#DrainTheCountySwamp Part 1: Vote Out Tax Raising Commissioner "Crony Cohen"!

The Tampa Bay Times just reported the inflation tax in Tampa Bay is raging at 9.6%. Of course everyone knows the real inflation rate of food, household goods, gas, furniture, vehicles, etc. etc. is in the double digits. 

Crony Tax Raising Harry Cohen 

Hillsborough County commissioner Harry Cohen doesn't care. He is one of the Tampa Centric 5 Democrat commissioners pushing to put another massive $18 BILLION rail tax boondoggle on the November ballot.  

Harry Cohen is running for re-election in November. He wants to burden all Hillsborough County residents and businesses with higher taxes. 

Happy New Year Tampa Bay! Tampa Democrats REMOVE FDOT's Plan to Widen/Improve I-275 North of Downtown

Tampa Centric Five

Happy New Year Tampa Bay from the Tampa Centric Five Democrats on the Hillsborough County Commission. 

The Tampa Centric Five appointed themselves to Hillsborough County's Transportation Planning Organization (TPO) and sent their Happy New Year wishes for more traffic congestion in Tampa Bay. 

As they ironically expressed their concerns about "rapid growth" in Tampa Bay, they voted to ELIMINATE FDOT's plan to improve and add capacity to 10 miles of I-275 from downtown to Bearss Avenue. 

This FDOT I-275 improvement project has been in FDOT's plans for decades. The project has been in Hillsborough TPO's Transportation Improvement Plan (TIP) for years and years as North Hillsborough and south Pasco growth has exploded...until the Tampa Centric Five Democrats appointed themselves to the TPO. 

Hillsborough's Leaders Ride the Train to Failure

Yesterday a group of "Hillsborough leaders" took a tour of SunRail SunFail, Orlando's commuter rail that has been the envy of our "leaders" for years. But the horror! The county commissioners got stuck in traffic, and they missed their train!

People are spending hours sitting on I-4 trying to get from one place to another,” SunRail’s deputy program manager Sandra Gutierrez told the Hillsborough contingent. 

“You talk to these people who have transformed their commute from a highway system to a commuter rail system, and it’s just night and day.”  I think we had that true life experience today,” Hillsborough County Commissioner Pat Kemp quipped, after meeting up with the others later in the morning.

What a nightmare! If we only had SunRail in Tampa Bay we'd never experience traffic jams again. 

Source:https://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/breaking-news/os-pictures-sunrail-crash-in-seminole-county-20171130-photogallery.html

Yet the real horror is Hillsborough's leaders plans to replicate SunRail failures in Tampa Bay.

Peak at the Future: CSX jams up South Tampa

South Tampa got a peak at their jammed up future when CSX shut down several roads cross CSX tracks for planned maintenance, allegedly without proper notification to the City of Tampa and residents. It sounded like Armageddon from reading the local press reports. The Eye daughter even called complaining her normal 15 minute commute home from work increased to over an hour. Politicians and bureaucrats weighed in.

Then it got really confused.

Here We Go Again: Another Transportation Campaign

Tampa Bay taxpayers keep enriching the same consultants on our transportation issue over and over and over.

After taxpayers spent $1.2 million on the Go Hillsborough debacle, taxpayers are currently funding a $1.6 million study on expanding the failed streetcar.

And now we have the latest $1.5 million taxpayer funded "let's hire a new consultant same as the old consultant" gig. How did this one come about and what are they doing? We'll connect some dots.

While taxpayers were still paying Parsons Brinckerhoff in 2015 for Go Hillsborough and the sales tax hike was still being considered, the Transportation Management Association (TMA) was talking trains - again. The TMA are electeds and transportation officials representing the MPO's of Hillsborough, Pinellas and Pasco. Their meetings are well attended by insiders and special interests but fly under the radar of the general public because most do not know this group exists.

In October of 2015 the Tampa Tribune reported CSX tracks may be route to commuter rail's future.

The November 2015 TMA meeting focused on commuter rail, SunRail, the CSX corridor and how to get into the federal funding grant program for transit.

At the January 5, 2016 MPO meeting, FDOT presented the concept of passenger service on CSX-owned freight rail corridors. The presentation included the chart below depicting a hybrid rail pilot project from downtown to USF using a hybrid rail car that can run on freight tracks similar to what the city of Austin implemented. They also admit it would take 24-31 minutes to go from downtown Tampa to USF by train while  driving that trip today during rush hour is about 30 minutes, and of course less during non-rush hours.

Hybrid Rail Pilot Project presented at
January 5, 2016 MPO meeting

Rail projects require millions and billions of dollars and a committed long term revenue source to get federal funding. So the TMA invited transit lobbyist Jason Jordan, as we posted here, to their April 2016 meeting to present how to win sales tax hike referendums.

