JTA O&M Facility proposed for LaVilla

[thelakelander]

Another high profile block in LaVilla is being targeted for infill development. At the intersection of Bay and Jefferson Streets, the Jacksonville Transportation Authority would like to construct and operations and maintenance building for the proposed U2C Bay Street Innovation Corridor project. Take a look at the plans recently submitted to the Downtown Development Review Board and let us know what you think!

Read More: https://www.thejaxsonmag.com/article/jta-om-facility-proposed-for-lavilla/

[CG7]

So for an O&M building for something literally caledl an innovation corridor you design a tan box. You can't get any more unimaginative than that!

[thelakelander]

^Pretty much. This one needs some serious work. Don't care what the core use is. It definitely needs some interaction with Jefferson and Bay Streets.

[jaxoNOLE]

That's going to be one stellar gateway corner, what with a gas station and this beauty.

[Captain Zissou]

Wow. A fence around the building? This couldn't be any worse in terms of street interaction.  Why is this not incorporated into the regional transit center that's a quarter mile down the street?  JTA knows absolutely nothing about creating a vibrant downtown. This whole U2C project is proof of that, but with each new component, they keep showing their lack of understanding.

[Captain Zissou]

It also seems a little premature to be tying up land for maintenance facilities when the technology still doesn't exist.

[Steve]

seriously....this is one of the worst projects I've seen in the core. I realize the Acosta Ramps and Skyway make this block weird, but this is effectively a warehouse.

[thelakelander]

That's going to be one stellar gateway corner, what with a gas station and this beauty.

This LaVilla stuff is totally insane. This is what the community actually wants for Broad (especially Broad), Jefferson, Bay....









^All of these are old photos of these corridors during LaVilla's heyday. Basically, the community wants just as much density and pedestrian interactivity on these streets as what was there before that was intentionally taken away from them and razed for today's moonscape.



How we're going to get there? We're going to save, preserve, restore the historic building fabric that's left and ensure that all new infill is complimentary from a form-based perspective. In the end, this is what that plan ultimately looks like for downtown and LaVilla:



In short, this means the total opposite of what happened to Riverside Avenue in Brooklyn over the last decade. No parking lots and dead walls. If you have a project that's trying to force these things on this community, then be prepared to be up against a fight by community members to kill the project outright. If you are COJ, JTA, DIA, DDRB, etc., the same applies.

Why, we'd take one of the high traffic corners between LaVilla and Brooklyn (when there's a Whole Foods going up within close walking distance...so the market has already arrived) and kill their potential with this type of stuff is something that people really have a hard time understanding.



If this is what we're going for, it's not appropriate at the current location. A site on a secondary street, the current Skyway O&M property or in a warehouse district would be more appropriate.

[Steve]

You know if we did really have a genuine need for this at this location (Assuming that all the U2C crap made complete sense and was unquestionably economically feasible), you could do this by putting this building closer to the center, then building out a mixed-use project, with retail facing the streets and such, perhaps even doing housing above it or something like that.

There are ways things like this could be acceptable. This is not one of them.

[thelakelander]

Without a doubt, this one is going to need some retail component along Jefferson and Bay. The suburban setback will have to go as well.

[simms3]

JTA knows absolutely nothing about creating a vibrant downtown. This whole U2C project is proof of that, but with each new component, they keep showing their lack of understanding.

And to think they are basically in charge of the TOD overlay bill that was passed...they determine highest and best use in that bill.  They are the gatekeepers for building the city up within the overlay.  The "TOD overlay" also mostly references bus ("BRT") routes.  LOL

seriously....this is one of the worst projects I've seen in the core. I realize the Acosta Ramps and Skyway make this block weird, but this is effectively a warehouse.

I feel like it wouldn't actually be all that hard to come up with an activation for this area.  All we have to do is look at RAM for inspiration on what to do under highway overpasses!

[Jax_Developer]

JTA outdoes themselves once again. Bravo.

Simms, JTA put that in their box so they can control the valves of who gets to do TOD's. To be fair, we have virtually no eligible sites given the eventual removal of the skyway. I don't really count BRT, but it's better than nothing. Still, those routes are not in the best residential zones.

[Charles Hunter]

Why can't this function be served in the existing Bus O&M Facility on Myrtle Avenue? If JTA is really going to construct satellite maintenance facilities for their buses, there will be plenty of room on Myrtle Avenue.

[Live_Oak]

Maybe because the "automated" vehicles aren't going to go all the way over to Myrtle.

[marcuscnelson]

I wonder how much of the $57 million currently budgeted is just this building.

I do see in the staff report that they recommend getting rid of the equipment area facing Jefferson, so that might improve things somewhat.

My guess on why this is specifically here instead of at the JRTC or Myrtle or Skyway O&M is that they need some kind of facility for the Bay Street corridor and they don't want to make the vehicles go too far in non-revenue operation to reach said facility, and this spot, which is more likely to be seen as useless because of the existing guideway seems good enough. I do wonder what happens if all their dreams come true and the Skyway is converted for U2C use, what happens with either this facility or Skyway O&M. Surely they're not keeping both so which gets abandoned? The facility attached to the JRTC ended up effectively abandoned after the O&M was built so in theory based on age that would lose but it also has a better connection to the elevated structure so who knows?

What I really find curious is why it seems this is such a self-contained facility. There's not much reason why the datacenter and operations rooms and offices actually have to be a brand new facility colocated with the maintenance center. JTA just built brand new offices, surely those can go in there, or to Armsdale, or to Myrtle. And then a smaller maintenance depot can go here or to another site. If Beep is presumably going to be handling some of their work from Lake Nona or Guident from Boca Raton anyway then it's not that big a deal to have offices literally on top of the maintenance center.

JTA knows absolutely nothing about creating a vibrant downtown. This whole U2C project is proof of that, but with each new component, they keep showing their lack of understanding.

And to think they are basically in charge of the TOD overlay bill that was passed...they determine highest and best use in that bill.  They are the gatekeepers for building the city up within the overlay.  The "TOD overlay" also mostly references bus ("BRT") routes.  LOL

seriously....this is one of the worst projects I've seen in the core. I realize the Acosta Ramps and Skyway make this block weird, but this is effectively a warehouse.

I feel like it wouldn't actually be all that hard to come up with an activation for this area.  All we have to do is look at RAM for inspiration on what to do under highway overpasses!

I mean personally from a zoning standpoint I'd count regular bus stops for TOD purposes, even if developers are obviously not going to build skyscrapers around the 23 Bus. But for better or worse JTA spent $140 million of mostly federal money on BRT infrastructure, we ought to have the land use framework to make use of that investment. However it is ludicrous that they would legally have any direct role in the TOD. Their job is to build transit, not real estate (or self-driving R&D projects). They should certainly help in making that transit work with prospective development but forcing themselves into the position of picking and choosing projects to call TOD is madness. The market knows more than them.