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Parkway opponents deploy Web weapon

The site has no group affiliation, but compiles arguments against the proposed toll road.

Bobby Roscow is a Central Florida native who cherishes Citrus County, even though he hasn't lived here in years. Hahn Vu, born in Vietnam, is a newcomer who learned less than six months ago that the proposed Suncoast Parkway extension would come uncomfortably close to the home she is building in southwest Citrus.

Together, they have created a new Web site - www.truthaboutsuncoast2.com - that they are billing as a clearinghouse for anti-parkway information. For people who have been fighting for a decade to keep the parkway out of Citrus, the Web site is a welcome addition to the ammunition.

"It's so useful for people who are new to the county and haven't had the opportunity to know these things because they just moved here," said Janet Masaoy, chairwoman of the board of directors for COST, Citizens Opposed to the Suncoast Tollway. "I want to be sure they get everything they should get. This way, it's there."

The 42-mile Suncoast Parkway links Hillsborough County with Pasco and Hernando counties. The toll road's northern terminus is U.S. 98 near the Hernando County-Citrus County line. The state is studying a possible Citrus addition - known as Suncoast Parkway Project 2 - that would extend the road north to U.S. 19 at Red Level.

Roscow, who owns a farm north of Inverness but lives in Connecticut, said he is not affiliated with COST but does share many of the group's goals.

"I don't want to be involved because you end up in their bureaucracies," Roscow said of his and Vu's independent Web site.

Roscow is best known as the instigator of a lawsuit filed in August against Department of Transportation Secretary Jose Abreu. Roscow and Citrus resident Teddi Bierly sued DOT for excluding the public from work sessions of the Environmental Resource and Regulatory Agency Group, made up of representatives from 10 state agencies.

Vu works from home as a project manager for a financial company and also has experience as a Web master. She said she agreed to handle the technical end of the Web site because the parkway project makes her "livid."

"There's a lot of information that's already gathered out there, but the problem is, it has just sat in people's files," Vu said. "It just doesn't get out to the public."

While the site is not affiliated with COST or any other group, it certainly supports the position that the parkway would be detrimental to Citrus County.

It links to newspaper stories that detail, for example, how taxpayers are subsidizing another DOT tollway in Florida that didn't attract enough toll-paying traffic. To find that particular story, Web users click on a link from the word "manipulated."

Other links attempt to prove the point that the parkway will worsen traffic, reduce home values, diminish the Citrus quality of life and adversely affect the water supply.

The site also provides information about upcoming public meetings on the parkway and maps of proposed parkway paths. One portion of the site, called "Fact & Fiction," provides one-sentence arguments for supporting the parkway and detailed counter-arguments for each one, including links to studies that refute the "pro-parkway" side.

"I'm so adamantly opposed to this project because it is just the antithesis of everything I could see benefit the county in terms of what it has to offer Florida," said Roscow, reached at his Connecticut home Tuesday. "To put this through totally ruins that."

The Web site created by Citrus native Bobby Roscow and Citrus newcomer Hahn Vu is at www.truthaboutsuncoast2.com

The proposed Citrus extension of the Suncoast Parkway will be discussed at a state Department of Transportation open house. The event will be from 4 to 8 p.m. Nov. 13 at the National Guard Armory, 8551 W Venable St., Crystal River.