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Shaking The Dice

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THE SUNCOAST NEWS

Published: June 14, 2008

With the price of motor fuels sparking a lot of worry, this would seem the time to move toward an alternative to cars as the major means of getting around the Suncoast. That happened this week. The $66 billion state budget for fiscal 2009 Gov. Charlie Crist signed this week has $2 million for the Tampa Bay Area Regional Transportation Authority. TBARTA will use the money to ramp up its planning for a mass transit system in an eight-county region that runs from Citrus County south to Sarasota County and includes Pasco and Pinellas. Crist vetoed $1 million for TBARTA last year.

The Legislature created TBARTA and gave it the task of planning a transit system for the Suncoast and convincing area officials to help fund it. Despite $4-a-gallon gas, that will remain a tough sell if everyone is honest about what a mass transit system would cost.

For one, any public infrastructure project invariably takes longer to complete than the planners imagine and ends up costing a lot more. (Run a Web search on "Big Dig" and "Boston.") Also, if the current high fuel prices do what they are supposed to in a market economy - spur increase production of fuel or the development of more economical alternatives - then people's desire to ride trains or buses will quickly vanish.

Right now we're just shaking the dice on a big gamble but haven't rolled them. Let's make sure we completely know the odds before we do.

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