Nat Ford: Why Jax should invest in the future of transportation, Downtown

[jaxjags]

If no expansions then why even change to U2C. At this point upgrade or tear down the Skyway and proceed with the other projects

[WAJAS]

If no expansions then why even change to U2C. At this point upgrade or tear down the Skyway and proceed with the other projects

I think the idea is that they will try to fund the expansions through state/federal sources. Are the rest of the amendments on for tomorrow?

[jaxoNOLE]

If no expansions then why even change to U2C. At this point upgrade or tear down the Skyway and proceed with the other projects

I think the idea is that they will try to fund the expansions through state/federal sources. Are the rest of the amendments on for tomorrow?

Bay Street lives on as well. As of now the rest of the amendments are on for next Wednesday.

So there go the neighborhood extensions.

I like the removal, primarily* because it requires them to prove the concept on Bay Street first. If it's successful, public buy-in to fund the neighborhood extensions should be forthcoming. If it isn't, then the neighborhood extensions should rightfully be killed. Begrudgingly, I understand wanting to connect to the elevated structure if you're going to make BSIC useful. $240M for that conversion seems nuts. Remove the center beam and repave 2.5 miles, plus add one ramp down to Bay street? How does that cost $240M?

*"Primarily" for now, until the Carlucci amendment hopefully passes.

[marcuscnelson]

If no expansions then why even change to U2C. At this point upgrade or tear down the Skyway and proceed with the other projects

Ford appeared pretty confident that they'll somehow get funding elsewhere to do it, to the point that Cumber was upset about why they asked for the money in the first place.

So there go the neighborhood extensions.

I like the removal, primarily* because it requires them to prove the concept on Bay Street first. If it's successful, public buy-in to fund the neighborhood extensions should be forthcoming. If it isn't, then the neighborhood extensions should rightfully be killed. Begrudgingly, I understand wanting to connect to the elevated structure if you're going to make BSIC useful. $240M for that conversion seems nuts. Remove the center beam and repave 2.5 miles, plus add one ramp down to Bay street? How does that cost $240M?

*"Primarily" for now, until the Carlucci amendment hopefully passes.

It's because they'll have to replace or create more ramps at the stations in order for the AVs to meet platform level for boarding, potentially going as far as entirely replacing the bridge structure in those areas. So in a way, think of it less as removing a beam and paving, and more like building 5 miles of bridge. I'm not sure whether the cost also includes building the ramps or elevators and whatnot.

[jaxjags]

If no expansions then why even change to U2C. At this point upgrade or tear down the Skyway and proceed with the other projects

Ford appeared pretty confident that they'll somehow get funding elsewhere to do it, to the point that Cumber was upset about why they asked for the money in the first place.

This bothers me also. Do your homework and be transparent and clear to the citizens of Jacksonville. They would be terrible industrial project managers.

[thelakelander]

Ford just said the JTA will pay $15 to $20 million per year to maintain and operate the U2C after it is up and running.

On what? But I thought the crazier thing was the speech he gave to Morgan:

I glad you asked that question because while we talk about the U2C project, it is the technologies that are clearly rapidly coming towards us, that are going to change transportation for everyone in this country, and the Jacksonville Transportation Authority is being seen as a leader in this actual space in terms of developing autonomous vehicle technology. Our current bus system is operated with bus operators and going into the future we're going to have to train our bus operators to become drone operators, where they will be operating some of these vehicles remotely from control centers. This is going to give us an exponential level of service that we can provide in this community. I think about the senior citizens that will be able to have greater mobility and not rely on the JTA to pick, pick them up when we say we can afford to pick them up or we have scheduled to pick them up, they'll be able to call these types of vehicles and actually get door to door service, is that going to happen in the next few years. No, but the foundation's we are building right now is not just the U2C project for downtown, it's actually looking at these technologies and what will they bring for generations to come. And as a level of accessibility that I don't think, and transportation that we have not even dreamed of.

That was crazy. Not only crazy in that JTA is desiring to speed hundreds of millions in local tax money on wild schemes....far beyond the foolishness of believing the AV thing will be up and running anytime soon, but also crazy in many of these councilmembers sounded totally unprepared and not versed in the topic at hand. Do they not get agenda packets for this stuff? They wasted most of the time at this meeting arguing over semantics of how to even conduct and vote at a meeting, instead of debating the merits of the amendments.

[jaxjags]

This quote was in the Dailey Record from Nat Ford:

JTA CEO Nat Ford said in a May 6 interview with the Daily Record that returning the federal grant money for the original Skyway and the $12.5 million already received for the U2C's Bay Street Innovation Corridor could put the city at risk of losing future U.S. Department of Transportation project funding.