All of this led to FDOT handing HART $1.5 million last year to fund something… and hire another consultant. As reported by the Tampa Tribune last March:

Headed up by the Hillsborough Area Regional Transit Authority, or HART, the study will determine how to connect Hillsborough, Pasco and Pinellas counties through various forms of public transit. 

The scope of work for the study is now being determined, after which a consultant will be hired, said HART CEO Katharine Eagan. 

“At this point, we are meeting with members of the Transportation Management Association, which has members from each county’s Metropolitan Planning Organization, talking about what to do in this corridor. Specifically, we are looking at connections between the three counties, which could include rail infrastructure.”

At least HART used an RFP to procure the work (unlike Go Hillsborough). HART's RFP was titled Tampa Bay Regional Premium Transit Feasibility Study and can be found here.

The scope of this work is not a feasibility study. The scope is to create and sell to the public a regional transit plan for projects to pursue federal grant money, e.g. New Starts.

A selection committee representing Hillsborough, Pinellas and Pasco rated the three vendors who responded to the RFP. Based on their ratings, Jacobs Engineering was awarded the $15. million contract. Jacobs did the alternatives analysis for the failed Greenlight Pinellas and was a subcontractor to Parsons Brinckerhoff on Go Hillsborough.

The 128 page Jacobs response to HART's RFP is found here. Most of it is boiler plate stuff but the work is not a feasibility study. Jacobs will review and update past studies, not do another study and they include many of the same people who worked on HART's 2010 rail project, Greenlight Pinellas and Go Hillsborough.

Like Parsons Brinckerhoff did with Go Hillsborough, Jacobs Engineering brings their PR firm B2 Communications attached to this work effort. Lots of the same public engagement elements as Go Hillsborough are included: focus groups, tele-townhalls, polling, social media, branding, coalition building, targeted outreach, etc.

B2 Communications also worked on the failed Greenlight Pinellas campaign. They presented their Lessons Learned at the 2015 Transit Initiatives and Communities Conference sponsored by the transit advocacy/lobbying group Center for Transportation Excellence (CFTE). These CFTE conferences are billed as "the only national conference exclusively devoted to understanding transportation ballot measures and providing concrete advice on how to win."

Unfortunately oddly missing in this effort is our own transportation think tank at USF, the Center for Urban Transportation Research (CUTR).  Why?

After the contract was awarded to Jacobs, they requested the name of the work be changed to Regional Premium Transit Plan to more appropriately fit the work scope they are doing.

So at the January 10, 2017 Pinellas County Commission meeting where Katherine Eagan, CEO of HART presented she called this work a plan as TBNweekly reported (emphasis mine):

The goal is to come up with three priority projects supported by all parties that will meet Federal Transit Administration’s requirements for capital and/or operations funding. The goal is to complete work on the plan by September 2018. The plan will include coming up with a consensus about who will build the projects, who will run them and how they will be paid for. Eagan said the purpose of the evaluation plan was to determine the most competitive projects for federal funding.

While taxpayers are funding another consultant, taxpayers have already paid for Hillsborough, Pinellas and Pasco MPO's to complete their federally mandated 25 year Long Range Transportation Plans (LRTP's) and five year Transportation Improvement Plans (TIP's).

In addition, taxpayers have already paid TBARTA to create a Regional Master Plan:

The 2015 Master Plan update builds upon previous updates, refining the regional networks and outlining a strategic vision for implementation. New to this update, the TBARTA Master Plan will serve as the Regional LRTP, a plan previously completed by the West Central Florida MPO Chairs Coordinating Committee (CCC). To join the plans, changes were made to the Regional Networks to more closely reflect the combined priorities and vision of the two entities. 

All of these plans were created collaboratively through robust public engagement according to all the agencies creating them.

Jacobs presentation during the HART RFP process does not start off with a problem statement about our transportation and mobility issues that needs addressing. They start with lessons learned for why taxpayers rejected previous sales tax hikes to fund transit.

This Jacobs slide is striking because it appears this is Jacobs problem statement - not addressing our mobility issues.

Jacobs RFP Presentation

Does Jacobs think Tampa Bay voters and taxpayers are stupid? Apparently, we have not been educated enough after millions of dollars, including tons of taxpayer money and resources, have been spent on education campaigns trying to sell voters and taxpayers to raise taxes for costly rail/transit solutions.

And that must be why according to their slide below, more than half of Jacob's work effort is public engagement.

Jacobs Engineering $1.5 million
Regional Premium Transit Plan

Ironically, Jacobs states there is a need to listen to the public but the public has consistently stated fixing our roads is the highest priority.

