JUST ANOTHER SLEEPY SOUTHERN PORT? NOT!

From a tiny native American canoe that doubled as a ferry which crossed the St. John's River at the "Cow Ford" in the heart of todays metropolis, Jacksonville has bloomed all along it's waterfront. Quick quiz? Which of all groups employ the most people and drives the economic engine of America's First Coast? If you guessed the
military, insurance, finance, or factorys you would be wrong. JAXPORT our booming international window on the world is the unstoppable king that dominates our City.

LOST STREETCAR OF THE WEEK

A feature of lost transit around the America's (A whole woods full of dumped Trolleys in MD?)

Happy passengers, busy commuters, holiday shoppers are now but ghosts, the door opens, but nobody cares anymore. Wasps and mice have populated the forlorn car bodies. Sometimes gone, sometimes nearly hopeless, and occasionally completely rebuildable, how many of these long lost rail cars will find their way back to civilization? to museums? or the tender loving care of historians and preservationists? How many others will simply fade into the elements from which they came?

LOST RAILROAD?

A new feature of lost transportation around the America's

Quick where is it? Anyone know? Anyone care? What is it? It is a General Electric 44 Ton Center Cab switcher in Navy gray. Now? Okay. When the Jacksonville Traction Company built it's Interurban line out to Black Point on the St. Johns River in what was then Camp Johnston, it was far out in the Country. Things could have been much, much worse. The original property for what is now NAS JAX was at Camp Blanding! The Army was content to make a land swap for some property closer to a major port and rail center turning 1/2 of Camp Blanding into a State Park and Forrest. Thus the current site of NAS. The Yukon Baptist Church (still standing across from the base) was moved from the Black Point Community. Other houses were removed to Yukon, or what was then known as Dewey Park. The Atlantic Coast Line built a wooden station at Yukon, a twin of the one in Orange Park. (Oddly the Orange Park Station was torn down years ago but the Yukon depot was moved to a private business location on the East side of the hill just South of the Orange Park Mall, off Blanding). The Dough boys had only 2 ways to get out to the base with any reliable transit. Five or six ACL trains each way a day dropped whole companies of recruits at Yukon depot. Finally the Trolleys reached the base, and not only gave the boys a way into town, but a ride every 15 minutes for a quarter! When the tracks came up after the great Streetcar Conspiracy of GM - Firestone - Standard Oil infamy wiped away our transit lines, the Navy moved onto the old Trolley tracks. For the next 40-50 years the base expanded and worked it's very own self contained railroad system. Nobody ever knew the North Gate access, which ran along the front of the hangers and exited through the new "Truck gate", was part of the Trolley system. Military Intelligence being an oxymoron, the Navy decided to abandon the old railroad system and by the 2000 it was but a memory. The locals will always remember it as "The Navy Train" and part of it's route even ran in front of the base for a mile or so and passed on the East side of the Yukon Depot. Freight was interchanged with the ACL. Often sensitive cargo would have passenger cars or cabooses full of armed marines on either end of the "mystery cargo". For all the Millions of times I talked to the crew, rode the Navy engine, and was even presented with a map of the "system" by a base commander, I never took a photo. NOT ONE! My map is long lost and so is my own special little railroad. Like thousands of others that dot the country, it died just 20 years before it was needed again. Sad our hindsight is always 20/20. This artistic version is as good as it gets. And YES, if YOU have a photo or memorbilia from our "Navy Train" please contact me, it would mean a lot.

Union Station is it Transportation Center or Social Darwinism?

