^Something must be wrong with Orlando and South Florida these days.  They seem pretty excited about enhancing fixed transit corridors throughout their regions.

[SightseerLounge]

I thought HART was in some sort of crisis not too long ago!
They'll plan all of this, but they won't even consider any rail options! People know what they want! Some of the BRT has a use, but they want to criss cross the whole city with BRT! It is a joke!

These people insult everyone with this BRT is rail nonsense! At least, Orlando it's getting it right!

Y'all forget that in Florida, 'RAIL' is a 4-letter word.

Yes, it is!

This is comical! Yeah! Just order more buses! Comical!