But here we go again. The same echo chamber of consultants, PR firms and special interests who keep trying to sell us on costly trains are at it again.

If it walks and squawks like another taxpayer funded PR campaign, it is another PR campaign.

And this time it has gone regional.

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Notes:
Commuter rail ridership in Austin DECLINED 11% third quarter 2016 according to the latest APTA ridership numbers just published. Total transit ridership in Austin is less than it was 18 years ago while their population has grown 66% over that same period.

While we keep being told that Denver is a model to follow for costly rail transit, Downtown Denver survey shows people are opting to drive over using public transit

Commuter Rail may be an option

CSX would merely make the tracks available for lease through a deal with State the rest would be up to the local community.

St. Petersburg, Fl

Opinion by: E. Eugene Webb PhD
Coauthor of: So You Want Blog.

CSX has thrown its hat into the tumultuous ring of Tampa Bay area public transit. 

You can read the details in: Caitin Johnston's piece in the Tampa Bay Times, CSX's offer finally opens the door to commuter rail in Tampa Bay.

Carving an interesting path through Pinellas and Hillsborough Counties and connecting the down towns of Tampa, Clearwater and St. Petersburg, these CSX tracks could form a backbone to move commuters over fairly large distances.

For now, the CSX offers to make certain lines available do open a new and interesting window of discussion. The commuter rail system would, by its very nature, be inter modal requiring both bus and possibly light rail to carry short distance and last mile traffic.

There is a host of issues as Caitin Johnston points out, the most difficult overcoming the political parochialism that will always accompany an effort like the CSX offering proposes.

CSX would merely make the tracks available for lease through a deal with the State the rest would be up to the local community.

The initial thought is to establish yet another regional board made up of elected officials to try to bring a plan together.

These Boards of elected officials have proven to be virtually useless. They accomplish little beyond talk are poor managers, they are prone to encourage corruption, if not among themselves, then among the organizational staffs they create and their hired consultants.

Public transportation would be better served if TBARTA were disbanded, and the Hillsborough and Pinellas County transit authority boards were reconstituted with a majority of non elected officials.

The real issue here before any of this ever gets off the ground is to make sure we don't have the same-old  people, political groups, consultants, influence peddlers and politicians who want to get their hands into the money flow running this effort.

If they do commuter rail will likely go the way of GreenLight Pinellas, Go Hillsborough and other transit initiatives.

E-mail Doc at mail to:dr.gwebb@yahoo.com or send me a Facebook (Gene Webb) Friend request. Please comment below, and be sure to share on Facebook. See Doc's Photo Gallery at Bay Post Photos.

Disclosures:
Contributor: Waterfront Charter Amendment (Vote on The Pier), Carly Fiorina for President

Is CSX Trying to Sell its High Priced Junk to Us?

CSX is offering to sell some of its under utilized tracks around Tampa Bay to the Florida Department of Transportation.

There are 97 miles of railroad track connecting the downtowns of Clearwater, St. Petersburg and Tampa. The steel grating links Tampa International Airport to the University of South Florida, stretches across four counties and reaches as far north as Brooksville.

Freight trains run on those tracks now. But they could, one day, form the spine of a passenger rail system that would finally connect Tampa Bay — and ease the region's dependence on roads.

This is no pie-in-the-sky scenario. It's an idea gaining sudden momentum because railroad giant CSX Corp. is shopping around two segments of its Tampa Bay routes.

 CSX is interested in selling two lines.

One of the rail lines offered by CSX is the "Clearwater line." It stretches from downtown St. Petersburg, climbs northwest through Pinellas County to downtown Clearwater, veers to Oldsmar, then runs east past Tampa International Airport and ends near downtown Tampa, in Ybor City.

The second route is the "Brooksville line." It starts in Tampa, juts north from the first line, passes by USF, cuts through Land O'Lakes in Pasco County and finishes in central Hernando County, near Brooksville.

Urged by local leaders, CSX analyzed its lines and found that those two routes carried minimal freight traffic and could be used for passenger rail.

Here's where the tracks run CSX wants to unload.

CSX rail lines for sale
(in red and blue)

We should note a few things.

This is not a light rail solution. If realized, this will be a commuter rail solution. That is, big, heavy, noisy, diesel trains, on existing CSX tracks that were originally built for efficient movement of freight. It is not commuters, or people heading to the ball game or the art museums or the latest event in a downtown park.. Want to convert to light rail? Not going to happen.

