Former N.C. Mayor Urges Bold Steps for Transit Net

Wednesday, February 24, 2010

LAKELAND | If Polk County is going to be economically competitive, it has to develop a transportation system that offers the most choices and is located in the right place, regional business leaders were told Tuesday.

“You have to have the courage to do it and to do it right,” Pat McCrory, former mayor of Charlotte, N.C., said at a regional transportation forum at The Lakeland Center.

Tuesday’s forum, which was organized by the Central Florida Development Council, brought together about 350 business leaders from the region between Tampa and Orlando to learn about how to connect the region to spur economic development.

McCrory was the driving force behind an effort to launch one of the largest transportation projects in North Carolina’s history to bring light rail and to expand the bus system and other forms of mass transit.

The system was financed with the proceeds from a 1998 sales tax referendum, similar to what is being proposed this year in Polk and Hillsborough counties.

He said the key to success is for everyone in the region to work together and to continue to communicate.

“We’re talking about a process, not a project,” McCrory said.

He said in Charlotte the development of the new and revitalized transit corridors changed the face of the city and converted blighted areas into new commercial and residential buildings.

But it takes a practical approach, McCrory said.

“Sixty percent of that effort was not about light rail, but about expanding the bus system,” he said, explaining the buses are clean, there are shelters, there are express routes and other features that will attract riders and form an integrated system that provides true choices for commuters and other travelers.

In addition, McCrory said the system has to be sustainable and it has to involve connecting transit, roads and other transportation routes with economic development, housing patterns, tourism, culture and public safety.

“Don’t think in isolation,” he said.

McCrory also said transit decisions should be based on data, not politics, explaining they have to reflect the best decision on cost, ridership and long-term operating costs.

He said it’s important to think long-term.

“You’re the group that’s responsible for the future,” he said. “You can plan for it or ask the next generation to react to it.”

McCrory’s comments came against a backdrop of speakers from the business and transportation community that repeatedly emphasized the need to think regionally about transportation and economic development.

By regionally, speakers said they mean the area from Tampa’s metropolitan areas to Orlando’s metropolitan areas, both of which include Polk County.

“Polk County is a critical element in the future transportation system,” Stuart Rogel of Tampa Bay Partnership told the crowd.

Local officials also used the forum to pitch efforts to link transit to future land-use planning.

They pitched a planned referendum scheduled for November’s ballot to seek voter approval for a sales tax increase to pay for a countywide transit system.

For more information, please contact Tom Palmer at The Ledger.