Jacksonville area stiffed in competition for federal transportation dollars

[tufsu1]

And Jax gets the loser treatment again, Isnt there other threads on this situation?? Im starting to wonder about Jacksonville future..The Leaders are just too relaxed...I dislike relaxed leadership.

Its that they are clueless.  Especially at the JTA.

When you are in competition for money and you want to win, you mount a public campaign.  You make your presentation amazing.  You get your local press to help you out. You canvass the mayor, the council, the legislative delegation. In short you get your ass to work and stop pretending that you only really want it if no one else needs it this weekend.

These idiots did this entire thing in the dark.  No communication to the press, no discussion with the blogs and activists that could have helped them. No public campaign.  No nothing.

That, and I'm not sure how wowed the USDOT possibly was with JTA's silly B(R)T and bus-based crap...

Orlando Tampa and Miami are in there with high speed rail proposals, and in comes JTA with a crappy bus rebranded as "BRT!" Must have gone over like a ton of bricks. How embarrassing.

well FTA did give Orlando $10 million in TIGER II funds for their BRT...and they have been funding BRT projects all over the country!

[CS Foltz]

tufsu...........didn't JTA get atleast one grant for the BRT in town? I am referring to the one intown, not the Philips Hwy proposal.........geez I hope they change their mind on that one!

[ChriswUfGator]

And Jax gets the loser treatment again, Isnt there other threads on this situation?? Im starting to wonder about Jacksonville future..The Leaders are just too relaxed...I dislike relaxed leadership.

Its that they are clueless.  Especially at the JTA.

When you are in competition for money and you want to win, you mount a public campaign.  You make your presentation amazing.  You get your local press to help you out. You canvass the mayor, the council, the legislative delegation. In short you get your ass to work and stop pretending that you only really want it if no one else needs it this weekend.

These idiots did this entire thing in the dark.  No communication to the press, no discussion with the blogs and activists that could have helped them. No public campaign.  No nothing.

That, and I'm not sure how wowed the USDOT possibly was with JTA's silly B(R)T and bus-based crap...

Orlando Tampa and Miami are in there with high speed rail proposals, and in comes JTA with a crappy bus rebranded as "BRT!" Must have gone over like a ton of bricks. How embarrassing.

well FTA did give Orlando $10 million in TIGER II funds for their BRT...and they have been funding BRT projects all over the country!

Yeah that's not what I'm talking about, JTA already got that money, that's how they initially funded B(R)T.

This is new money, and JTA was competing against *actual* mass transit proposals from other cities.

[tufsu1]

not true....JTA got regular New Starts money for BRT....the TIGER grants were a separate thing entirely.

JTA was competing against other projects around the country, including Orlando's BRT.

BTW....Tampa also recently got a grant to do "sustainable TOD planning" on Nebraska Avenue, where their BRT line will run

[thelakelander]

Would love to see how that one turns out.  My guess is that TOD being stimulated on Nebraska Avenue due to BRT, is just as likely to happen as that transit proposal passing last night.

[tufsu1]

well the first thing they need to do is get rid of the "street women"

[fsujax]

just tie the "street women" into a TOD!

[heights unknown]

We were stiffed because of our past history in this regard which is not good. We have failed to show that we spent past transportation dollars wisely.

[ChriswUfGator]

We were stiffed because of our past history in this regard which is not good. We have failed to show that we spent past transportation dollars wisely.

Not according to Tufsu...

He seems to think JTA does a wonderful job...

[tufsu1]

It has nothing to do with whether JTA does or doesn't do a good job.....trust me, there are lots of problematic transit agencies out there....and some of them got $