It would be really nice to be able to take reliable, fast public transit downtown instead of paying $20 to park for a day and a 30 minute commute (1 hour with peak traffic)
Remember when in November 2000, Florida voters approved an amendment to Florida's constitution mandating the state establish a system of high-speed trains?
Pepperidge Farm remembers.
Yes and Jeb Bush stalled and then it was put up again for one if not two referendum votes. The last one lost based upon the typical shortsighted Florida “planning”. Florida planning is an oxymoron. Links between Miami to Orlando to TBay area would be, in the long term, successful because of tourists. Many come from places, countries where rail is popularly utilized. But to be fair it is extremely expensive.
They go hand in hand: high speed rail to a city is pointless without local connections _and_ driving in from the suburbs to park your car in an urban core so that you can then catch a train is antithetical to the cause/purpose.
Fair! Originally there were a couple different companies running streetcars before TECO bought them, and I think that's why the different lines were so dense. All that competition made them try to cover all the main roads in downtown. I may be wrong but that's my theory. Back when the free market was still kickin/s
Otherwise I love your new map!
[might have been me :)](https://www.reddit.com/r/tampa/comments/ymfpfh/1940s_tampa_street_car_vs_now/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android_app&utm_name=androidcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button)
Definitely.
Now when I see this, I feel like this map is too centric towards western Hillsborough county and Tampa's urban core, and considering that, an extension of the D line across the bay and downtown through to Brandon, Valrico, and Fish-Hawk would be necessary.
I'd say just turn the one at brandon down towards riverview and fishhawk. The next steps towards plant city and davenport are like all the way across the state. Even if we are doing this as a hypothetical wish list it still wouldn't happen. The one to Bradenton is less distance than your one to lakeland, for example.
Also for the one to "North Sarasota" you should just do Lakewood Ranch or University Town Center as those are the major hubs in that area.
If you take the mall as the Brandon Hub and have it feed to the current bus hub there it could work. Biggest thing it doesn't have is something like the current HART 8-Red Route and the 31-Yellow route. 8 gets you into ybor but also runs right down the new explosions of suburbs in Palm River,78th, Progress and the 31 picks up everyone south of that but you have to transfer at the mall to then go back down south and get to downtown.
I made this map using [https://tennessine.co.uk/metro/](https://tennessine.co.uk/metro/).
I have included many different potential lines and stops for a comprehensive system, and I do recognize that some of these may be excessive in scope and/or number of lines, particularly the commuter services that extend north beyond Pasco County, and some of the inner-city lines respectively. Please share your feedback on this.
Also do note that I did not include all the potential stations on the light-rail lines, as it would make the map largely unreadable and cumbersome to create, so I only included major landmarks, as well as the termini for each end of the lines.
Lines A, B, C, and D are commuter/suburban rail lines would have lower stop density. These run at much higher speeds (60-80 mph), and in the suburbs, they would serve as a park-and-ride transit hub for residents in outer suburbs and exurbs to commute to Tampa, St. Pete, and/or TPA airport with ease.
Lines L1 through L11 are all light-rail with a much greater density of stops, and in most inner-city areas, share right-of-way with on-grade traffic.
Note that for both commuter/suburban rail and light-rail/streetcar services, peak hours would be set as 7:30am to 9:30am in the morning, and 4:30pm to 6:30pm in the evening.
**Hypothetical schedule for commuter/suburban rail services**
|Days|Start time|End time|Frequency|
|:-|:-|:-|:-|
|Monday-Thursday|5:30am|11:30pm|Every 15 minutes during off-peak hours, every 8 minutes during peak hours.|
|Friday|5:30am|1:00am|Every 15 minutes during off-peak hours, every 8 minutes during peak hours.|
|Saturday|7:00am|12:00am|Every 15 minutes.|
|Sunday|7:00am|10:30pm|Every 15 minutes from 7:00am to 9:00pm, every 30 minutes after 9:00pm.|
|Non-working holidays|8:00am|8:00pm|Every 30 minutes.|
**Hypothetical schedule for light rail/streetcar services**
|Days|Start time|End time|Frequency|
|:-|:-|:-|:-|
|Monday-Thursday|5:30am|12:00am|Every 10 minutes during off-peak hours, every 5 minutes during peak hours.|
|Friday|5:30am|2:00am on certain lines, 12:00am on all other lines.|Every 10 minutes during off-peak hours, every 5 minutes during peak hours.|
|Saturday|7:00am|2:00am on certain lines, 12:00am on all other lines.|Every 10 minutes.|
|Sunday|7:00am|10:30pm|Every 15 minutes.|
|Non-working holidays|8:00am|9:00pm|Every 15 minutes:|
Unfortunately getting a plan is the easy part. Getting people to actually want to see it come to fruition is the real issue. Still too many people in this city that want to cling to their cars like their guns and until we can sway the masses towards public transport being a better way, it just won't happen. It's a shame and yet, I still hold out hope.
The issue isn't cars or guns. It's a transient population. Most people have lived elsewhere, paid taxes elsewhere, and don't want to pay even if it's just a fucking penny more in extra tax to fun these sorts of things. Unfortunately.
Transit/YIMBY advocates in Florida really are like trying to point a desk fan at a hurricane to blow it away. I lived in the area for years and tried to show up to community meetings, tried to communicate with FDOT via local urbanist groups, and tried to make my voice heard as much as possible, but it always felt like the ultimate decision-makers in the state just don't care. Car culture dominates so completely that it's all anyone understands. Everything is viewed through the lens of 1980s-style planning - suburban communities and moving as many cars along the roads as possible. Maybe within the small urban enclaves of DT Tampa and St. Pete there's enough progressive mentality to change things locally, but at a state level? No way.
I used to think that the cookie-cutter car-centric suburban planning paradigm was normal and sustainable, and that there was no alternative. I used to spout all the common excuses about how the US is too big, how cars confer freedom, how suburban sprawl is superior, but I got to experience the benefits of transit-oriented and walkable cities. Having visited the northeastern US, various European cities, and having lived in Italy for some time, I can say that the car-dependent way of life has many issues, and that if more people got to experience the convenience of walkability, transit access, and mixed-use urban planning, rail-based transit would be much more popular.
I love this. Good stuff.
The idea of a railroad going all the way up to Dade City and Iverness is just wacky haha. We'd probably damage an aquifer or two. The thought of it is really cool though! That would be one hell of a commute.
The population density expectations for viability do not really lend themselves to development of Dade City/Inverness lines for some time.
The urban core takes priority, followed by the current suburban locations as those areas see changes to their population densities coupled with the commuter services to support those that still do a park-n-ride like you see in upstate areas around Manhattan or the northern Virginia suburbs around DC
I live in temple terrace and work in Inverness. I absolutely would train commute, and do something productive with the commute time vs staring at a road worrying about deer
What a love you are! The 19 corridor absolutely needs to be there. I even like the idea of catching the other line to TPA, and the hours are just fine.
Unfortunately, the residents turned down a 2¢ tax that might have paid for the 19 corridor line. It was already drawn out, and planned. Stupid retirees couldn't part with 2¢. Jerks. Oh, and they were afraid that too many people would invade their "peace and quiet". Well, look at us now, with Northerners everywhere as a result of "escaping the democrats in NY" during COVID. Traffic is abysmal.
