JTA Greyhound plans to go before DDRB

[Ocklawaha]

The only reason is they're lobbying for FREE MONEY and the more the merrier. Why waste $100 million when we can waste $180 million.

The current Greyhound Station doesn't need a penny of public money, in fact it is a tax paying citizen of downtown and one of the only 'islands' of downtown activity 24/7. Seems reason enough to move them out, we can't have that kind of activity going on when the other city streets are dead.

DDRB told me, "Don't worry, Greyhound is just a insignificant piece of the JRTC." I'm sorry but the JRTC is a three legged stool built on Amtrak, Greyhound and JTA, pull out one of those legs and the whole project becomes dysfunctional. But JTA will say, it's not disfunctional, it's the first phase of a wonderful new neighborhood of stations.

Bottom line? JTA doesn't have a clue how to design a transportation center. FDOT is pushing this for their own reasons which parallel to JTA'S and as Tallahassee has recently shown they don't give a damn about Jacksonville. If city council or the mayor have a lick of sense they'll slam dunk this project until the convention center is out of the way.

OCKLAWAHA

[thelakelander]

JTA approves plan for new Greyhound station at Prime Osborn Center

But efforts to create a major transportation hub are dropped for now.

Jacksonville Transportation Authority board members approved plans Thursday to build a new Greyhound bus station on four parcels of land donated by the city in June near the Prime Osborn Convention Center. They also dropped immediate efforts to seek another nine city properties for creation of a major transportation hub.

Forgoing - for the moment - that second, larger part of the plan followed Mayor Alvin Brown's July statement that he needed more information about it. There also was opposition by some City Council members who were concerned the deal could become a money-maker for JTA.

The portion approved unanimously on Thursday will cost between $3.5 million and $5 million and construction is expected to begin by the middle of 2012, JTA spokeswoman Shannon Eller said.

The money will come from state and federal grants the agency and the Florida Department of Transportation are currently pursuing, she said. But the agency is ready to advance money to complete construction on time and then seek reimbursement from grants, she added.

Brown must still sign the deal. He issued a statement Thursday saying he will "review this one to ensure that the project is financially viable and that the contract is in the best interests of the taxpayers." Brown said he continues to have concerns about the larger, regional center proposed by JTA.

Full Article: http://jacksonville.com/news/metro/2011-09-29/story/jta-approves-plan-new-greyhound-station-prime-osborn-center

[Tacachale]

^That might be encouraging if there were any evidence he had capable people advising him. But recent developments make that seem unlikely.

[jcjohnpaint]

So they are going to start 1/4 of the trans project to drop 3/4 of the project, when the entire plan sucked the whole time?  So now we are moving the station out of the core...... patchwork/  anyways I really don't care because the whole thing including the terminal needs to be reconsidered.  This transportation center would be too suburban even for the southside. 
Have a plan and a good one and go through with it! 

[tufsu1]

JTA already owns a good chunk of land over there....they don't need the other 9 parcels to build the hub....m,aybe this is a sign that they are retooling the center to be more compact....unfortunately, that will just leave Greyhound off as an island

[thelakelander]

Doubt it.  It's just a sign that they don't have the necessary support to ram the entire thing down the public's throats at the moment.

This whole fiasco is pretty crazy.  There's been no discussion of what happens with the existing Greyhound site, no true public vetting of the entire JRTC plan, no discussion of if the entire thing should be delayed until a permanent position is taken with the Prime Osborn.  Quite frankly, I simply don't understand the need to move forward anything on this site immediately and fronting money to do so (getting those federal grants aren't a given), when looking at the complex set of still unanswered questions.  Who's going to shrivel up and die if we delay this entire thing a few months until its thoroughly vetted and holistically planned with the rest of downtown?  This whole thing is quite puzzling.

[ricker]

Again,  IF the prime osborn III center is a major piece of this puzzle,
WHY must any new REGIONAL multimodal transportation hub stretch beyond Myrtle, Forsyth and Lee streets. ??

Have the designers / planners / dreamers "deciderers" on this never traveled!?

THANKYOU MJ for putting together such comprehensive studies of how some actual cities do get it right.

With regard to what we may see sprout out of the ground on Houston/johnson streets...Not much of what has been revealed seems pedestrian friendly, thusly impractical. Fwiw

Back to the drawing board. Imho

[Ocklawaha]

Nothing puzzling about it, it's the same inept planner at JTA that brought us the Skyway, bus lanes for hourly buses and the ridiculous, inaccessible and thus empty, Southside Parking Garage.

Don't underestimate the power of JTA to screw us out of a true transportation center for the next hundred years. Really? Yeah, take away Greyhound and you pull one of the legs (Amtrak, JTA, Greyhound) off of this three legged stool. Might as well give up on us ever joining the REAL cities out there unless we can stop this nonsense.

OCKLAWAHA

[mtraininjax]

Might as well give up on us ever joining the REAL cities out there unless we can stop this nonsense.

Can you stop it? What is your plan to stop it? I am all for a good fight, but for the last 8 years of the lost decade, all I hear about is talk, talk, talk, how about some action to make it happen? We need more action on this board to make things happen, you want the 1504 to return to the rails, make it happen. You want a real transportation center, make it happen.

As Nike says, Just Do IT!