A.G. Gancarski
On Monday morning in front of City Hall, U.S. Rep. Corrine Brown, Mayor Lenny Curry, and Councilmembers Reggie Brown and Joyce Morgan helped hail the first of 100 Jacksonville Transportation Authority compressed natural gas buses.
Such buses appear to be the future of the JTA fleet. They’re projected to save the JTA $5.7 million over a 15-year period. By the end of November, 23 of the buses, which cut down drastically on smog and noise emissions, will be unveiled by the JTA in what JTA CEO Nat Ford called a holiday “gift” to the community.
Curry praised the buses as a “step in a new direction” for Jacksonville, while giving Ford props for instituting policies that have led to “increased ridership” and “decreased travel times” for JTA customers.
“Transportation is especially important for a city the size of Jacksonville” that has a “lot of ground to cover,” Curry said.
The eco-friendly, fuel-efficient buses with their anticipated 12-year lifespan will do the trick, helping to make Jacksonville a “better, more prosperous community,” he said.
Curry introduced Congresswoman Brown, calling her a “champion for Jacksonville.”
Brown extolled the Chamber of Commerce weather, a staple of Jacksonville’s Octobers, and quipped, “It’s cold in Washington, and I’m not talking about the weather.”
“Infrastructure puts people to work,” Brown said, and the buses are clearly integral to that.
Ford’s remarks, meanwhile, constituted a big chunk of the speech-making prior to the ribbon cutting.
Calling it a “monumental day for JTA,” Ford described the “good planning and work” by JTA staff and board members that brough the bus project to fruition. It involved a two-year evaluation process before settling on compressed natural gas and deciding to locate a CNG fueling facility on Myrtle Street.
About 23 to 25 of the buses are due during the next few years, Ford said.
Among the perks for users are:
- High frequency service with 10-minute intervals during peak hours, and 15 minutes off-peak;
- Branded stations, with bike racks, LED lighting, and real-time passenger info;
- Wi-Fi on buses;
- Dedicated downtown bus lanes; and
- Park and ride lots, with the first one near the I-295/Lem Turner intersection by fall 2016.
The rollout is expected to be completed by 2019, with Downtown and the North Corridor [Lem Turner] happening this year, followed by Southeast, East and Southwest expansion.
Meanwhile, the Green Line begins service along the North Corridor in December, a 9.4-mile route from the Rosa Parks Transit Station up to the Lem Turner/295 area.
The southeast corridor completion, in 2016, will allow “seamless travel” from that part of northwest Jacksonville through downtown to the Avenues Walk, creating an interconnection that has been a priority of both JTA and the nascent Curry administration.
When asked after the ribbon-cutting if there was room on one of those buses for beleaguered Jaguars coach Gus Bradley, Curry kept it positive.
“Another week, another game.”
Luckily for Jacksonville, the JTA CNG bus line plan appears a bit better thought out than the Jaguars’ detour-riddled road to “victory.”
