Most everyone by now has heard that the streetcar endowment fund is bordering on collapse. Oh, there's still money in the account, but, it's going to be bouncing bottom pretty quick unless there's an astoundingly profound upturn in the general economy. And nobody is predicting that.

This can't be a good thing, or can it?

The endowment fund supporting the streetcar has been the largest single financial pillar for the system since it began rolling that October of 2002. Dick Greco noted the system could run for 10 years on monies already in reserve even if nobody rode the thing in all that time (it might just do it, too - but not much longer beyond that). The irony then is that, in fact, everyone does ride it, and, the system has turned an unbelievable profit in development production between Channelside and Ybor, $1 billion if you ask the folks themselves, far beyond what anyone could have imagined. It is ironic because, as an operating entity, it's nearly as broke as it is wildly successful.

Quite naturally this has been cause celebration for critics of transportation choice in Hillsborough County who choose to cite its ability to "support itself" as a benchmark of its value to the citizens of Tampa, apparently expecting a system like the Teco Line to become the first ever such civic project to be so. We all know I-275 is a cash cow, right? We all know TPD takes MasterCard or Visa when they show up to arrest a burglar, right?

Move along now, nothing profitable about this billion dollar construction bonanza going on here.

My loyal and enlightened TR readers: I stand apart from my brethern rail supporters, HART, and, perhaps the noble and very competent streetcar board members themselves, and even perhaps you, to join in a celebration of the depletion of the endowment, not because, like my critical counterparts, it validates failure, but because it ceases to be the false tool of validation anti-railers constantly drum beat. You get the sense they've been waiting and toe-tapping for the fund to dry up and "ah ha!, see!, the streetcar was a boondoggle!"

Let's cut to the chase. With the endowment out of the picture - or at least relegated to a proper secondary supporting role, those who oppose the eventual and certain expansion of light rail throughout Hillsborough County will now have to find some other fake yard stick to judge by. Maybe little fairies don't spring out the streetcar windows when it moves, so, ah ha!, the streetcar is a failure. Whatever works for them. For the rest of us, and those politicians who aren't run out of office, Tampa City takes rightful and proper stewardship over the best thing Tampa has ever done for itself in decades. Now, baby, Tampa can get down to business.