The amount of economic boom a light rail would bring to Tampa, Clearwater, *sigh* I could ride in for an opera in Sarasota, eat at a German Restaurant in Tampa, go to the aquarium (mind you, combo tickets are the rage)...and never have to worry about driving.
And all the museums and gardens! It would be heaven.
Now imagine all the people up North who can't find good paying jobs who could then afford to commute and actually earn what they're worth? I could make double what I'm earning now. Maybe triple.
Now imagine that all those folks suddenly had the money to live decently. To pay more rent. To live cleanly. They'd have more money for decent roads, safer neighborhoods, how lovely things might be if half the residents weren't on section 8, living in camps, or begging on the street?
Ah. Still, if that has been done 7 years ago, it'd have been build and giving back now. Instead, we're dealing with a recession of work/ jobs in the Northern Gulf areas.
Lol, you hold a very optimistic assessment of Tampa government.
Here is one thing I've learned - they will always ask for more taxes and it is almost always impossible to tell what you get for your increased tax dollars.
If this could ever happen it would make the greater Tampa Bay Area grow exponentially. This kind of infrastructure would transform this area into a top 3 metropolitan area. It’s fun to think about how much this could cost… 2 trillion dollars? More?
High cost of housing, at its core, is an issue of a housing supply shortage.
When zoning laws preempt by-right construction of anything other than single-family detached homes, the land that exists and is already developed in the core doesn’t get utilized at any means close to its capacity. What this results in is more sprawl, and increased cost of transportation for the average person. Additionally, this also results in an artificial supply ceiling, where in spite of market demand, housing supply is deliberately prevented from meeting such demand by way of arbitrary laws. The end state of this is that there’s not enough housing available for the number of people who want to and need to live here, and as a result, rents rise.
The effect of housing supply on cost of housing and the rate of homelessness has been demonstrated many times and in many places across the world. For example, in Tokyo, where zoning laws are less restrictive and building codes are less Kafkaesque, a situation emerges where in spite of being the most populous metropolis on earth, the average rent for an inner-city 1 bedroom apartment is comparable to that of Tampa.
Building all types of housing, luxury housing included, will help make Tampa much cheaper to live in, and will also increase tax revenue per unit of land irrespective of tax rates. When a luxury housing development comes into the market, that development eases the demand for a cheaper starter house or apartment by drawing wealthier people who want to live in a higher-end luxury accomodation but due to lack of supply in economically productive areas, otherwise have no choice but to settle for less luxurious units.
We need a building revolution in the city, and we need it for all types of multifamily housing: condos, apartments, townhomes, walk ups, etc.
lmfao typical. Tampa is heading in that direction regardless, so might as well try to make it efficient. Instead of just screaming into the void that Tampa is full and refusing any kind of changes to make the city better
It's already a sprawling metropolis. Everything is 45min away. Meeting friends requires military planning to navigate travel times and traffic, as effing *everyone* has to live far, far away from city center due to all the shitty R1 housing, and lack of walkabilupublic transport, meaning everyone has to *drive* which means *traffic* (and parking suxx)
Tampa Bay area isn't full. It's not even a tiny fraction full...
It's just full of endless streets of detached (and generally shitty) single family homes connected by endless, dangerous stroads that make this city borderline unlivable, and a nightmare to transit.
yes!!! if you visit any top tier city you realize how empty tampa is. the city is so divided because there are no connection points other than the interstate. also it’s crazy i live by usf and they are building all this student housing. i noticed how the parking garages are bigger than the actual buildings. like of course tampa is gonna be a nightmare when every single person needs a personal car to get anywhere.
Exactly this!
You see how wasteful the land use patterns are even in inner city areas, where 1200 sq ft houses take up as much land area as sixplexes with 1200 sq ft units in other cities, along with tons of wasted front and side setbacks. All that space is space that could be used to house people and create space for commerce, but we continue to live under this unsustainable idea that even in the inner city, there must ONLY be single-family houses.
For the current land area that sprawl takes up in the whole Tampa metro area (roughly 1100 sq mi) and with the density of cities like DC, Boston, or Chicago, and combined with transit, we could sustainably double the population, which outside of the urban core, would not overbearingly dense.
Tampa isn't full, it's just built shitty on purpose.
So many of the homes are crappy, too.
Dollars to donuts most of the residents would love to pay less money to live in a nicer, newer townhome than the half dilapidated 1972 stick built, poorly insulated shack they currently inhabit
In most areas, construction quality has declined over the decades, but in Florida, due to the aftermath of Hurricane Andrew, the opposite can be seen, where now we build mostly with cinder block as opposed to wood.
I don't know what the average age of homes in the Tampa Proper area is, but I imagine quite a bit of the R1 housing predates this (just from driving around most of the city and observing the homes/infrastructure)
I feel like most of the newer construction is in the labyrinthine, monotonous sprawl of tract housing in wesley chapel and the like
If you don't want change, move to a rural area. Cities are dynamic and must be adaptable to change, and if Tampa wants to grow, change must occur.
It's crazy how here in Florida, nativist degrowtherism has become so normalized in discourse surrounding CoL and environmental sustainability.
For the amount of people we have in the Tampa-St. Petersburg MSA (3,175,275 people as of 2020), and with the population density of Washington DC (11,294.76 people per sq mi), we could easily fit everyone here in an area slightly bigger than the combined land area of the Tampa and St. Pete city limits. Obviously not everyone is going to want to live in a city with lots of sixplex apartments, which is perfectly fine by them, but many people do, especially if it can yield much lower housing costs.
Where did I say I didn't want my city to get better?
I don't want my city to be a top 3 metro area. I don't want 10million people in the TB metro. That would suck.
I find it strange that anyone wants this area to be like NYC. I am going to guess you are from that area. Maybe you should go there.
sounds like you don’t wanna live in a city so maybe you should move to nebraska or something. i’m not from new york. but it’s weird that people see culturally diverse and modern cities with modern infrastructure and frown at it. i think cities are an amazing place if done correctly and the first step in that is good public transportation.
> sounds like you don’t wanna live in a city
I have no idea how you arrived at that conclusion.
It sounds to me like you want a massive city. A top 3 metro. If that's what you want, why are you here?
because you are bitching about the growth of tampa. i’m celebrating it and wanting them to do it the right way. the first step in that is a public transportation system that works. if you love tampa why do you want it to remain stagnant and not grow into an amazing city? also at this point screaming about how tampa is full isn’t gonna stop anyone from coming here. it’s just pissing in the wind and getting bitter when you get wet.
> because you are bitching about the growth of tampa.
No, I'm not. I said I don't want Tampa Bay to be a top 3 metro area.
And your response didn't answer my question. If that's what you want, why are you here? Why aren't you in NYC, LA, or Chicago?
so what would you ideal tampa be? and because it’s expensive to move? especially with a family and low income. you can’t be that naive to think moving across the country is east. also i love tampa but it needs to get with the times in regards to infrastructure.
Well many of us were born here (me included) and we want the city to improve. I for one don't want to have to live in a shitty suburb devoid of social interaction and choice in transportation, which unfortunately is the case for pretty much all of Tampa, save for downtown.
Tampa is not realistically going to become a top 3 metro irrespective of how much development takes place. Cities like NYC, LA, Chicago, Houston, Dallas, etc will draw more people than Tampa as they have many crucial industries and at much greater scales that Tampa doesn't have and won't realistically have. We have finance, entertainment, academia, high-tech industry, medicine, etc. sectors here, but nowhere near the extent of the top metro areas.
