BlogWood: MT Archives

Tis the season: HARTline to raise fares, cut routes.

Continuing a holiday tradition, HARTline plans to raise $150,000 on the backs of Hillsborough County’s poorest citizens while cutting routes they depend on to work and shop. Why does this refrain seem so familiar?

The poor could always walk, but there are few navigable sidewalks around here, traditionally one of most dangerous places in the country for pedestrians and bicyclists. This area was designed for cars. When applying for a menial level job in Tampa, one of the first questions asked is whether or not the applicant is the owner of a reliable automobile. A car has become an essential requirement for every entry-level job. Employers know that HARTline will not get their employees to work on time, especially on weekends and holidays.

Even HARTline Director Sharon Dent drives. Perhaps with her measly 6 figure salary, it would be a hardship for her to afford the higher fares, thus she relies on a large automobile to haul herself around instead?

A SPTimes editorial from 2001 is very telling: the same problems HARTline has today have been cropping up year after year:

Hillsborough Area Regional Transit, the county bus system, has more than a budget problem. It has an image problem, a political problem and a leadership problem - none of which will go away until the community comes to grips with whether HARTline should remain a countywide service. If HARTline's director, Sharon Dent, can't cut through the molasses in the coming year, the county should find new leadership.

For someone with such poor budgeting, planning and communication skills, Dent sure has had job security. HARTline is perennially short of cash. Routes open and close at the drop of a hat. Its negative image is why some politicians refuse to provide more operating funds. Dent's major accomplishment has been shifting the blame and placating her board - good for her but not the sort of tactics that serve the interests of bus passengers.

It doesn't take a visionary to see what's wrong. HARTline needs a stable funding base if it ever hopes to plan strategically, reshape its image or lobby effectively for expanding mass transit. Urban rail in Tampa and inter-city service should not even be considered with HARTline's current configuration. The ideal solution would be for the city and county to support new taxing authority for HARTline. The amount needed is small; even $5-million annually would provide the seed to end the budget crisis that somehow arises year to year.

Hmmm... a stable funding base? How ‘bout $20 million from the Hillsborough County? A couple of weeks ago, Dent was offered this money, a big chunk of a proposed 1/2 cent sales tax hike, but couldn’t seem to get organized enough to give details of how she might spend the funds.

A proposal to raise the sales tax and fees on new construction to pay for roadwork and new bus routes hit a dead end before the Hillsborough Commission Wednesday. ......

Without ensuring that impact fees on new development are raised sharply and charged uniformly in the county, the proposal would raise too little money to do much good, (Commissioner Pat) Frank argued.

"I think we're trying to do too many things with too little money," Frank said.

Frank said she also failed to get enough detail from the county's transit service on how it would use its $20-million-a-year share from the proposed half-penny sales tax hike.
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Frank withheld her support until she got assurance from HARTline about how it would spend the money, advocating concentrating service in densely populated areas. But she failed to get the assurance she was seeking during a hastily called HARTline meeting Tuesday.

HARTline executive director Sharon Dent attempted to appease Frank Wednesday by offering greater detail that she pledged to take back to the board.

"A few minutes ago, we now get specifics," Frank said Wednesday, dismissing Dent's overture.
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Democratic Commissioner Kathy Castor withdrew her earlier support of last week, saying she too was dissatisfied with the lack of detail from HARTline.

The debate ended and the transportation plan died with it.

I wonder why Pat Frank was worried about how HARTline would spend this money. Perhaps it’s HARTline and Sharon Dent’s history of serving poor urban customers by using their full price fares to subsidize service for tourists and downtown office workers?

I’m trying not to go off on a rant against the $56 million Disneyesque Electric Streetcar system built for the sole benefit of cruise ship passengers, and Marriott guests, so I’ll ignore that for now in favor of the fake Trolley.

This dressed up rubber-wheeled bus cruises the streets of downtown offering free rides to office workers and visitors. Even at this price, the busses are empty as often as not. Now, as Dent proposes to cut real routes and raise fares for the working poor, there is talk of expanding this faux Trolley service into the pricey Hyde Park Village shopping area so that more wealthy white people can ride the bus on a whim:

Village officials are working with the Hillsborough Area Regional Transit Authority, also know as HARTline, to extend the yellow, rubber-wheeled trolley known as the Uptown Downtown Connector to the shopping center at Swann and Dakota avenues. ......

Village general manager Pat Westerhouse said extending the trolley line will help bring University of Tampa students and downtown workers to Hyde Park for lunch and shopping. Instead of driving and parking in a garage, they can hop on the trolley.
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HARTline, which started the connector four years ago, hopes the Hyde Park line draws the after-work and weekend crowds. The route would start at the Southern Transportation Plaza near the Marriott and Tampa Convention Center, make a stop at the Hyatt Regency downtown and end on Swann at Howard Avenue.
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For years HARTline has been looking at ways to increase the trolley's ridership, which averages about 300 people a day, or about 5,500 a month. Often, it rolls by with just a handful of people. Sometimes, only the driver.

HARTline officials say the service is necessary for tourists.

HARTline is quick to demand more and more from their best customers, our own hard working neighbors who can least afford to pay, yet HARTline is always willing to subsidize transportation costs for people who are prepared and very able to spend their own money.