A REAL TRANSPORTATION CENTER OR SOCIAL DARWINISM IN JACKSONVILLE

Belgian Railways are hard at work with passenger expansion programs. One has to wonder how a tiny country-state in the European Union can do such things and mighty Uncle Sam and his lovely daughter Florida can't. Miami, Tampa and Orlando are also working on true one-stop centers for Transportation. Ocala's is up and running, and Miami's will share airport-rail-metro-bus all in one place, amazing foresight. We keep talking about Jacksonville Transportation Center, yet our plans are scattering it all over LaVilla. Thus it will not be a "Center" in the classic sense, more like a Transportation Neighborhood. In a still somewhat parochial city like Jacksonville, the bait or carrot, seems to be "Amtrak". We'll move Amtrak back to the old station, and send all of the JTA buses (the stick) and Monorail down there to get those unfortunate passengers out. Meanwhile, Greyhound, (the big-dog stick) will bite and send it's coaches out of downtown. Thus in one swoop, we move Amtrak from a horrible location to a better position, offer escape, and get the "smelly bus patrons" out of our path. Is this Transit Planning or "social engineering?" We wiped out a prosperous African-American business district and very historic neighborhood for this. Now we have a "moonscape" on the West side of downtown and nothing to show for it. Could it be we WANT to scatter these various passengers and NOT bring them into a true center? Could it be this won't be where right meets left, rich sits with poor, and lions and lambs all converge in peace? Why would a City with millions of ground passengers annually, want to run those dollars away from either the City Core businesses, The grand old Union Station, (which contains acres of space for malls and shops) or a centralized tourism generator? Suspect - YOU BET! Watch this Darwinism carefully to see if the powers that be keep the useless "Convention Center" in place until the rail and bus stations are up and running. Just long enough to FORCE us to scatter out the masses of "undesirables", then suddenly the whole convention show will leap out for the downtown or the stadium district. Watch this closely, as our hypocrisy seems to know no end. Apocalyptic planning on a grand scale. Someone prove me wrong please! I would hate for these foriegn guests label us the City that is Minorität frei. It would appear that the Belgians don't have these problems. Perhaps, they just like everybody to come together, smile on their brother and love one another right now..." Antwerpen Central (pictured) and the North-South Junction projects are part of the Brussels-Amsterdam improvement program.

The River the City the Sea

Standing His Post, originally uploaded by Digit_AL.

The spirit of moving is an eternal factor in Jacksonville as the river flows northward toward the sea. Our bronzed sailor stares forever toward new and exotic horizons. He'll turn his back on his home port for months on end, until the day the whole city rejoyces over his ships return. Welcome home to Jacksonville.

What is and What isn't a Trolley?

Photo 1: THIS IS NOT A TROLLEY

Photo 2: THIS IS A TROLLEY

What is...and isn't...a trolley?
This (Revision) from the Sacramento Bee Newspaper - Oct 2007

On the ongoing plans to build a streetcar line between Sacramento and West Sacramento prompted quite a few comments. One thing I notice is that, for many people, it isn't at all what a streetcar, or a trolley, is.

The term "streetcar" refers to fixed-rail transit that is run on city streets, rather than on separated grades like a railroad. The term was originally used to describe horse-drawn cars operating on rails, but can also cover cable cars, steam dummies (small steam locomotives intended to pull cars on city streets) and electric trolleys. Because horse cars, cable cars and steam dummies were all supplanted by electric trolley cars, the terms "streetcar" and "trolley" are pretty much identical.

The term "trolley" comes from the pole used to connect an elevated high-voltage power line to an electric vehicle. One of the earliest prototype electric streetcars had a four-wheel device that hung from the overhead wire, connected via a cable to the car, referred to as a "troller," is probably the origin of the term. Trolley poles came in various forms, using either a wheel or a shoe at the end of the pole to ensure good connection to the wire.Trolley vehicles normally run between 24 to 50 feet: about the size of a LARGE modern bus, but generally wider. Speeds vary, but for the most part trolleys run at 20-40 miles per hour.That being said, what ISN'T a trolley?

What about Jacksonville's new Riverside Trolley? The problem is, this ISN'T A TROLLEY. It is intended to look like a certan type of trolley, if you kind of squint, but it fails for several reasons. For starters, it's still a smoky, noisy bus. Second, it runs on wheels instead of rails, and therefore doesn't run as smoothly. Third, because it has no fixed path, its schedule and route can change at the whim of the operating company, thus it gives little security to land developers who want to encourage transit-oriented growth that the transit won't vanish in the next fiscal wind.

Finally, this isn't a trolley because "quaintness" is not a required feature of a streetcar. Modern streetcars (and even some historic ones) aren't necessarily long on charm, wood paneling or quaint design (even though many of them are.) They're a vehicle built for a purpose, and the purpose isn't to look cute (even though many of them do): they exist to move people.