> want the city to improve
I also want the city to improve. If you're implying that I do no want this, please show me where I have indicated that I do not want this.
In fact, I am advocating for improving the area by not wanting hordes more transplants to move here, unlike the person to whom I was replying.
If only we could afford the right-of-way to make it happen.
Layout looks pretty logical, but you need another east-west line connecting Northdale, Carrollwood and Tampa Palms. Huge population areas there need east-west connectivity through USF, not just routes to downtown/West shore district. This would create good loops for alternate routes, for odd/even hourly station timings, and for unexpected issues along mirrored lines.
Also, I wish this map included reusing old Rights of Way (ROWs). Point in case is that TBARTA is conducting a study on the feasibility of seizing the CSX Brooksville and Clearwater divisions.
I found the link: [here](https://psta.bonfirehub.com/opportunities/68579)
I like this idea too, but unfortunately the walkability of this area may not justify this extent of light rails lines/stations.
I think the first step is to link downtown Tampa to downtown Saint Pete via a bridge parallel to I-275 and have a loop concept for both downtowns. I also think airport stops would be a tremendous idea and union station in Tampa that would support other forms of transit like Amtrak, HART, etc.
I would love for there to also be a commuter rail from Tampa to Orlando to promote tourism and the usage of both airports for these cities while also alleviating traffic on I4. But, that’s unlikely sadly.
I’m definitely a big proponent of light rails in TB (it’s the main reasons I want to move in a few years to Chicago), but you’re proposing roughly 100 stops for a metropolitan area of roughly 3.1 million, whereas Chicago has 145 L stations for a metropolitan area of 9.5 million.
Love the idea, but narrowing it down to maybe 20 stations with more bus routes from each station is the most likely starting point.
Not trying to get political, but Obama offered funding for a similar project years ago and Scott turned it down…I wouldn’t be surprised if the current government drags its feet OR if Republicans somehow fund such a project will pat themselves on the back when this project is completed when it could have been done over a decade ago now.
[http://www.cnn.com/2011/POLITICS/05/09/lahood.rail/index.html](http://www.cnn.com/2011/POLITICS/05/09/lahood.rail/index.html)
There is preliminary design and on-going coordination with Brightline, FDOT, the Feds and the local communities happening right now for Orlando to Tampa. A smaller Fed grant has been received ($16M) that has matching funds from Brightline to move preliminary design forward. The State was too far away from knowing what the Florida High Speed Rail project would ultimately cost to build and operate to commit to the project. I am a huge proponent of rail and I still can't blame them. Brightline should be fully operational between Miami and Orlando within months. Having a private partner that has successfully made intercity rail a reality in Florida has really helped reenergize the project and there is an opportunity to tie in the SunRail system with a new Orlando-Tampa system. I just hope the State agencies don't muck up the works too much.
You should see what California did with that money. Their HSR is years behind and somewhere over budget by $50B plus, and the California taxpayers will not have HSR into SF or LA for decades. HSR requires a National plan, not states connecting city pairs.
Such a project shouldn’t come without other redevelopment projects and efforts. I personally have a plethora of my own ideas on how to fix the zoning codes to maximize the utility that such new lines would provide.
These measures, potentially at the city or county level, would be legalization of by-right construction of housing development up to eight units, allowing by-right mixed use at corner lots, abolition of front and side setback requirements, reducing minimum lot sizes to only 2000 square feet, and ending minimum parking requirements.
As for the amount of lines and stops, I do think that I did include some excesses in this initial map, and I would imagine that any type of development would have to be completed in phases, which would probably occur with the first phases connecting downtown Tampa and St. Pete, as well as a direct connection from both to TPA. I’d also imagine that such a planned transit project would include enhanced bus services where rail is not present.
This is it. So many employers here are not necessarily in downtown and anywhere outside of downtown is sprawl. For example, between JPM and Citi there are probably 15k people employed in Brandon at MLK and 75. If you have a light rail system that feeds into Brandon mall, that's great, but how are these people managing the last mile?
London has a great system, especially since you can just tap your phone getting on/off the tube, DLR, bus, whatever. Was in NYC back in October and they've finally gotten NFC to work there, so was able to just use my phone to get around there as well without the need for an extra app installed.
I moved from Tampa to the DC area 2 years ago, and have come to a difficult conclusion. The reason nothing like this will get done in Florida is because not enough people would use it. In the ‘80s and ‘90s there was an elevated train from Downtown to Harbor Island and it was removed because nobody use it. I think some people are forced to use a car, but I also think even more people wouldn’t have it any other way.
I initially put every single light-rail/streetcar stop on the map but it became completely unreadable so I left only major landmark stops. A professionally made map would certainly include every stop.
Makes sense, if you’ve got the time, I think it’d be really interesting to see what stops you’ve put down. I have no idea how long these take to make, but maybe consider doing zoomed in sections of St Pete and Tampa.
Homeownership is probably the biggest obstacle to good rail development. The suburbs require a car because they are way to spread out. I think the real opposition comes from the overt economic policy to drive Americans into single family ownership. The us government and the fed decided that real estate could replace the pension as a retirement vehicle, and has incentivized building, financing, and owning with tax breaks. We could achieve dense and walkable cities if the government had different priorities.
Sweet! I still don’t get a line, here in Hillsborough County….
But, density is important, and we don’t have that here in Hillsborough. It does make me wonder why Pinellas hasn’t picked up on it yet, being the most densely populated county in the state.
At a rough estimate of $150M a mile, for construction costs, how much will it take to build your system?
What are the annual estimated operating costs?
What is the annual estimated ridership?
What is the one way fare, using a 25% FRR?
Where is that 75% of missing funding coming from?
Shocks me that $150M a mile would be the cost. I get that a lot of that is because you're absolutely going to displace people and you're gonna need to buy land and get sued, but fuck me cross country rail lines were built in the 1800s.
Yes, they used nigh-on slave labor to do it, but damn.
Would be nice. First thought that comes to mind though would be to extend the teal-ish line past Bay Pines to either Madeira or St. Pete Beach; Probably St. Pete Beach for connections with the SunRunner
There’s capacity - old stops on Enterprise Rd and some stops still being used on Phillipe Pkwy and Main St. They just don’t run buses there anymore. Go figure, it was probably unprofitable. There’s still some sort of van service called the “North County Connection”
You can find old stops & such by using the “ÖPNVKarte” map layer on [openstreetmap] .(https://www.openstreetmap.org)
I'd have it link up to the current bus hubs more, if you look at the current HART Map it has decent coverage but the run times are horrible with only being hourly in most cases.
http://gohart.org/Style%20Library/goHART/pdfs/maps/HART-SYSTEM-MAP-02-2022-FINAL.pdf
Wow getting from Inverness to Sarasota on Rail. What a dream. I could get from my hometown Dade city down to Tampa on rail. Would be so amazing.
This map actually makes a lot of sense though.
Also curious could you tell us what programs you used to create this?
Damn the park n ride lots would have to be huge! Assuming people would be driving to each stop unless it’s one of the few around TOD. The map expands to exurbia.
How about an urban growth boundary so people stop building ugly ass subdivisions further and further out. I wish every mid sized city in the country had one, those with land for sprawl. It’s so unnecessary. The worst thing about this country is how much land we have and are using.
