J Magazine Winter 2019

“Someone came up with the theme that LaVilla is a
diamond in the rough waiting to be reborn again.
We latched onto that, making it even more
pronounced in the final design.”
Andrew Rodgers director of Construction and Engineering
Transportation Center ranged from $130 million to $150 million. No
wonder it never got off the ground.
Ford decided to make the Regional Transportation Center look
forward, not backward. And he set a goal of reducing the cost.
So he invited firms to compete for a modernistic design that would
dramatically reduce the cost. The POND firm and Michael Baker International
won the competition.
The result: A $59 million bottom line, not $130 million.
Cutting out a parking garage reduced the cost. Otherwise, the more
modernistic design allowed for more efficiencies.
Besides the lower cost, JTA wanted a design that makes a statement
on innovation. The new building, with the Skyway running through it,
is reminiscent of Walt Disney World.
“We wanted something forward-thinking that would stand the test
of time, that futuristic look,” said Andrew Rodgers, director of Construction
and Engineering, Construction and Capital Programs.
The shapes on the glass on the building have a dramatic effect,
with blues turning color as the light changes. The shapes of the glass
look like diamonds.
“Someone came up with the theme that LaVilla is a diamond in
the rough waiting to be reborn again,” Rodgers said. “We latched onto
that, making it even more pronounced in the final design.”
The design is focused on the customer, it emphasizes safety and
convenience. While it is a new home for JTA employees, too, customers
are the first priority.
Compare it to the current Rosa Parks hub where someone going to
a bus must cross multiple lanes of bus traffic. At the Regional Transportation
Center, there will be one loading platform for all of the buses.
“It’s a lot safer and more effective,” Rodgers said.
The Regional Transportation Center also will have a pedestrian
bridge over Forsyth Street that connects to the inner-city bus terminal
(Greyhound). Pedestrians won’t have to cross Forsyth Street and cars
zooming down the Interstate ramp.
Of course, there is heightened security. JTA enlisted consultants as
well as advice from the federal Transportation Security Administration.
A $500,000 partnership with Cisco will result in cameras everywhere.
That means a suspicious person or package can be identified
and followed throughout the terminal.
The customer focus will include a plaza where food trucks or other
activities can be held. The LaVilla Room will be open for public events.
There will be some retail space on the ground floor, possibly space
for grab-and-go food items.
And the board room on the top floor will have over twice the space
than the current board room. Community events could be held there
as well since, of course, it will be just about the most convenient location
in the city for transportation.
For drivers there will be a break room. The Rosa Parks station
doesn’t have one. This will allow more contact between drivers and
supervisors.
Throughout the Regional Transportation Center, the story of transportation
in Jacksonville and the history of LaVilla will be told and celebrated.
Visitors will get an immediate sense of place at the Regional Transportation
Center, one they don’t often see elsewhere in Jacksonville.
There already is a large illustration of James Weldon Johnson on one
of the columns of the building.
Beyond the borders of the center is the LaVilla neighborhood that
is filling up with new apartment buildings. Blocks of vacant land,
mostly owned by the government, make development easier than
normal.
The Regional Transportation Center has already been considered
as an anchor for the neighborhood.
The LaVilla master plan for the Downtown Investment Authority
includes requirements that history be recognized with, for instance,
a heritage trail. Talk about a sense of place! LaVilla has one. It doesn’t
need to be invented, it only needs to be reported.
Lift Ev’ry Voice and Sing Park, the boyhood home of James Weldon
Johnson and Rosamond Johnson, will be developed with a $100,000
grant from Vestcor as part of is winning bid to develop townhomes in
LaVilla.
The first model mile of the Emerald Trail will pass nearby, going
from Park Street to UF Health Jacksonville.
Other historic locations nearby include Union Terminal with its
nod to A. Philip Randolph, Brewster Hospital, the Clara White Mission,
Old Stanton High School and Darnell-Cookman Middle-High
School of the Medical Arts.
The Regional Transportation Center is set to be completed on time
in late March or early April.
A temporary certificate of occupancy in late January would allow
phased moves into the building.
“Maintaining schedules is very important here,” Rodgers said of a
construction project that has taken about 2 ½ years.
There were a few construction hurdles. Some contaminated soil
had to be removed, there were delays following hurricanes and a
World War II-era bomb had to be removed.
Almost immediately upon its opening, current Skyway vehicles
will return. But soon the autonomous vehicles will be replacing them
on the Ultimate Urban Circulator. Within three years, driverless vehicles
will travel the Skyway and ease down to road level. This driverless
system is being watched as an efficient way for midsized cities to provide
mass transit without expensive fixed rail systems.
That’s the future, being shaped and imagined at the futuristic Jacksonville
Regional Transportation Center.
Now we just need a catchy name.
MIKE CLARK is Editorial Page Editor of The Florida Times-Union and
Editor of J. He has been a reporter and editor for the Jacksonville
newspapers since 1973. He lives in Nocatee.
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J MAGAZINE | WINTER 2019