Many people assume that LRVs (light rail vehicles) were the modern version of trolleys/streetcars. While it could be said they evolved from the Trolley roots, they are wrong. LRVs are intended to run primarily on private right-of-way rather than city streets, are typically 60-80 feet long and intended to run as multi-unit vehicles, are capable of higher speeds (up to 50-70 mph) and are intended for inter-city and suburban service. They are the historical replacement for the interurban, which is a type of transportation virtually unknown in modern society. Interurbans operated like LRVs do now: they run on streets in cities, but their real strength is in open country and private ROW where their larger size and faster speeds aid commuters. But a city trolley isn't usually intended to do that.

The classic example people think of when you refer to trolleys is the Pacific Electric (aka the "Red Car") of Los Angeles and Orange County,(See the movie "Who Framed Roger Rabbit" for the sad-comic-true story) but that was an interurban system. Streetcar service in Los Angeles was covered by the Los Angeles Railway (aka the "Yellow Car"), a physically separate system (originally a cable car system, they operated on 3'6" cable car gauge instead of standard 4'8/5" gauge) owned by the same person (Henry Huntington.) Why would Huntington, a financial wizard on a par with his uncle Collis P., operate two "redundant" electric railroad systems in the same area? Because he realized that they served two distinct and separate roles! LARY streetcars moved people around in downtown Los Angeles and adjacent neighborhoods: PE interurbans moved people around throughout the greater Los Angeles area, in between cities.

In some parts of the country, the line between Trolley and Interurban blurred. Often the Trolley served as something of a rural or regional Interurban. In the Southeast, lines such as the massive Jacksonville Traction Companys, Camp Johnston (NAS JAX) and Ortega, routes even called for heavier more Interurban like Trolley cars. In fact Jacksonville had a fleet of restroom equipped, bar and lounge section, "Observation-Lounge" Trolleys. Also a common practice in the American South was to use grade separation on the Trolley lines themselves, often in the downtown area's. These routes were laid with treated hardwood cross-ties and then covered in lush landscape and grasses. Jacksonville's Main Street, Palmetto Avenue and Pearl Street lines are just three example of this construction that was billed as "The most beautiful Trolley Line in the World."

Vision for Jacksonville Traction Company, Inc.

VISION FOR THE JACKSONVILLE TRACTION COMPANY, INC.

Imagine a string of pearls illuminating one of the greatest downtown waterfronts in the world. Each pearl is a world-class destination: culinary, cultural, historical, recreational. Now, imagine that the string is a destination in itself—attractive vintage vehicles from around the world, each with its own rich history, each representing a great city or country. That string of pearls is Jacksonville Traction Companys vision for the proposed Water Street-Downtown historic streetcar line.

The idea of the revival of the original JTCO is decades old. But a comprehensive vision for the line is especially timely now, in the wake of soaring fuel costs, vacations close to home and the rebirth of Jacksonville's core. This measure would return the question of downtown urban Transit to the private sector and allow for rapid construction and completion along our booming transportation corridors. Among these improvements is a major streetcar and transportation museum, as well as a Trolley based Theme Park. The JTCO-line, as proposed would serve as a primary landside distributor of bus, Skyway and any BRT passengers and well as the anchor for all downtown tourism.

President JTCO

Hello Jacksonville wer're back

Commuter Rail in Jacksonville Past? You Bet! Number One In The State!

JACKSONVILLE TRACTION COMPANY, INC.

Since 1912 - Reactivated in 2008

This is the massive system we junked in favor of more "flexible modern buses." Shortly after the buy out by National City Lines, Motor Transit Company, the City was "gifted" with becoming the hub of a new General Motors Distribution Center. While the buses might have seemed like a great idea at the time, they added fuel to our sprawl. No longer would development be confined to easy commuter rail routes (Yes, streetcars and light rail are "Forms" of commuter rail but NOT what is usually ment by the term). The routes could be altered on a whim, and thus the heavy investment of livable spaces never developed along them. Autos took control and suddenly as if by magic, all of the National City Properties went bankrupt one by one to be pawned off on the Cities and taxpayers. Amazing that today, we are fighting those same agencys to see the error of their ways. Sadly, many efforts have fallen on deaf ears, "Skyways" and "BRT" or "Hovercraft" would save us. Did you know the Automobile and it's sister vehicles were NOT AMERICAN by invention and neither was the ship or the monorail? FACT! The Streetcar and Interurban train are our own unique creation and gift to the world. Won't you join me in leading the charge in bringing them home again!