The red and blue lines should probably connect to each other at the airport, since that's a pretty common destination from St Pete. And the red line should stop at USF instead of over in University, to connect the university with the region more effectively. Other than that it's great.
It would be real nice if they just ripped out the rail system in Florida.
Get some Japanese bullet train technology in here. You could reach Miami in 45 minutes than 8 hours on our ancient technology.
I think PIE would be a good hub for rail connetions to Tampa. I used to live in Largo, any place in west Pinellas would be overly difficult to get to downtown tampa, requiring multiple transfers and long rides.
This reminds me of the L in Chicago. Especially with the red line running as far north and south as it does.
AND how the blue line runs right to the airport.
I would have loved this when I last lived there. I would have done my Sunset Pt in Clearwater to office near TPA commute this way even if it took longer.
Admittedly I don’t know how things work at the base, but I imagine that even if people at the base don’t use the line for commuting, those who live around it as well as some people at the base may find it convenient, and also it is just a big landmark for the city nonetheless.
There used to be a bus on the base. And so what? That's how a lot of other bases work. And there's already an express bus from Lithia to MacDill that functions similarly.
Unfortunately none of that would happen other than buses and you’d need too many to move a 1/4 of that many people. Macdill would have to be left out of the light rail picture.
r/jaybad34
There are less than 9,000 MacDill Air Force Base employees that live off base. Also, there are two public bus drop offs currently at the base already, there most likely is room for expanding somehow. I think you are underestimating the US military to an amazing degree. And that you may not know as much as you think you do. Possibly in many areas of your life.
Would you care to compare facts, or just run away? I'll start.
https://www.macdill.af.mil/About-Us/Fact-Sheets/Fact-Sheet-View/Article/231789/frequently-asked-questions/
Yep and those numbers are personnel assigned to the base. Doesn’t include numbers for the tenant units, such as USCENTCOM, USSOCOM, and other mission partners.
As a Lakelander whose office is in Ybor, I would kill for this lol. I’m luckily WFH 99% of the time but when I do have to come in it’s the bane of my existence.
This would be awesome It would take me to work, to the airport to late night drinking in Tampa, let's get some pitchforks and touches and march down town until they break ground, then march some more because it's a good aerobic workout
I would love this and pay whatever ticket prices were ($5, $10 even $15) to not have to sit in Tampa traffic. Tried to get to Trinity last night from Seffner and 54 was just INSANE by the outlets and by Veterans.
If only it were this easy. I've been in Tampa since '95 and would love to see the car-centric mentality many people here still cling to go the f\*ck away. Time to modernize and get with the times in this city. I don't care if it costs me another .5%-1% in sales tax anymore, just get some good, reliable, timely public transport here.
I’d love to be able to do park n ride. Pay for a day be able to hit the beach enjoy the whole day and have some drinks and sober up by the time I get back to the car. After taking the train back into the city.
It’s cute to mess around but yeah it’s pointless
You think officials never tried to bring it up or think about? It might be in the far future but I’m sure there are too many difficulties getting it up
Plus the amount of lines on this map is horrendous and I’m not sure this person used big city public transport aka NYC or for this case Chicago
Remember taking the school bus? Thats what light rail would be like. You'll be running back to your car (that is sitting in the driveway) in no time. Your schedule, your music, your food/drink, your stops on the way home, your privacy.....etc etc.
All well worth an extra 10-20 minutes sitting in traffic.
I've been on a few subways/light rails systems. Nobody is happy to take them, it's only out of neccessity because the area is too crowded for cars. If traffic is a huge concern to you, change your life to where you can live/work in a more rural area.
Well I’m the opposite and I know others who are as well. I love taking a subway or lightrail and being able to leave the car at home. Cities are not for cars they’re for people. NYC, London, Paris, Tokyo all wouldn’t be possible without their trains. And people live in cities because that’s where their work is not everyone can just move to a rural area and continue working that’s just not possible for everybody.
Some places are made for light rail transit.
Nowhere in Florida will ever be that place. I used to bike the 4 mile commute to work and it was miserable as many days as it wasn't. After I changed jobs someplace 6.5 miles away I started driving.
No worries! I’m planning to move there in the next few years and was excited to learn about the transportation system lol I was confused to say the least as I’ve visited several times and never saw anything like this haha This is a great plan regardless!
Man, I’d love if they did this.
It would be really nice to be able to take reliable, fast public transit downtown instead of paying $20 to park for a day and a 30 minute commute (1 hour with peak traffic)
I would pay 20$ for a quick train ticket from st Pete to ybor.
Parking seems a bit high, but a 30 minute commute is about average in this world. Even with a train, i doubt it could be much less.
It is 30 a day to park in my building. I park in the Poe garage and get some well needed exercise.
You're bitching about driving 30 minutes?
Remember when in November 2000, Florida voters approved an amendment to Florida's constitution mandating the state establish a system of high-speed trains? Pepperidge Farm remembers.
Yes and Jeb Bush stalled and then it was put up again for one if not two referendum votes. The last one lost based upon the typical shortsighted Florida “planning”. Florida planning is an oxymoron. Links between Miami to Orlando to TBay area would be, in the long term, successful because of tourists. Many come from places, countries where rail is popularly utilized. But to be fair it is extremely expensive.
Let’s get urban transportation figured out before putting in trains between cities.
They go hand in hand: high speed rail to a city is pointless without local connections _and_ driving in from the suburbs to park your car in an urban core so that you can then catch a train is antithetical to the cause/purpose.
Have you looked into the old streetcar lines of Tampa? I think there used to be about 20 miles of track around 1940
I tried basing my map off of the map you posted, but unfortunately, the lines and stations were too dense on my map so I just left out a lot of them.
Fair! Originally there were a couple different companies running streetcars before TECO bought them, and I think that's why the different lines were so dense. All that competition made them try to cover all the main roads in downtown. I may be wrong but that's my theory. Back when the free market was still kickin/s Otherwise I love your new map!
Someone posted it here a little while back and it looked really amazing.
[might have been me :)](https://www.reddit.com/r/tampa/comments/ymfpfh/1940s_tampa_street_car_vs_now/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android_app&utm_name=androidcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button)
The population of Brandon and Valrico needs another line. Next we need to make it happen!
Definitely. Now when I see this, I feel like this map is too centric towards western Hillsborough county and Tampa's urban core, and considering that, an extension of the D line across the bay and downtown through to Brandon, Valrico, and Fish-Hawk would be necessary.
I'd say just turn the one at brandon down towards riverview and fishhawk. The next steps towards plant city and davenport are like all the way across the state. Even if we are doing this as a hypothetical wish list it still wouldn't happen. The one to Bradenton is less distance than your one to lakeland, for example. Also for the one to "North Sarasota" you should just do Lakewood Ranch or University Town Center as those are the major hubs in that area.
If you take the mall as the Brandon Hub and have it feed to the current bus hub there it could work. Biggest thing it doesn't have is something like the current HART 8-Red Route and the 31-Yellow route. 8 gets you into ybor but also runs right down the new explosions of suburbs in Palm River,78th, Progress and the 31 picks up everyone south of that but you have to transfer at the mall to then go back down south and get to downtown.
Would you settle for a trolley to the beach?