Notice the word COULD. Not will or probably, but could. I think he is just talking and has NO support for this statement. Call me angry these days but not happy that the U2C has hijacked the LOGT debate with people that I like to say "we don't need the facts, we have already made up our minds".

[thelakelander]

I like the removal, primarily* because it requires them to prove the concept on Bay Street first. If it's successful, public buy-in to fund the neighborhood extensions should be forthcoming. If it isn't, then the neighborhood extensions should rightfully be killed. Begrudgingly, I understand wanting to connect to the elevated structure if you're going to make BSIC useful. $240M for that conversion seems nuts. Remove the center beam and repave 2.5 miles, plus add one ramp down to Bay street? How does that cost $240M?

All the George Jetson stuff costs millions of dollars. $240 million for 2.5 miles is pure foolishness, regardless of the technology though. At some point, no matter technology and pros that come with it, you can reach a point where the cost makes implementation not worth it. We've reached that point with the U2C. I'd rather them use play with AVs at ground level and not even touch the Skyway. Spend that $240 million on something worthwhile that can stretch further into the neighborhoods and connect with the Skyway at Kings Avenue, Rosa Parks or the JRTC. So what if people have to transfer between the modes.

[thelakelander]

If no expansions then why even change to U2C. At this point upgrade or tear down the Skyway and proceed with the other projects

Ford appeared pretty confident that they'll somehow get funding elsewhere to do it, to the point that Cumber was upset about why they asked for the money in the first place.

This bothers me also. Do your homework and be transparent and clear to the citizens of Jacksonville. They would be terrible industrial project managers.

Clearly it was an opportunistic money grab. Getting 75% in state and federal funding is a very competitive process. Maybe you win money soon, maybe you don't. Getting 100% with local money means you can avoid that process. So, even if the LOGT flat out fails, the U2C won't die. They'll just keep going after other funding sources. So to a degree, it pretty much validates Cumber's position.

[jaxlongtimer]

On what? But I thought the crazier thing was the speech he gave to Morgan:

I glad you asked that question because while we talk about the U2C project, it is the technologies that are clearly rapidly coming towards us, that are going to change transportation for everyone in this country, and the Jacksonville Transportation Authority is being seen as a leader in this actual space in terms of developing autonomous vehicle technology. Our current bus system is operated with bus operators and going into the future we're going to have to train our bus operators to become drone operators, where they will be operating some of these vehicles remotely from control centers. This is going to give us an exponential level of service that we can provide in this community. I think about the senior citizens that will be able to have greater mobility and not rely on the JTA to pick, pick them up when we say we can afford to pick them up or we have scheduled to pick them up, they'll be able to call these types of vehicles and actually get door to door service, is that going to happen in the next few years. No, but the foundation's we are building right now is not just the U2C project for downtown, it's actually looking at these technologies and what will they bring for generations to come. And as a level of accessibility that I don't think, and transportation that we have not even dreamed of.

When you parse this statement, you realize how much gobbledygook it contains:

(1) JTA, a leader in autonomous vehicle tech?  Over Tesla, Waymo, the major auto companies, etc. who have spent decades and billions of dollars so far and still haven't achieved anywhere close to autonomy?  Uber and Lyft, who did the same and already gave up?  But JTA will leapfrog them on a relative shoestring budget in a fraction of the time?

(2)  Bus drivers as drone operators?  LOL, maybe if they are under 30 year-old gamers.  And, what's the difference, other than location, of an operator in the bus or at an operations center?  It's still one operator per vehicle full time.  So what is the advantage?

(3) Pick up senior citizens at their door on will-call?  Don't taxis and Uber already provide this service at far less overall cost?  Are we going to send a multi-million dollar vehicle that holds up to 15 people door-to-door to pick up single passengers?  And move them across town to their doctors at 15 mph in traffic?

(4) Yeah, "looking at these technologies" from the outside in.  I see no specific promise here of a given level of service for a given range of costs.  This is the ultimate political escape hatch.  We are effectively window shopping... and paying $379+ million for the adventure. 

No investor would spend money on a project based on this presentation and the City shouldn't either.

[marcuscnelson]

When you parse this statement, you realize how much gobbledygook it contains:

(1) JTA, a leader in autonomous vehicle tech?  Over Tesla, Waymo, the major auto companies, etc. who have spent decades and billions of dollars so far and still haven't achieved anywhere close to autonomy?  Uber and Lyft, who did the same and already gave up?  But JTA will leapfrog them on a relative shoestring budget in a fraction of the time?

Let me tell you what they told me: JTA's teams consider Waymo an example of working full autonomy. Tesla's problems are solved by procuring "multi-sensing vehicles," beyond just the cameras that Tesla uses. Uber and Lyft "giving" up doesn't mean it doesn't work, just that they want to be vehicle operators rather than vehicle suppliers. And they're very confident that it'll work well enough by 2025 (for now...) when they become operational on Bay Street.