These tracks are where they are. They are not optimized for Transit Oriented Development, if anyone believes that myth. They do connect the downtowns of Tampa, St. Petersburg, and Clearwater, as well as Tampa airport and USF or at least close enough, but in a rather meandering way. They're not helping major residential communities such as Brandon, Fishhawk, Keystone-Odessa or New Tampa, and misses major job corridors around Westshore, I-4, I-75, and Pinellas Gateway.  Good for Brooksville, nothing for Brandon.

The only segment worth anything for commuters is the downtown Tampa - USF, and perhaps up to Land O' Lakes. The rest is pretty worthless, but its a packaged deal from CSX. The Tampa - Clearwater - St. Petersburg route will be too time consuming for most who already have a car and will still be able to drive where they want in less time. The downtown Tampa to airport route suffers as well, unless you have time for a not so scenic circuitous route.

There are other CSX tracks in the Tampa Bay area that are not currently listed for sale. Namely a line that from downtown Tampa, paralleling the Selmon Crosstown south of Gandy into the Port Tampa City area, as well as those in the east county Brandon area. Expect those to be offered for a nice price, but after the initial sale of the junk.

But it does go all the up to Brooksville! I guess the urbanist crowd is eager to sell the utopian dream of Transit Oriented Development to Brooksville.

Urged by local leaders, CSX analyzed its lines and found that those two routes carried minimal freight traffic and could be used for passenger rail.

In other words, at best CSX does not need these lines, and may be money losers for them.  If they can dump those lines and get a top price from the FDOT, perhaps several times anyone else will pay, and we will let them continue to use the same lines with no liability (see Sunrail), why not?

Who's the sucker that wants to buy them?

Also, it's likely that CSX will want to retain some rights or lease back some ability to continue to run freight on these lines, likely constraining transit schedules.

At this stage, costs, ridership and timelines are unknown. We do know that Orlando's SunRail has regularly missed ridership estimates, and has no long term funding source beyond the existing state of Florida and now some new federal subsidies. Tri-Rail in South Florida is continually subsidized by the state as well, and neither has made any difference in congestion relief.

CSX will not sell its lines to local municipalities, only to the FDOT, so it will take a lot unforeseen planning and coordination into all our Tampa Bay transportation related "plans" across several Tampa Bay counties and FDOT to bring this to fruition. Don't hold your breath.

The Times editorial writers are a bit more cautious.

The prospect holds some allure. With some modification and addition, it could link the University of South Florida with a multimodal transit hub in downtown Tampa, with future high-speed connections to Central Florida and light rail or modern tram connections to West Shore, Gateway and downtown St. Petersburg. A spur line that runs down to the northern edge of Tampa International Airport could theoretically link air passenger traffic to Clearwater and USF. Westchase residents could commute quickly to downtown Tampa and USF. Depending on the sale price, right of way costs could be significantly lower than most alternatives.

But none of those potential advantages necessarily justifies what could turn out to be a suboptimal rail network — even if federal and state governments shoulder three-quarters of the cost, as they did with SunRail. Other than for the USF-downtown Tampa leg, ridership levels could be weak for decades.

Most important of all, the CSX network bypasses what transit experts call the "home run line" — a direct, dense light rail route over the Howard Frankland Bridge between downtown Tampa and downtown St. Petersburg that includes the area's major employment and residential hubs as well as TIA. Commuter rail systems are too heavy to cross the Howard Frankland. The CSX purchase will work only if it augments reasonably quick construction of that home run line.

"[R]idership levels could be weak for decades." A brief awakening from the rail cheerleaders.

Note the lack of the "home run line" between Tampa and St. Petersburg, crossing the Howard Frankland Bridge. We can expect rail proponents to claim that FDOT has agreed to beef up the transit corridor for their plans to replace the north bound span in the next 10 years or so, and adding commuter rail is no big deal.  But don't expect them to cite any costs. The transit corridor FDOT committed to to was for managed bus toll lanes, which is a manageable cost we support. To beef up the structure to add light rail adds nearly $1B to the HFB plans. Commuter rail is even heavier, traveling faster, so we can expect the costs to be even more than light rail. Regardless, any rail solution over the HFB is a non-starter as it will reduce capacity for hurricane evacuation routes, and will have to be shut down in any wind conditions exceeding 35 mph for light rail.

The fundamental problem of rail is it goes where rail goes, not where people go. These CSX lines were designed to move freight, and to repurpose them to move people where people want to go will be costly. If SunRail and Tri-Rail are any guidance, it won't help with their daily commute or relieve congestion, and will continue to be a drain on the taxpayer and the vast majority of residents who will not regular ride on this rail.

It's a suckers bet. CSX is trying to unload its junk on us.

Keep away from a bad deal, unless your goal is to urbanize Brooksville around a commuter rail station.