TRAVEL? or TRIP?

A Series of Micro-Posts on a Lost Art

DO YOU KNOW HOW TO TRAVEL?

Do you Travel or do you make trips "swiftly?"

trav?el ?? (trvl) KEY ?VERB: trav?eled or trav?elled , trav?el?ing or trav?el?ling , trav?els

VERB: intr.
To go from one place to another, as on a trip; journey.
To go about in the company of a particular group; associate: travels in wealthy circles.
To move along a course, as in a groove, (or track?).
To admit of being transported without loss of quality; Some wines travel poorly.

Informal To move swiftly. (Note: there is no formal meaning that equates travel with moving swiftly).

VERB: tr.
To pass or journey over or through; traverse: travel the roads of Europe.

NOUN:
The act or process of traveling; movement or passage from one place to another.
travels
A series of journeys.
An account of one's journeys.
Activity or traffic along a route or through a given point.
The activity or business of arranging trips or providing services for travelers.

ETYMOLOGY: Middle English travelen, alteration of travailen, to toil, from Old French travailler ; see travail

Where's the Bar? Got drink? Sandwich? Chips? Salsa? Music? Conversation? Care to Dance?

I always thought it important to have just a bit more room, a place to kick back, maybe take in some music, read a good book, or watch some video, hey, there's an open card game in the corner... can't you see it? Of course you won't on this crowded aircraft, but then we're in a rush remember? 2 hours to get to the airport ahead of the flight to get through security, 1 hour to fly and 1 more hour to get your bags and get out of security = 5 hours and we only went from Jacksonville to Tampa. Sorry but my train is arriving downtown in about 5 minutes and you

won't feel any pain on landing.

Here are 3 meals, only one is from an aircraft and two are onboard a train, can you decide which you'd rather eat?

Ever meet anyone that loved airplane food? I'm not talking about keeping it down, or someone that considers it edible or even good, I mean in the sense that they'd fly just to eat the stuff? Yet I've known dozens, maybe even 100 people that would ride the Hiawatha to have the baked Salmon, or the Silver Meteor to eat the Peanut Soup. Unlike airline or bus terminal food, each railroad dinning car has it's own chef, and each train it's own idenity, so no one just eats, they bask in a long tradition of excellence as they dine with ever changing views.

*(The one wrapped in plastic and paper is the airplane meal)

"OH MONTANA! HOW STUNNING YOU WERE..."

When you travel have you seen the great cities, farms, towns, mountains and rivers of America?

The view from 15 feet is so much better then the one from 30,000 feet. As you can get up and walk around anytime, visit the lounge or dinning car on a train, you'll arrive bathed in a new sense of the earths beauty.

Did you enjoy my views of Montana? Which one talked to you the most... come on... be honest!

How is you leg room? Can you stretch out, converse with or make friends, or "move about the cabin"

Travel is more then where we sit for 2 - 5 hours, it should be a destination or experience in and of itself. Perhaps we have lost something with the Victorian era or the Industrial Age? Would a beaver hatted nabob be seen in one of todays flying commuter buses? You might be surprised to know that just this past month, when modern Americans were offered a REAL choice, they left the sky for the rails. All Air Shuttle Service between Harrisburg, PA. and New York City just ended as NJ and PA funded extensive train improvements and the air traffic vanished.

A ONE RAILROAD WORLD PORT

Photos:

Norfolk Southern

Florida East Coast

CSX

Imagine if you will, world shipping lines wanting to locate as near to the Panama Canal as possible and still maintain several railroads to move their containers to market. So where do you go? Houston or New Orleans? Maybe, or somewhere in between, Pensacola? Mobile? All of the above? They all suffer from distance to the East Coast Mega Markets. Some from space problems, depth, or lack of rail connections. So what about Tampa? No, locked into one railroad, our own CSX. Miami? Locked into two railroads FEC and CSX with little space to expand, ditto the other South Florida Ports. So why not Jacksonville? The next nearest large City with only minor depth problems, 3 major East Coast Railroads, 2 terminal companies, and miles on miles to expand. Don't believe it? Well my friend when the really big money starts to roll in you better believe that built out St. Johns waterfront will creep up the Broward River, Trout River or Clapboard Creek. Right up to the edge of the National Wetlands. We really do stand at the door of a gold mine of jobs, employment, industry and a ever booming economy. So where's the rub?

