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Letter to the editor

We want short cuts, just not through our neighborhood

By CHUIN-WEI YAP
Published June 10, 2007

LAND O'LAKES - Take a drive out to Lake Patience Road.

Which one? I hear you ask.

There are, in fact, two Lake Patience Roads in central Pasco. One runs through Oakstead. Just north of that, there's the other. They're not connected.

At their closest point, they are no more than 50 feet apart. If they are joined -- presto! -- a new "shortcut" from U.S. 41 to State Road 54.

But they're not joined.

So some enterprising wiseguy or girl decided to make a dirt road linking one to the other.

This is what the dirt road tells us: drivers love shortcuts.

In Pasco, few have advocated this point of view with more gusto than Longleaf developer Frank Starkey.

No more cul-de-sacs, he says. Build street grids, so drivers can zig-zag their way through their own short cuts.

Sure, you can say Starkey's just a starry-eyed acolyte of the antisprawl New Urbanism movement. Or you can look for a developer's seedy financial motives in his push for grids.

Tell me if you find something.

Here's his rationale: "It's Ma Bell versus the Internet," he says.

The telephone service used to be routed through massive central switching stations. To make a call, you have to patch through this collecting station.

That's pretty much how Bruce B. Downs Boulevard and State Road 54 work today. If you live in Oakstead, you have to get on SR 54 to get to U.S. 41.

The Internet builds on the modern phone system, which got rid of central patching stations years ago. You just go point to point, using the shortest route possible given all other traffic in the system.

Starkey crunched some numbers, comparing New Tampa and South Tampa (which he calls "Old Tampa").

They're both about the same size and have the same population, but Old Tampa runs on a grid of mostly two-lane roads. New Tampa and Wesley Chapel rely heavily on Bruce B. Downs, with roads branching off into your dead-end cul-de-sac.

"It's not about transportation," Starkey says. "It's about traffic."

Here's what he found: the load on Old Tampa roads is 61 percent. That means the roads there carry three-fifths of what they were designed to do.

In New Tampa, the load is 110 percent. On Bruce B. Downs, it's 185 percent. That means idling engines and long waits.

It's not always an instinctive choice, though, to let go of the privacy of the cul-de-sacs.

Last year, Hillsborough County built Kinnan Road in the Cross Creek community. It was supposed to link up with Mansfield Boulevard in Wesley Chapel's Meadow Pointe and provide a shortcut for local motorists who wanted to avoid Bruce B. Downs.

Pasco officials said no. They feared cars piling into the new short cut. Perhaps not surprisingly, many Meadow Pointe residents, including colleagues I talked to at the St. Petersburg Times, agreed with the county.

But, to get the grid going, somebody's got to take the unpopular option.

"The problem with 'the interconnect' is that it's not the law of the land," Starkey said. "For too long, we've made it a political choice. And people will always choose the cul-de-sac."

In other words, the consumer instinctively wants private roads and cul-de-sacs. Knowing that, street grids become a tougher choice for political and administrative leaders to back.

Think of that the next time you're stuck on Bruce B. Downs or SR 54.

Remember the two Lake Patience Roads, and the dirt road that joins them.

The Lane Ranger is a twice-monthly column on anything and everything to do with road issues. We focus on fast-growing central Pasco, but we're also countywide in our interests. Send your gripes, compliments, worries, tips or any other thoughts to Chuin-Wei Yap at cyap@sptimes.com or call (813) 909-4613.

About this column

61 percent of load on roads in South Tampa, where streets are designed on a grid system

110 percent of load on roads in Wesley Chapel/New Tampa, where cul-de-sacs reign

185 percent of load on Bruce B. Downs Boulevard

- More shortcuts

- Less privacy

- Fewer road widening projects

- Fewer choices for drivers

- Developers say consumers prefer cul-de-sacs

- Heavier stress on roads

[Last modified June 9, 2007, 20:36:01]