Good news, or, the best news we can hope for, folks.

A board packet posted at the HART website makes it public that a deal has been reached between HART and the Tampa Historic Streetcar Board regarding funds originally allocated to the Whiting Street extension.

Screenshot from the HART-posted joint meeting packet. Complete PDF version is available here.

Here's the deal: THS is going to go along with the transfer of funds, the $900,000 of recent focus, to the upcoming BRT line. Not that it had much choice given that new information would seem to reveal that it could never hope to use those monies for the extension in the first place. It seems that Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality (CMAQ) money, which is what the $900,000 was, must pay for at least 80 percent of its given project allocation. $900,000 isn't 80 percent of the $3 million minimum cost to do the extension, so it would have been a moot point at the outset.

• Download the complete HART/THS Board of Directors Joint Meeting Packet (PDF File)
  

So, in return for supporting the transfer, HART will initiate the process of transferring $2 million originally slated for an Ybor City Streetcar Museum, to the streetcar system itself. This $2 million will evidently be used to help substantiate funding for the Whiting Street extension, and, a general 20-year financial plan.

Service Reductions and "Other" Cost Saving Measures

The downside is that the packet makes reference to service reductions for the streetcar (as well as other cost saving measures, which are not specified), which will trim $500,000 from annual expenses. We have to imagine that this means cutting back streetcar operations to three or four days a week. That's of course speculation, but seems to jive with "word on the street". If it proves true we can expect some adoption of the system to take a hit as a commuter service today, though the system will be around, with extension, to better operate in that capacity tomorrow.

So are we happy or what? Let's face it, a Tampa urban rail system with a questionable financial future just got a more certain one; a critical extension to that system with no money to fund it, just found plenty - the streetcar will reign supreme tommorow; and, Tampa is getting some neat BRT buses and routes, with no hard feelings attached. It's about as good as we can hope for given we have to wait a few years for our residents to fill up Channelside.

Making Sure it Happens, What Now?

This whole ordeal has made this advocate shaky and wary. The whole shebang has to be approved by the Tampa City Council, and the Hillsborough County MPO, which in all likelihood will happen without resistance. The packet outlines what we have to do next and provides a rough time table for it to happen. I notice that there is an "operational" date for the BRT given, but no "break ground" date for the extension. Maybe that's still open, but I would hope, for one, that we put some fire under our butts to get it started before something else happens.

Play my little video above for a bit of on-the-ground commentary - I shot it during my lunch meeting last week.