JTA Cutting Riverside Trolley Service

[Gravity]

I guess you have to concede at some point this has to be paid for by interest and usage.

People in this town are used to the suburban lifestyle. I think the solution might be marketing the public service better, but that is a hard sell. When i lived in Riverside and worked downtown... i was excited by the trolley stop at the corner. I would think FCCJ students living in the area would welcome that as well.

The problem is, once you are off work... or out of school... do you always go straight home? We are lacking a comprehensive public transit system that solves more that just one-way commuting needs. It is a mite better than the central hub style bus routes elsewhere in town, but what happens if you want dinner in San Marco, or have a date out at the beach. You will take your car, cause the alternative doesnt exist.

The trolley is a great first step, but it is a local solution. The problems we have are city-wide, local solutions need to fit into a bigger plan. Solutions from other cities cannot just be transposed or overlaid like the maps on this site.

Im not sure we can get there from where we are.

Random thought... what about a ferry from County Dock road area to the ortega area?

[thelakelander]

JTA needs to be dismantled, and the sooner the better.

Agreed - and we have come to this conclusion a million times on this site.  HOW do we make it happen?

Don't renew the gas tax and it will force some type of reorganization.  Its a chunk of what keeps them afloat.

[thelakelander]

I guess you have to concede at some point this has to be paid for by interest and usage.

Correct.  However, how operations are run and community involvement is what generates interest and usage.  Fail at those two, and whatever you're putting on the street will likely fail as well.

The trolley is a great first step, but it is a local solution. The problems we have are city-wide, local solutions need to fit into a bigger plan.

A faux trolley is not an incremental step to anything.  You could achieve the same thing with an efficiently ran regular bus.  Nevertheless, I do agree that everything needs to be planned and implemented at a holistic level.

Solutions from other cities cannot just be transposed or overlaid like the maps on this site.

Sure they can.  You look at other places to see what methods have worked or failed and see if some may be successful in certain situations you're community may face.  Using the Riverside Trolley as an example, it partially failed because suggestions from the community were ignored.  Many of those suggestions actually came from solutions that have been successfully implemented in other communities across the country.

]

[Kay]

JTA needs to be dismantled, and the sooner the better.

Agreed - and we have come to this conclusion a million times on this site.  HOW do we make it happen?

Where exactly do they get the authority to exist--from the state legislature?

[fsujax]

http://www.leg.state.fl.us/statutes/index.cfm?mode=View%20Statutes&SubMenu=1&App_mode=Display_Statute&Search_String=jacksonville+transportation+authority&URL=0300-0399/0349/Sections/0349.03.html

[Overstreet]

If it is such a good idea buy a couple of trolleys, set up the business and do it.  You can change the hours all  you want. 

Unless of course, public transportation means it doesn't have to cover cost.

[thelakelander]

...and even with tolls, the Outer Beltway won't make a profit either.  The same goes for public libraries, parks, fire and police departments.

[cline]

Garbarge collection is lucrative though.  Just ask Waste Management.

[Coolyfett]

So it this suppose to mean that a Skystation near 5 Points is a bad idea?

[Kay]

http://www.leg.state.fl.us/statutes/index.cfm?mode=View%20Statutes&SubMenu=1&App_mode=Display_Statute&Search_String=jacksonville+transportation+authority&URL=0300-0399/0349/Sections/0349.03.html

Ask and you shall receive.  Thanks.

[urbaknight]

I'm just going to share my opinion with any and every manager I see. I'm going to tell them exactally what I think of them and their shitty job performance, and that I'm gunning for each and every one of their jobs; and will not rest until every one of them are fired!

I wonder if that would that get me kicked off JTA buses all together? If so, can I sue, citing that I'm legally blind and therefore, have no other way to get around?

[Ocklawaha]

JTA needs to be dismantled, and the sooner the better.

Without a doubt, this is a planned failure aimed at anything that threatens to take center stage away from BRT.

JTA is, and has been an out of control, rogue agency, long on waste and short on creative solutions. Squandering money on ill advised concepts, JTA can uniquely snub the citizenry, marching as they do to Tallahassee's drummer. Inept, inefficient and wholly incompetent to respond to the needs of a rapidly growing metropolitan area. JTA should be split into the Jacksonville Highway Authority, and the Jacksonville TRANSIT Authority, a transit authority that answers first and foremost to the citizens of Jacksonville.

Combining mass transit with an organization primarily dedicated to road building is the transportation equivalent of a zoo that keeps it's rodents and snakes in the same cage.

JTA had the opportunity to follow the Park and King suggestions that came from MJ, or the concept of creating activity centers on either end of the route by terminating at Roosevelt Plaza via Avondale and Fairfax, and in downtown. A bus route operated on frequent and consistant headways could operate well into the night. Functional and predictable schedules take the guess work out of mass transit, operating more as a magic carpet then a traditional sloppy bus.

OCKLAWAHA

[ChriswUfGator]

JTA needs to be dismantled, and the sooner the better.

+1 million

^10th power

[TheProfessor]

Weren't there two other trolley bus lines in addition to the Riverside Trolley??

[cityimrov]

I have a theory on this.  I haven't gathered the facts to prove it but it's a theory that might make sense on why JTA does what it does. 

I think JTA mass transit plans does a decent job in the only thing it seems to do.  That is, bus lower class workers from their place of resident to some workplace somewhere else and back again.  That seems to be the main mission and goal of the entire mass transit system in their eyes and the eyes of the people who put them in a position of power. 

This idea of supporting a walkable district, density, etc - these are foreign concepts to JTA.  Toys, as you will.  Things like the Riverside Trolley is just a small side project to them.  Nothing really important compared to it's main mission of moving the lower class workforce who can't afford cars from it's home to their place of work.  Anything beyond that fundamental goal is foreign to them. 

To get JTA's and the people who put JTA's power in, you need to talk more about moving lower class workers from home to work otherwise they won't have a clue what your talking about.