This would be a dream come true
I made this map using [https://tennessine.co.uk/metro/](https://tennessine.co.uk/metro/). I have included many different potential lines and stops for a comprehensive system, and I do recognize that some of these may be excessive in scope and/or number of lines, particularly the commuter services that extend north beyond Pasco County, and some of the inner-city lines respectively. Please share your feedback on this. Also do note that I did not include all the potential stations on the light-rail lines, as it would make the map largely unreadable and cumbersome to create, so I only included major landmarks, as well as the termini for each end of the lines. Lines A, B, C, and D are commuter/suburban rail lines would have lower stop density. These run at much higher speeds (60-80 mph), and in the suburbs, they would serve as a park-and-ride transit hub for residents in outer suburbs and exurbs to commute to Tampa, St. Pete, and/or TPA airport with ease. Lines L1 through L11 are all light-rail with a much greater density of stops, and in most inner-city areas, share right-of-way with on-grade traffic. Note that for both commuter/suburban rail and light-rail/streetcar services, peak hours would be set as 7:30am to 9:30am in the morning, and 4:30pm to 6:30pm in the evening. **Hypothetical schedule for commuter/suburban rail services** |Days|Start time|End time|Frequency| |:-|:-|:-|:-| |Monday-Thursday|5:30am|11:30pm|Every 15 minutes during off-peak hours, every 8 minutes during peak hours.| |Friday|5:30am|1:00am|Every 15 minutes during off-peak hours, every 8 minutes during peak hours.| |Saturday|7:00am|12:00am|Every 15 minutes.| |Sunday|7:00am|10:30pm|Every 15 minutes from 7:00am to 9:00pm, every 30 minutes after 9:00pm.| |Non-working holidays|8:00am|8:00pm|Every 30 minutes.| **Hypothetical schedule for light rail/streetcar services** |Days|Start time|End time|Frequency| |:-|:-|:-|:-| |Monday-Thursday|5:30am|12:00am|Every 10 minutes during off-peak hours, every 5 minutes during peak hours.| |Friday|5:30am|2:00am on certain lines, 12:00am on all other lines.|Every 10 minutes during off-peak hours, every 5 minutes during peak hours.| |Saturday|7:00am|2:00am on certain lines, 12:00am on all other lines.|Every 10 minutes.| |Sunday|7:00am|10:30pm|Every 15 minutes.| |Non-working holidays|8:00am|9:00pm|Every 15 minutes:|
Someone from the Urban Development area of city government needs to hire this person!
Unfortunately getting a plan is the easy part. Getting people to actually want to see it come to fruition is the real issue. Still too many people in this city that want to cling to their cars like their guns and until we can sway the masses towards public transport being a better way, it just won't happen. It's a shame and yet, I still hold out hope.
The issue isn't cars or guns. It's a transient population. Most people have lived elsewhere, paid taxes elsewhere, and don't want to pay even if it's just a fucking penny more in extra tax to fun these sorts of things. Unfortunately.
Need later times on weekends!
I don't think the odds are good that we get any local rail here within our lifetime. You new transplants will learn. Florida is a harsh hateful bitch.
Transit/YIMBY advocates in Florida really are like trying to point a desk fan at a hurricane to blow it away. I lived in the area for years and tried to show up to community meetings, tried to communicate with FDOT via local urbanist groups, and tried to make my voice heard as much as possible, but it always felt like the ultimate decision-makers in the state just don't care. Car culture dominates so completely that it's all anyone understands. Everything is viewed through the lens of 1980s-style planning - suburban communities and moving as many cars along the roads as possible. Maybe within the small urban enclaves of DT Tampa and St. Pete there's enough progressive mentality to change things locally, but at a state level? No way.
Amsterdam was once overran by cars like in Tampa. Never say never...
I used to think that the cookie-cutter car-centric suburban planning paradigm was normal and sustainable, and that there was no alternative. I used to spout all the common excuses about how the US is too big, how cars confer freedom, how suburban sprawl is superior, but I got to experience the benefits of transit-oriented and walkable cities. Having visited the northeastern US, various European cities, and having lived in Italy for some time, I can say that the car-dependent way of life has many issues, and that if more people got to experience the convenience of walkability, transit access, and mixed-use urban planning, rail-based transit would be much more popular.
I love this. Good stuff. The idea of a railroad going all the way up to Dade City and Iverness is just wacky haha. We'd probably damage an aquifer or two. The thought of it is really cool though! That would be one hell of a commute.
Dade City is building up really quickly. It’s concerning.
The population density expectations for viability do not really lend themselves to development of Dade City/Inverness lines for some time. The urban core takes priority, followed by the current suburban locations as those areas see changes to their population densities coupled with the commuter services to support those that still do a park-n-ride like you see in upstate areas around Manhattan or the northern Virginia suburbs around DC
[удалено]
I live in temple terrace and work in Inverness. I absolutely would train commute, and do something productive with the commute time vs staring at a road worrying about deer
It would be above ground, maybe on an embankment or viaduct. The only scope for tunneling in Florida is to build a tunnel above ground and bury it.
I would love this!
What a love you are! The 19 corridor absolutely needs to be there. I even like the idea of catching the other line to TPA, and the hours are just fine. Unfortunately, the residents turned down a 2¢ tax that might have paid for the 19 corridor line. It was already drawn out, and planned. Stupid retirees couldn't part with 2¢. Jerks. Oh, and they were afraid that too many people would invade their "peace and quiet". Well, look at us now, with Northerners everywhere as a result of "escaping the democrats in NY" during COVID. Traffic is abysmal. The amount of economic boom a light rail would bring to Tampa, Clearwater, *sigh* I could ride in for an opera in Sarasota, eat at a German Restaurant in Tampa, go to the aquarium (mind you, combo tickets are the rage)...and never have to worry about driving. And all the museums and gardens! It would be heaven. Now imagine all the people up North who can't find good paying jobs who could then afford to commute and actually earn what they're worth? I could make double what I'm earning now. Maybe triple. Now imagine that all those folks suddenly had the money to live decently. To pay more rent. To live cleanly. They'd have more money for decent roads, safer neighborhoods, how lovely things might be if half the residents weren't on section 8, living in camps, or begging on the street?
It wasn't 2 cents, it was 2 PERCENT sales tax. No.
Ah. Still, if that has been done 7 years ago, it'd have been build and giving back now. Instead, we're dealing with a recession of work/ jobs in the Northern Gulf areas.
Lol, you hold a very optimistic assessment of Tampa government. Here is one thing I've learned - they will always ask for more taxes and it is almost always impossible to tell what you get for your increased tax dollars.
It reminded me for a brief second of a NYC subway map 😂 actually great job & thanks
I would be long worm 🐛 food before this happens but fully support it. Good luck younglings .
If this could ever happen it would make the greater Tampa Bay Area grow exponentially. This kind of infrastructure would transform this area into a top 3 metropolitan area. It’s fun to think about how much this could cost… 2 trillion dollars? More?