(2)  Bus drivers as drone operators?  LOL, maybe if they are under 30 year-old gamers.  And, what's the difference, other than location, of an operator in the bus or at an operations center?  It's still one operator per vehicle full time.  So what is the advantage?

It's actually not. The idea is that you have some operators monitoring, who occasionally take over remotely in case the AV encounters any problems self-driving. JTA does not currently have the equipment to test this capability.

(3) Pick up senior citizens at their door on will-call?  Don't taxis and Uber already provide this service at far less overall cost?  Are we going to send a multi-million dollar vehicle that holds up to 15 people door-to-door to pick up single passengers?  And move them across town to their doctors at 15 mph in traffic?

Bernard Schmidt told me that they actually can't pick up people at their door because it obliterates headway maintenance. So either Ford is lying to sell this or trying to sell a hypothetical future use beyond what's been proposed as something they're going to do.

(4) Yeah, "looking at these technologies" from the outside in.  I see no specific promise here of a given level of service for a given range of costs.  This is the ultimate political escape hatch.  We are effectively window shopping... and paying $379+ million for the adventure.

I gave my grand theory of this story a few weeks ago, that the AV was their promising jack of all trades that would give them everything they wanted, with the bonus of getting onto the cover of Forbes for "making the future happen," and unfortunately even after visiting them (especially so, if anything) that still seems true.

No investor would spend money on a project based on this presentation and the City shouldn't either.

Honestly, Hussein Cumber's letter should probably be a death blow. Again, if the guy who helped lead in taking a risk like privatized passenger rail in America thinks that this isn't worth the money, then it probably isn't.

[jaxoNOLE]

So there go the neighborhood extensions.

I like the removal, primarily* because it requires them to prove the concept on Bay Street first. If it's successful, public buy-in to fund the neighborhood extensions should be forthcoming. If it isn't, then the neighborhood extensions should rightfully be killed. Begrudgingly, I understand wanting to connect to the elevated structure if you're going to make BSIC useful. $240M for that conversion seems nuts. Remove the center beam and repave 2.5 miles, plus add one ramp down to Bay street? How does that cost $240M?

*"Primarily" for now, until the Carlucci amendment hopefully passes.

It's because they'll have to replace or create more ramps at the stations in order for the AVs to meet platform level for boarding, potentially going as far as entirely replacing the bridge structure in those areas. So in a way, think of it less as removing a beam and paving, and more like building 5 miles of bridge. I'm not sure whether the cost also includes building the ramps or elevators and whatnot.

I still don't understand how it adds up. Are the ramps/elevators part of the $240M or the $132M? I presumed the $132M, because the extensions otherwise have very little actual construction involved and, with no extensions, I would hope JTA would not be building ramps to nothing. It would be very disingenuous to claim federal/state funding for extensions but lump the transitions into the local budget for the elevated conversion. So, why is the $240M justified? What existing station modifications, absent extensions and transitions thereto, are so extensive as to require more money than the entire Overland Bridge replacement?

Seeing the greed on the initial ask makes me wonder if the actual cost of converting the elevated structure and building one ramp down to Bay could be done for a fraction of the stated cost. Without designs, plans, or hell, even a specific AV in mind, how the heck can they know what it will cost?

[thelakelander]

Without designs, plans, or hell, even a specific AV in mind, how the heck can they know what it will cost?

That number is a shot in the dark. This thing isn't designed and they don't even know what all will be needed to even allow it operate in the rain, much less all the other promises and visionary stuff being tossed out there to promote this expenditure for who ever will listen. As things get more refined, the previous unknowns will become additional expenses. That's the way these types of projects go. There's nothing over at JTA to suggest that things will be different. We'd be better off taking a fraction of that money and tossing it into improving the bus system. At least that's something that can happen quickly and provide more benefit to transit users countywide.

[jaxlongtimer]

^  I don't recall the exact numbers, but FDOT has built entire interchanges and maybe even all of 9B for much less than $240 million.  So, how can 3 or 4 ramps to grade plus ripping out the track approach that much?  How much do the cars go for?  If they are "autonomous" (haha), the main cost beyond would be software which is typically "leased" so they can get support and updates/upgrades included.  Based on JTA's comment that it would cost $15 to $20 million a year, I am assuming the software is paid annually and not upfront.

Although I am against the entire project, if someone where inclined to approve any portion of it, JTA should provide a detailed breakdown of the projected costs plus the assumptions used to put it together.  Failure to do so would just support the suspicion they don't really have a handle on this project and/or inflated the numbers for a money grab.

[jaxoNOLE]

Failure to do so would just support the suspicion they don't really have a handle on this project and/or inflated the numbers for a money grab.

Well, experience so far indicates....