Well the gods of the JPA seem content to leave the network of CSX branchlines that reach across the Trout river and turn east to Blount Island as our sole port access. They even want to help CSX build a container yard and maybe a cut-off to their massive Waycross Junction. The Norfolk Southern, while not as big a player in Jacksonville, as CSX, certainly as big and as healthy elsewhere in the Eastern USA... and guess what? Aside from Lake City, we are their only contact in Florida. The end of a Chicago, Detroit, Cleveland, St. Louis, Cincinnati-Atlanta- Macon-- Valdosta-Jacksonville race track. But the entry on the far Northwest side of the City does little to help with traffic to and from Blount Island. They built a multi-million dollar container terminal in Simpson Yard, but it's already crowded and far from the action. Their favorite partner the Florida East Coast with their signature downtown bridge over the St. Johns River, rolls in from South Florida, crosses the river and moves freight to and from CSX and NS.

So Mr. Big Shipper, how do you get a container to say Daytona Beach? or Valdosta? You could insist on all rail but since CSX says it "could" take them 4 days to move your load from Blount Island to the other railroads, that won't happen. So how about we unload them at early evening, and by midnight we flood every interstate in Jacksonville with a parade of big rigs headed for Simpson Yard or FEC's own Bowden Yard on the Southside. This seems to set well with JPA, A single thought that could be a DEAL BREAKER!

So while hands are wring over our tears "there's just no way to get to ________ " I suspect someone is all smiles in the CSX palace. Does JPA know about JTA? Have they ever thought about JAA? Could we just once, THINK beyond the obvious? What about a City buy out of all CSX and NS track Northeast of Moncrief Yard or Union Station? Sure it would cost millions, but that's where federal bucks come in. We then work through JAA grants, and JTA funds and grants with FDOT to turn our new freight terminal into a true "UNIVERSAL ACCESS" switching road. We pull ALL the big trucks off the highways and save ourselves even more $$$ in the long haul. Further? Okay, then we rebuild the old downtown "S" line or Seaboard Air Line Route from Union Station - Beaver Street - Shands - Springfield Yard, where it connects with track still in place to the North. We turn this into an early AM to late PM mass transit line with JAA kicking in funds to hook into the airport itself. Freights not trucks run all night and to ALL carriers. Can you imagine the attention we would attract then? I'd tell CSX to their face, they will shoot themselves in the foot if they don't push for this. To twist a bible quote... "We must be fishers of international shipping - NOT keepers of private boat ponds."

Failing to attain the attention of the big dogs CSX, JPA, JAA, JTA we still have a chance for one last terminal line, and it could well develop thousands of acres of untouched Jacksonville. Did you know that JEA maintains a string of 240 KV high power lines from the Norfolk Southern (remember the FEC rolls right into their yards), near Westlake, to NW Moncrief, Garden City (Just South of the Airport), Ritter Park/Oceanway, Northside Generators, Blount Island? You can't build under those lines, a highway can only run under them in passing, but a railroad, better yet electric railroads can and do run under them all over the USA and the World too. How buying old railroads or building new ones is easy math to see how it could save and enhance our port, jobs and economy. It may not be as easy to see why it would save us money. That answer comes from the Oklahoma Department of Transportation, who state that one fully loaded semi-tractor and trailer, does as much damage/wear and tear on a highway or bridge in a single pass as do 86,000 automobiles. That's an answer we could take to the bank, or pass the bill to our childrens, children. Time for us to wake someone up at City Hall and ask of our authority's, "Who are these guys".

THE ROSA PARKS TRANSIT CENTER

A MODEL FOR OUR FUTURE?

