Today marks the debut of a new column on bicycling in Lakeland. Author Tammy Wright starts with a little background… I grew up in the Seventies on the outskirts of a very small North Carolina town. Living in a neighborhood without sidewalks meant bike riding was limited to the back yard and a small quiet [...]
Goodness Gracious. Whatever one thinks of the outcome of the CSX/High Speed Rail/Tri-Rail/Rail Authority/Sunrail monstrosity that finally romanced its way through Tallahassee last week, can we all agree on the general lameness of DOT’s supposed leaders? I’d long since given up on any expectation that Stephanie Kopelousos and her top staffers would actually provide public [...]
As I was driving home last night, I heard a WUSF report in which Sen. JD Alexander, R-Lake Wales, waxed patriotic about how it's our duty to support our troops by approving Sunrail. Yes, really. The idea is that the 3,000 daily riders of SunRail will help us wean ourselves from foreign oil, thus making it less likely that our soldiers will need to fight in the Middle East. I wish I could find a link because the actual statement, in his trembling voice, is moving. Given Alexander's obvious deep feeling for the common good of our state and soldiers and his solemn belief that the CSX/SunRail deal is so vital to both, I expect an announcement any day that he's divesting his vast personal business interests in this deal. See them detailed here. Of course, it's just a coincidence that the Winter Haven rail hub CSX will build as part of this deal with $23 million or so of your money will serve JD's personal business interests and those of his partners. With a deal this important to our future, this important to our troops, I'm sure that JD will want to remove any taint that might surround it. That's what a patriot does.
You may have seen that U.S. Secretary of Transportation Ray Lahood supposedly said recently that Florida won't get high speed rail money unless the state senate agrees to CSX's blackmail payment, eerrr, Sunrail deal. I suspect that Lahood does not intimately know the politics and intricacies of the CSX freight realignment/Sunrail deal and is simply pushing for as many transit deals as possible across the country. But even if that's not true, and he's inarticulately but honestly pushing for CSX/Sunrail, there's a good way for the Orlando folks to get their act together and make it easier for the Florida Senate to support them.
Redbox now has a blue box, Blockbuster, for competition. I have used Redbox many times before, mainly because I was at a location where they had it (Wal-mart and CVS). Now Blockbuster has come out with their own box, so I tried it last night at my favorite local grocery store, Publix. Same concept as Redbox, just $1 a day rental BUT the movie has to be in by 7pm the next day before you are charged another dollar. I believe Redbox is 9pm before the next charge. There just happened to be a code on the machine that will not charge my credit card the 1 dollar. Would you like to know what it is? gsnx9x8 It is good till the end of November. I wonder how this new box will change the loyal in store customers Blockbuster already has? (P.S. The movie I rented was Confessions of a Shopaholic and it was worth it and if you see Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs in the theaters, be sure to see it in 3D. Mr. Man and I enjoyed it.)
Some of Lakeland's brightest have asked how it is possible that none of Lakeland's finest have committed a red light camera violation. Well, one has. We have the video. Check inside...
A new diner will open soon and I have a few pictures of the inside. If you drive by it now the windows have brown paper on them. It will join the other business in the Highland City shopping plaza such as the Subway, Chinese food, a chiropractor’s office, a party store and of course Publix. Keep reading to find out the name and see the pictures.
I clearly don't know the back story to any of the most recent negotiations - or whatever they are. But the letters to Sunrail backers from the Federal Transit Authority and from CSX discussing the new developments are chock full of nothing. They commit to nothing and really hint at nothing. Take a look for yourselves on the extended entry:
Some schlub wrote this not long ago: In this economy, CSX will not lightly walk away from more than $600 million in cash and system improvements, liability or no. A commenter expressed some skepticism and asked what I based that on. Oh, well, just a hunch. From The Orlando Sentinel: Last week, in a development first reported by the Orlando Sentinel, Dyer, Mica and others negotiated an extension to a proposed contract with CSX, the Jacksonville train company that owns the tracks that SunRail would use.
You may have seen this story Thursday in The Ledger: CSX Battle Drained State of $44 million Quite a chunk of change. I’ll let Joe Follick’s story discuss the merits of spending that money in advance of a big project. I’m more interested in who you and I paid to do what over the last [...]
Thanks to a Lakeland Local reader, attorney Kemp Brinson, we have an update to the Red Light Cameras Money Matters story. In Fall 2008, I reported the formula used in the article. It was based on conversations with Lakeland city officials and an ATS representative. It was hinged on a monthly pool of citations. This morning, Brinson pointed out the contract was based on a daily pool of citations. In a conversation with the city this morning, they agreed the pool is daily. See inside for details...
We took our Lakeland Local camera out to a couple of the red light cameras last night. Here's a minute of what we found...
The red light camera sign on South Florida South of Beacon doesn't command the attention it should. Check inside for some photos of the subject.
The red light cameras we've written about since March 2007 are now live in Lakeland. This morning the first 9 cameras started shooting citation photos and video. As previously noted, there will be no grace period. Check the end of the column for a list of our previous articles on Lakeland's red light cameras. This article has been updated. Please see Red Light Cameras Money Matters More
In this economy, CSX will not lightly walk away from more than $600 million in cash and system improvements, liability or no. FDOT probably still wants to hand that money over to the company. In fact, it's already done so to some degree in the form of ongoing overpass improvements in north central Florida. Buddy Dyer is out begging for $20,000 in legal expense money so lawyers can try to figure out a way around the senate. Democracy in action. (Funny that with all the money spent on John Thrasher and other uber lobbyists during the session, Dyer is reduced to panhandling for this. You would think GrayRobinson would just pick it up for him.) Anyway, this isn't over. But it's worth taking a moment for some post mortem thoughts before this deal reveals itself as the undead zombie vampire that we fear it might be.
Hey, you remember when some schmuck wrote this?: And finally, I now think that if the freight realignment deal goes down, and CSX gets no public money for the hub, it won’t get built - at least for a number of years. I base that sense partly on some completely unreliable third-hand scuttlebut I’ve heard and partly on common sense. The stuff and vehicle-based economy that drove the push for this hub has crashed and faces long-term structural hurdles to returning to what it was in 2005. At the same time, Florida’s explosive population growth, which also drove the rationale for the hub, has halted. I’m willing to put my - meager - money where my mouth is. Anybody who wants to bet a $1 on the fate of the hub if the realignment deal goes down, drop me a line.[Emphasis mine] Let's mosey on over to Tom Palmer's blog for a bit of news:
The CSX deal absorbed a giant defeat on the floor of the Florida Senate this evening. See story here. How big? Orlando Mayor Buddy Dyer declared: "The forces of evil have won." Now, this isn't done. There's one more day. Anything can happen. But just think about that line from Dyer for a second. "The forces of evil." Really? Dude, it's single crappy rail line made possible by a massive, destructive corporate giveaway to CSX. We are not talking about waterboarding here. Get a grip.
Bio: Bio: Virgina born, Carolina raised, I'm a small town Southern girl with a case of wanderlust. Current obsessions include triathlon training, world travel, cooking, street style fashion blogs, and keeping up with my yellow lab, Buck. By day, I am a chemical engineer turned traveling sales rep for a large corporation. My job has taken me to many parts of the world and brought me to Florida in 2007. I decided to settle into Lakeland in 2008 and I've been in love with this city ever since then.