I-295 East Beltway Being Expanded to 12 Lanes

[RattlerGator]

How could there not be a connection? But so what? Clearly lakelander and tufsu1, along with others, have their vested interests too that color their takes. We all have our biases.

[Tacachale]

How could there not be a connection? But so what? Clearly lakelander and tufsu1, along with others, have their vested interests too that color their takes. We all have our biases.

Because Lake and Tufsu1 don't seem to have as lofty an opinion of the industry, despite also being involved in it.

[thelakelander]

I'm a fiscal conservative that doesn't follow any traditional party platform. I'm not a fan of waste, regardless of the industry or development type. When it comes to transportation, you can easily find me supporting a mass transit or road project in one situation and opposing them on another. Same goes for investing in downtown and suburbs.

[southsider1015]

The traffic is far from "gridlocked" but this is an interesting turn of events. This will be a big money maker for firms that have made a living relying on a continuous flow of these types of public projects to keep their doors open.  To be honest, I'm surprised this doesn't happen more often.

$3 million study!

Southsider would be in favor of this!

I've seen an extra $30,000 spent on design save $30 million in construction, and $300 million saved in right of way.  Non technical folks love to cry about how much money is "wasted" on consultants.  Does anyone complain about all the medical and legal fees?  No.

Southsider - Obviously you didn't get the joke . . . it was a reference to the JEA study on their building that they are saying will cost $3 million.  I work in design, I am a consultant and go through VE and pricing exercises all the time so I hope you're not assuming I'm an uninformed "non-tech folk" that doesn't understand the value of consultants, if that was even directed toward me.  And you mention $30,000, that is more realistic for some studies, even $300,000 studies or redesign efforts are normal for large projects and sometimes end up saving millions in total cost.  Not $3,000,000 like JEA is proposing . . . that sounds like more along the lines of a study for a state-wide interstate system, not a single aging building that has very little historical or aesthetic value in DT Jax.

Sorry, I missed the joke.  And I apparently didn't aim my comment at you, given your background. 

What would be helpful for JEA is to explain how they arrived to that number.  Not asking for full out transparency, just bullet points on it.

Once folks start to understand what all goes into these studies, and the amount of labor/time that goes into them, people tend to back off on the criticism.

Similar concept here with FCX.  FDOT doesn't explain all the details, so the public is confused and believes in conspiracies.

[southsider1015]

Status Update:

The 2nd place bidder (Superior Construction) has protested FDOT's Intent to Award to the 1st place bidder (Archer Western).  The protester claims that the procurement process wasnt properly followed, and that the winner had an unfair advantage.  The project is on hold until further notice.

Meanwhile, traffic is gridlocked on I-295, JTB, and 9B. 

I am interested in seeing how bad the 9B/9A merger gets when the new 95/9B interchange opens. That four lane to two lane joke will be ugly I think.

Yup.  Big yup.

[southsider1015]

The profit margin in the road construction business isn't even CLOSE to the profits made in financial, medical, and legal industries. 

It sure hasn't stopped them from spending millions of dollars each year on lobbying and political contributions throughout Florida

I'm not naive, by any means, to the political connections to the road and bridges construction industry.  But I've met and worked with a lot of politicians, contractors, lobbyists, engineers, architects, and other industry leaders.  This industry is very honest, hardworking, intelligent, and honorable.  Please don't try to include it with the slime and corrupt that makes up the majority of the big industries in this state. 

It's not nearly as big of a conspiracy as you and Stephen sometimes make it out to be.

Southsider, do you think there's a possible connection between your personal investment in the industry and your thoughts about what it does and how it runs?

Funny.  Of course, I'm biased.  Like another poster said, we all are. 

[southsider1015]

How could there not be a connection? But so what? Clearly lakelander and tufsu1, along with others, have their vested interests too that color their takes. We all have our biases.

Because Lake and Tufsu1 don't seem to have as lofty an opinion of the industry, despite also being involved in it.

Too funny.  Lofty.  Life is too short to work at a job that you hate, right? 

Even so, I like to think that I bring some balance to this forum.  I believe I'm pretty well informed on these topics, given my profession and experience.  Lake, Stephen Dare, and some of the other posters typically agree with each other, and that's great, but I usually don't.  There's more than one side to these issues, and the opposition to what's being said here needs to be heard.

Having said all that, I've learned a lot since I started lurking, and I enjoy the discussions.  I hope others can say the same.

[thelakelander]

^I'm a pretty independent thinker. Stephen and I debate on various issues more than me and you do!