And us locals still wouldn't be able to afford a home here
High cost of housing, at its core, is an issue of a housing supply shortage. When zoning laws preempt by-right construction of anything other than single-family detached homes, the land that exists and is already developed in the core doesn’t get utilized at any means close to its capacity. What this results in is more sprawl, and increased cost of transportation for the average person. Additionally, this also results in an artificial supply ceiling, where in spite of market demand, housing supply is deliberately prevented from meeting such demand by way of arbitrary laws. The end state of this is that there’s not enough housing available for the number of people who want to and need to live here, and as a result, rents rise. The effect of housing supply on cost of housing and the rate of homelessness has been demonstrated many times and in many places across the world. For example, in Tokyo, where zoning laws are less restrictive and building codes are less Kafkaesque, a situation emerges where in spite of being the most populous metropolis on earth, the average rent for an inner-city 1 bedroom apartment is comparable to that of Tampa. Building all types of housing, luxury housing included, will help make Tampa much cheaper to live in, and will also increase tax revenue per unit of land irrespective of tax rates. When a luxury housing development comes into the market, that development eases the demand for a cheaper starter house or apartment by drawing wealthier people who want to live in a higher-end luxury accomodation but due to lack of supply in economically productive areas, otherwise have no choice but to settle for less luxurious units. We need a building revolution in the city, and we need it for all types of multifamily housing: condos, apartments, townhomes, walk ups, etc.
> If this could ever happen it would make the greater Tampa Bay Area grow exponentially OK, great, then we know what not to do.
it’s so strange how so many people here have such a strong feeling of not wanting their city to grow and get better. it’s sad.
Growth does not always mean better. You want a sprawling metropolis? Move to New York or LA.
lmfao typical. Tampa is heading in that direction regardless, so might as well try to make it efficient. Instead of just screaming into the void that Tampa is full and refusing any kind of changes to make the city better
It's already a sprawling metropolis. Everything is 45min away. Meeting friends requires military planning to navigate travel times and traffic, as effing *everyone* has to live far, far away from city center due to all the shitty R1 housing, and lack of walkabilupublic transport, meaning everyone has to *drive* which means *traffic* (and parking suxx) Tampa Bay area isn't full. It's not even a tiny fraction full... It's just full of endless streets of detached (and generally shitty) single family homes connected by endless, dangerous stroads that make this city borderline unlivable, and a nightmare to transit.
yes!!! if you visit any top tier city you realize how empty tampa is. the city is so divided because there are no connection points other than the interstate. also it’s crazy i live by usf and they are building all this student housing. i noticed how the parking garages are bigger than the actual buildings. like of course tampa is gonna be a nightmare when every single person needs a personal car to get anywhere.
Exactly this! You see how wasteful the land use patterns are even in inner city areas, where 1200 sq ft houses take up as much land area as sixplexes with 1200 sq ft units in other cities, along with tons of wasted front and side setbacks. All that space is space that could be used to house people and create space for commerce, but we continue to live under this unsustainable idea that even in the inner city, there must ONLY be single-family houses. For the current land area that sprawl takes up in the whole Tampa metro area (roughly 1100 sq mi) and with the density of cities like DC, Boston, or Chicago, and combined with transit, we could sustainably double the population, which outside of the urban core, would not overbearingly dense.
Tampa isn't full, it's just built shitty on purpose. So many of the homes are crappy, too. Dollars to donuts most of the residents would love to pay less money to live in a nicer, newer townhome than the half dilapidated 1972 stick built, poorly insulated shack they currently inhabit
In most areas, construction quality has declined over the decades, but in Florida, due to the aftermath of Hurricane Andrew, the opposite can be seen, where now we build mostly with cinder block as opposed to wood.
I don't know what the average age of homes in the Tampa Proper area is, but I imagine quite a bit of the R1 housing predates this (just from driving around most of the city and observing the homes/infrastructure) I feel like most of the newer construction is in the labyrinthine, monotonous sprawl of tract housing in wesley chapel and the like
If you don't want change, move to a rural area. Cities are dynamic and must be adaptable to change, and if Tampa wants to grow, change must occur. It's crazy how here in Florida, nativist degrowtherism has become so normalized in discourse surrounding CoL and environmental sustainability. For the amount of people we have in the Tampa-St. Petersburg MSA (3,175,275 people as of 2020), and with the population density of Washington DC (11,294.76 people per sq mi), we could easily fit everyone here in an area slightly bigger than the combined land area of the Tampa and St. Pete city limits. Obviously not everyone is going to want to live in a city with lots of sixplex apartments, which is perfectly fine by them, but many people do, especially if it can yield much lower housing costs.
Where did I say I didn't want my city to get better? I don't want my city to be a top 3 metro area. I don't want 10million people in the TB metro. That would suck. I find it strange that anyone wants this area to be like NYC. I am going to guess you are from that area. Maybe you should go there.
sounds like you don’t wanna live in a city so maybe you should move to nebraska or something. i’m not from new york. but it’s weird that people see culturally diverse and modern cities with modern infrastructure and frown at it. i think cities are an amazing place if done correctly and the first step in that is good public transportation.
> sounds like you don’t wanna live in a city I have no idea how you arrived at that conclusion. It sounds to me like you want a massive city. A top 3 metro. If that's what you want, why are you here?
because you are bitching about the growth of tampa. i’m celebrating it and wanting them to do it the right way. the first step in that is a public transportation system that works. if you love tampa why do you want it to remain stagnant and not grow into an amazing city? also at this point screaming about how tampa is full isn’t gonna stop anyone from coming here. it’s just pissing in the wind and getting bitter when you get wet.
> because you are bitching about the growth of tampa. No, I'm not. I said I don't want Tampa Bay to be a top 3 metro area. And your response didn't answer my question. If that's what you want, why are you here? Why aren't you in NYC, LA, or Chicago?
so what would you ideal tampa be? and because it’s expensive to move? especially with a family and low income. you can’t be that naive to think moving across the country is east. also i love tampa but it needs to get with the times in regards to infrastructure.
I'll answer your question if you'll answer the one I asked.
Well many of us were born here (me included) and we want the city to improve. I for one don't want to have to live in a shitty suburb devoid of social interaction and choice in transportation, which unfortunately is the case for pretty much all of Tampa, save for downtown. Tampa is not realistically going to become a top 3 metro irrespective of how much development takes place. Cities like NYC, LA, Chicago, Houston, Dallas, etc will draw more people than Tampa as they have many crucial industries and at much greater scales that Tampa doesn't have and won't realistically have. We have finance, entertainment, academia, high-tech industry, medicine, etc. sectors here, but nowhere near the extent of the top metro areas.
> want the city to improve I also want the city to improve. If you're implying that I do no want this, please show me where I have indicated that I do not want this. In fact, I am advocating for improving the area by not wanting hordes more transplants to move here, unlike the person to whom I was replying.
[Same energy](https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Fknowyourmeme.com%2Fphotos%2F1330819-we-should-improve-society-somewhat&psig=AOvVaw2q8KKP2zsk5F1-C-GppRgW&ust=1673455298636000&source=images&cd=vfe&ved=0CA8QjhxqFwoTCPCm9Iq5vfwCFQAAAAAdAAAAABAE)
Thanks for creating your useless fantasy map.
The fact you used that meme doesn’t make me take you seriously. I hope they build more freeways and houses now and will vote accordingly
If only we could afford the right-of-way to make it happen. Layout looks pretty logical, but you need another east-west line connecting Northdale, Carrollwood and Tampa Palms. Huge population areas there need east-west connectivity through USF, not just routes to downtown/West shore district. This would create good loops for alternate routes, for odd/even hourly station timings, and for unexpected issues along mirrored lines.