Over the years Jacksonville has certainly had it's share of bad mass transit decisions. Building Union Station as a back-in stub or "head" Terminal, with some through tracks pretty much restricted to Florida East Coast and switching access. Not following the desires of the railroads to build it just west of the Current I-95 overpass, which would have had the effect of extending La villa and enlarging the Central Business District westward. The eternal flooding of the Myrtle Avenue underpass, rather then a man-made cavern, may well have become the front door of the City. Imagine a broad, bright and busy Myrtle bounding a vibrant downtown. But beyond this 1919 error, came the shady deals of the National City Lines and their "Motor Transit Company," a firm that bought out the sprawling Jacksonville Traction Company, our streetcar or light rail system. By 1936 it was cashiered for an all bus, all road, typical small town America transit system. It is interesting to note, about the same time, Miami and Tampa passed us by in population in national focus...they retained their rail transit much longer. Finally in this survey, enter the Skyway. The little airport shuttles built downtown in 3 American Cities as distributor's. Once again, we dove right over the waterfall of excitement and at the time some officials were even projecting this horizontal elevator to reach the Beaches, Airport and Orange Park. Hardly. A reality check entered the picture when the ridership failed to materialize, the system built to end dirty diesel buses downtown would be converted to a true monorail. Extension to a couple of large parking facilities fell short of station or contact. Buses kept right on rolling, right below the little railway in the sky.

Finally one project jumps out of this sad tale. The "FCCJ Station" which is located on the East - West State and Union Streets, nearly freeways themselves. All buses from downtown and the North and northwest side, as well as the beach and Arlington runs could now hub out of the Skyway Facility. In that location it would be hard to improve on the design. We could greatly improve current and unfinished Skyway system with a few more Rosa Parks type centers. Couple this with dropping the Skyway fares and balance that with parking fees and bus fare. With fewer buses running parallel and under the Skyway things would quickly turn around.

Here is the official designers word on the Rosa Parks Station:

Really Move Transportation Stations That

Jacksonville, Florida, is the largest city in the United States, in square miles that is. The long-term effects of congestion and a growing need for public transportation led to the development of a master plan and the design of a series of public transportation stations throughout the city. The Jacksonville Transportation Authority challenged project architects and engineers with developing a solution for public access to and from the automobile parking areas and the surrounding sidewalks, as well as to and between the buses and elevated skyway express system of the various stations. Covering the FCCJ Station is a self-supporting 12,000-square-foot, 180o vault Kalwall KalcurveTM skylight. There are 18 Kalwall pyramid skylights utilized in bus loading canopies attached to the station. As a true structural sandwich panel system, Kalwall panels weigh only 1-1/2 pounds per square foot. This reduces the size - and therefore the cost - of the supporting structure. It also makes erection much easier, simpler and faster.
"For these open-air, multi-story stations, we chose Kalwall for its indirect diffused-light properties that reduce glare," says Kim Rinaman, AIA, of VRL Architects.

"A quality storm-resistant structure was demanded for this hurricane-prone area. Kalwall creates an open, friendly, safe and inviting atmosphere, while providing shelter from the elements. It allows natural light in without creating dark shadows."

"Cost was a major factor in designing the FCCJ Station. We wanted reasonable initial cost with long-term maintenance return. With over 150,000 passenger bus trips per week, we chose sturdy materials to minimize effects of public use and resist vandalism."

Kalwall eliminates the cost and time of extensive maintenance. Unlike heat- strengthened, tempered or even reinforced glass, the Kalwall system is shatterproof and maintenance-free. Kalwall also stands up well to the diesel fume laden air common to an area with a high concentration of diesel engine traffic. Normal rainfall literally washes the panels clean, leaving the surface free of streaks and smudges.

Kalwall is the most highly insulating, diffused light-transmitting technology in the world. The primary element of Kalwall is a structural composite sandwich panel formed by permanently bonding specially formulated, fiberglass-reinforced translucent faces to a grid core constructed of interlocked, extruded structural aluminum or composite I- beams. At night, Kalwall glows as the inside light helps to illuminate the outside area. The Hemming and FCCJ Stations stand-out in the darkness like a beacon, as do all the others clad with Kalwall.

Adds Rinaman, "The interior has warm earth-colored textured masonry and paver units with painted steel structure and railings." Add to the diffused lighting a splash of color to complement the interior design and a warm, inviting atmosphere is created. "The tinted Kalwall skylights are the final touches to the look we wanted." The skylights feature color combinations of aqua/white, ice blue/white and crystal/crystal.

As the final urban touch de jour, we then lease out kiosks within these multi-modal centers for all sorts of executive attractive institutions. News stands, food vendors, flowers, candy, T-Shirts and gifts. With the investment we already have in this little train we would be fools NOT to push it on to a model of urban transit success.