Metro Jacksonville

JTA Withdraw... a formula

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"Don't worry, we'll have the whole system built within 20-30 years."

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"It will not just serve as the downtown distributer, it will reach into Springfield, San Marco and Riverside and eventually over the Matthews bridge into Arlington, just trust us!"

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"See Mike, I told you we could build the BRT without any elevated sections."

The Twelve Steps
JTA Anonymous

1. We admit that we are powerless to design good transit - that our lives are managed by big oil.
2. We came to believe that a Transit Agency, greater then a highway builder, could restore our City to sanity,
3. Made a decision to turn our will in BRT  and future transit, over to the care of the citizens, as we           understand them.
4. Made a fearless moral inventory of our lies, failures and cover-ups.  

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"It's true that we are disappointed and not too many people ride the BRT system, you have to imagine, how many less people might have showed up for light rail."

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"You must understand, that old Trolley Car was a threat, err  uh, eyesore, and it could have become dangerous to adults and children, we had to scrap it before antique collectors started climbing all over it."

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"That old streetcar barn just got right in the path of the New Acosta Bridge, we had no choice but to tear it down. In fact we were relieved that the bridge missed the site completely, so as a sort of living memorial, we built the Skyway facility in it's place."


5. Admitted to City Hall, to ourselves, and to the citizens the exact nature of our political wrongs.
6. Were entirely ready to have the City remove all these defects of  planning, BRT propaganda, bus operations, and our character.
7. Humbly ask Them  to remove our Mass Transit shortcomings, so we can build more roads.
8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, neighborhoods we have split, and TOD promises unfulfilled, and became willing to make amends for them all.
9. Made direct amends to our City wherever possible, except when to do so would involve us in Mass Transit again. .
10. Continued to take  corporate inventory and when we are wrong promptly admitted it.
11. Sought through public opinion and study to improve our conscious contract with The Citizens of Jacksonville, asking for knowledge of their will and for us the power to carry it out. 
12. Having had a TRANSIT AWAKENING in Jacksonville, partly as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this mission of separate highway, and transit agency's, to the far corners of the First Coast. 

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"Please, Please, ladies and gentlemen, you know that building a Light Rail Streetcar system is a very complex and expensive undertaking, we just don't feel it is the right fit for Jacksonville to risk that kind of money such an elaborate plant."  

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"Believe us, BRT is a simpler and far cheaper alternative then Light Rail, and it is possible that it could carry just as many passengers."

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"It is alleged that old trolley Number 118 once beat an airplane in a race, they even claim something like 86 mph, but everyone  in Jacksonville "knows" how slow those Trolleys were. In Los Angeles, the new BRT buses have achieved an average speed of 17 miles per hour, with our system, we can expect even higher speeds."

Ocklawaha