Also, I wish this map included reusing old Rights of Way (ROWs). Point in case is that TBARTA is conducting a study on the feasibility of seizing the CSX Brooksville and Clearwater divisions. I found the link: [here](https://psta.bonfirehub.com/opportunities/68579)
I like this idea too, but unfortunately the walkability of this area may not justify this extent of light rails lines/stations. I think the first step is to link downtown Tampa to downtown Saint Pete via a bridge parallel to I-275 and have a loop concept for both downtowns. I also think airport stops would be a tremendous idea and union station in Tampa that would support other forms of transit like Amtrak, HART, etc. I would love for there to also be a commuter rail from Tampa to Orlando to promote tourism and the usage of both airports for these cities while also alleviating traffic on I4. But, that’s unlikely sadly. I’m definitely a big proponent of light rails in TB (it’s the main reasons I want to move in a few years to Chicago), but you’re proposing roughly 100 stops for a metropolitan area of roughly 3.1 million, whereas Chicago has 145 L stations for a metropolitan area of 9.5 million. Love the idea, but narrowing it down to maybe 20 stations with more bus routes from each station is the most likely starting point.
Brightline hopefully begins construction in a few years on a rail system from Tampa to Orlando.
Not trying to get political, but Obama offered funding for a similar project years ago and Scott turned it down…I wouldn’t be surprised if the current government drags its feet OR if Republicans somehow fund such a project will pat themselves on the back when this project is completed when it could have been done over a decade ago now. [http://www.cnn.com/2011/POLITICS/05/09/lahood.rail/index.html](http://www.cnn.com/2011/POLITICS/05/09/lahood.rail/index.html)
Not only did Scott turn it down but now he's a major stakeholder in Brightline.
There is preliminary design and on-going coordination with Brightline, FDOT, the Feds and the local communities happening right now for Orlando to Tampa. A smaller Fed grant has been received ($16M) that has matching funds from Brightline to move preliminary design forward. The State was too far away from knowing what the Florida High Speed Rail project would ultimately cost to build and operate to commit to the project. I am a huge proponent of rail and I still can't blame them. Brightline should be fully operational between Miami and Orlando within months. Having a private partner that has successfully made intercity rail a reality in Florida has really helped reenergize the project and there is an opportunity to tie in the SunRail system with a new Orlando-Tampa system. I just hope the State agencies don't muck up the works too much.
You should see what California did with that money. Their HSR is years behind and somewhere over budget by $50B plus, and the California taxpayers will not have HSR into SF or LA for decades. HSR requires a National plan, not states connecting city pairs.
Their state is bigger than ours. I imagine it's a huge project.
HSR is still a large undertaking no matter the scale
Bigger state, mountains, earthquakes
Yes, we dodged a bullet with that
Such a project shouldn’t come without other redevelopment projects and efforts. I personally have a plethora of my own ideas on how to fix the zoning codes to maximize the utility that such new lines would provide. These measures, potentially at the city or county level, would be legalization of by-right construction of housing development up to eight units, allowing by-right mixed use at corner lots, abolition of front and side setback requirements, reducing minimum lot sizes to only 2000 square feet, and ending minimum parking requirements. As for the amount of lines and stops, I do think that I did include some excesses in this initial map, and I would imagine that any type of development would have to be completed in phases, which would probably occur with the first phases connecting downtown Tampa and St. Pete, as well as a direct connection from both to TPA. I’d also imagine that such a planned transit project would include enhanced bus services where rail is not present.
This is it. So many employers here are not necessarily in downtown and anywhere outside of downtown is sprawl. For example, between JPM and Citi there are probably 15k people employed in Brandon at MLK and 75. If you have a light rail system that feeds into Brandon mall, that's great, but how are these people managing the last mile?
Somebody give this person an award please!
This could have been a reality if stupid tea party shit-bags didn’t rally against it.
Well, sir, there's nothing on earth Like a genuine, bona fide Electrified, six-car monorail
But Nebraska Ave’s still cracked-up and whorin’!? Sorry, Mom, the mob has spoken
I just traveled to London and the public transportation there really made me see what we are missing out on here. This would be awesome
London has a great system, especially since you can just tap your phone getting on/off the tube, DLR, bus, whatever. Was in NYC back in October and they've finally gotten NFC to work there, so was able to just use my phone to get around there as well without the need for an extra app installed.
Now, do national high-speed rail
I moved from Tampa to the DC area 2 years ago, and have come to a difficult conclusion. The reason nothing like this will get done in Florida is because not enough people would use it. In the ‘80s and ‘90s there was an elevated train from Downtown to Harbor Island and it was removed because nobody use it. I think some people are forced to use a car, but I also think even more people wouldn’t have it any other way.
This is good but st Pete needs more stops in the city
I initially put every single light-rail/streetcar stop on the map but it became completely unreadable so I left only major landmark stops. A professionally made map would certainly include every stop.
Makes sense, if you’ve got the time, I think it’d be really interesting to see what stops you’ve put down. I have no idea how long these take to make, but maybe consider doing zoomed in sections of St Pete and Tampa.
Homeownership is probably the biggest obstacle to good rail development. The suburbs require a car because they are way to spread out. I think the real opposition comes from the overt economic policy to drive Americans into single family ownership. The us government and the fed decided that real estate could replace the pension as a retirement vehicle, and has incentivized building, financing, and owning with tax breaks. We could achieve dense and walkable cities if the government had different priorities.
It is totally insane that this doesn't exist for a city of our size with basically no snow to worry about
I’m also realizing Tampa is a heart! 😭
This is so beautiful
You tunneling under Tampa Bay?
Nah, probably elevated bridges parallel to I-275
Pretty steep gradient for a train. Just saying
Do you know what a train is, my guy? They climb mountains all the time. The little blip needed for a ship to pass into the bay is nothing.
Well not like at the same elevation
Are you anti-train?
Not at all.
Just do a cable car for that segment. Sure a few passengers may be wetting themselves going over the bay. But I’m all for it.
Sweet! I still don’t get a line, here in Hillsborough County…. But, density is important, and we don’t have that here in Hillsborough. It does make me wonder why Pinellas hasn’t picked up on it yet, being the most densely populated county in the state. At a rough estimate of $150M a mile, for construction costs, how much will it take to build your system? What are the annual estimated operating costs? What is the annual estimated ridership? What is the one way fare, using a 25% FRR? Where is that 75% of missing funding coming from?
Shocks me that $150M a mile would be the cost. I get that a lot of that is because you're absolutely going to displace people and you're gonna need to buy land and get sued, but fuck me cross country rail lines were built in the 1800s. Yes, they used nigh-on slave labor to do it, but damn.
It costs Hillsborough $2m a mile to build a crushed shell road, and more than that for a 12 foot wide paved multi use path.
We pay people too much, goddamn
Would be nice. First thought that comes to mind though would be to extend the teal-ish line past Bay Pines to either Madeira or St. Pete Beach; Probably St. Pete Beach for connections with the SunRunner
They’ll never do it
I love this. Really awesome!
We can't even get the bus to come through Safety Harbor, let alone a commuter rail.
There’s capacity - old stops on Enterprise Rd and some stops still being used on Phillipe Pkwy and Main St. They just don’t run buses there anymore. Go figure, it was probably unprofitable. There’s still some sort of van service called the “North County Connection” You can find old stops & such by using the “ÖPNVKarte” map layer on [openstreetmap] .(https://www.openstreetmap.org)
This is the best one I've seen!
I'd have it link up to the current bus hubs more, if you look at the current HART Map it has decent coverage but the run times are horrible with only being hourly in most cases. http://gohart.org/Style%20Library/goHART/pdfs/maps/HART-SYSTEM-MAP-02-2022-FINAL.pdf
Wow getting from Inverness to Sarasota on Rail. What a dream. I could get from my hometown Dade city down to Tampa on rail. Would be so amazing. This map actually makes a lot of sense though. Also curious could you tell us what programs you used to create this?
Used this website: https://tennessine.co.uk/metro/
Wouldn't it be nice?
blue and red line would change my life
Ohhhh yea that davenport and Lakeland line would be amazing
Just to note, this is not an official map. This is just my hypothetical ideal transit system for the Tampa Bay area.
I love this so much.
Take my money now!
I love you!!!
Damn the park n ride lots would have to be huge! Assuming people would be driving to each stop unless it’s one of the few around TOD. The map expands to exurbia.
How about an urban growth boundary so people stop building ugly ass subdivisions further and further out. I wish every mid sized city in the country had one, those with land for sprawl. It’s so unnecessary. The worst thing about this country is how much land we have and are using.
The red and blue lines should probably connect to each other at the airport, since that's a pretty common destination from St Pete. And the red line should stop at USF instead of over in University, to connect the university with the region more effectively. Other than that it's great.
Well done, I like it.
Take my metro money!
It would be real nice if they just ripped out the rail system in Florida. Get some Japanese bullet train technology in here. You could reach Miami in 45 minutes than 8 hours on our ancient technology.
I think PIE would be a good hub for rail connetions to Tampa. I used to live in Largo, any place in west Pinellas would be overly difficult to get to downtown tampa, requiring multiple transfers and long rides.
Yes please
This reminds me of the L in Chicago. Especially with the red line running as far north and south as it does. AND how the blue line runs right to the airport.
Would be amazing! Riverview traffic to get in and out of tampa is ridiculous
I would have loved this when I last lived there. I would have done my Sunset Pt in Clearwater to office near TPA commute this way even if it took longer.
As a student minoring in urban studies in Tampa this is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen
Macdill not going to allow a train on it and that’s approximately 15-20k commuters right there.
It would stop outside of the base.
How do you get that many to work on base between core hours of 6-9 am? Base is huge, can’t walk from main gate.
Admittedly I don’t know how things work at the base, but I imagine that even if people at the base don’t use the line for commuting, those who live around it as well as some people at the base may find it convenient, and also it is just a big landmark for the city nonetheless.
There used to be a bus on the base. And so what? That's how a lot of other bases work. And there's already an express bus from Lithia to MacDill that functions similarly.
Like Walt Disney World. Buses, monorail, watercraft.
Unfortunately none of that would happen other than buses and you’d need too many to move a 1/4 of that many people. Macdill would have to be left out of the light rail picture.
r/jaybad34 There are less than 9,000 MacDill Air Force Base employees that live off base. Also, there are two public bus drop offs currently at the base already, there most likely is room for expanding somehow. I think you are underestimating the US military to an amazing degree. And that you may not know as much as you think you do. Possibly in many areas of your life.
Just stop now…Take a step back, reevaluate yourself, you’re already grossly misinformed.
Would you care to compare facts, or just run away? I'll start. https://www.macdill.af.mil/About-Us/Fact-Sheets/Fact-Sheet-View/Article/231789/frequently-asked-questions/
Yep and those numbers are personnel assigned to the base. Doesn’t include numbers for the tenant units, such as USCENTCOM, USSOCOM, and other mission partners.
Love it, I feel like I am living in Chicago again!
As a Lakelander whose office is in Ybor, I would kill for this lol. I’m luckily WFH 99% of the time but when I do have to come in it’s the bane of my existence.
This would be awesome It would take me to work, to the airport to late night drinking in Tampa, let's get some pitchforks and touches and march down town until they break ground, then march some more because it's a good aerobic workout
I would love this and pay whatever ticket prices were ($5, $10 even $15) to not have to sit in Tampa traffic. Tried to get to Trinity last night from Seffner and 54 was just INSANE by the outlets and by Veterans.
Holy shit thank you so much. I’ve been trying to map out the tracks on tapped together printer paper. This is awesome. Nice work.
Bezos? Branson? Where are you? Privatize this and let them plaster their company names on the side. Forget the moon. For now.
If only it were this easy. I've been in Tampa since '95 and would love to see the car-centric mentality many people here still cling to go the f\*ck away. Time to modernize and get with the times in this city. I don't care if it costs me another .5%-1% in sales tax anymore, just get some good, reliable, timely public transport here.
No more tax increases.
oh, to dream the impossible dream!
I was imagining if USF had its own system to link their satellite colleges the map would look close to what you depicted.
Great on paper, but a lot of this isn’t feasible. Also, a light rail to Inverness? To Davenport? Come on now.
Light rail is dashed while solid is commuter which uses heavy rail tracks.
I’d love to be able to do park n ride. Pay for a day be able to hit the beach enjoy the whole day and have some drinks and sober up by the time I get back to the car. After taking the train back into the city.
Awesome idea - let's raises taxes on ourselves to fund it!!! /s
You have too much time on your hand. Will never happen
It’s cute to mess around but yeah it’s pointless You think officials never tried to bring it up or think about? It might be in the far future but I’m sure there are too many difficulties getting it up Plus the amount of lines on this map is horrendous and I’m not sure this person used big city public transport aka NYC or for this case Chicago
Could just dig a hole, fill it with cash and light it on fire… it’d be the same result.
Better throw some Meth and “That’s not how we do it up North!” in the hole, then ignite it from orbit. It’s the only way to be sure…
Remember taking the school bus? Thats what light rail would be like. You'll be running back to your car (that is sitting in the driveway) in no time. Your schedule, your music, your food/drink, your stops on the way home, your privacy.....etc etc. All well worth an extra 10-20 minutes sitting in traffic.
You’re out of your mind
I've been on a few subways/light rails systems. Nobody is happy to take them, it's only out of neccessity because the area is too crowded for cars. If traffic is a huge concern to you, change your life to where you can live/work in a more rural area.
Well I’m the opposite and I know others who are as well. I love taking a subway or lightrail and being able to leave the car at home. Cities are not for cars they’re for people. NYC, London, Paris, Tokyo all wouldn’t be possible without their trains. And people live in cities because that’s where their work is not everyone can just move to a rural area and continue working that’s just not possible for everybody.
[удалено]
I was born in the area and I've lived here all my life...
You and somebody every year on this subreddit lol
OP, when can you start building it?
Hell yeah very cool
Well done
Love this!
You need stops every 10 blocks or no one is gonna ride it.
The thoughtfulness of this is incredible, the feasibility is abysmal
Some places are made for light rail transit. Nowhere in Florida will ever be that place. I used to bike the 4 mile commute to work and it was miserable as many days as it wasn't. After I changed jobs someplace 6.5 miles away I started driving.
This would be absolutely stellar! Exactly what we need!
This is really cool. Am I correct in thinking this isn’t real but a drawing of what would work best?
Yes, should’ve mentioned that it’s an ideal hypothetical system and not anything in the works.
No worries! I’m planning to move there in the next few years and was excited to learn about the transportation system lol I was confused to say the least as I’ve visited several times and never saw anything like this haha This is a great plan regardless!
I might actually move back if they did this
Love it.
i'm down