"You know, it’s people-focused. Because, again, what is the point of the infrastructure?"
Joe Lopano’s tenure at Tampa International Airport ended last month. He leaves his successor, Michael Stephens, with an upcoming international terminal, more customers than ever and Tampa Bay’s longest passenger rail route — a 1.4-mile loop from the recently-built rental car center to the main terminal.
So Stephens is looking outside the airport to make his mark.
To get to the airport, travelers coming from either side of Interstate 275 must navigate the Westshore interchange, a crowded exit connecting drivers to State Road 60, the Veterans Expressway and Tampa International. Drivers call the interchange one of Tampa’s worst choke points.
Stephens, a former Hillsborough Area Regional Transit Authority executive, imagines a six-mile rail route from Water Street through Midtown and the Westshore business district, all the way to SkyConnect, where riders could transfer to the Tampa airport’s main terminal with ease.
The vision has personal implications for Stephens, who commutes over an hour each day to the airport from North Tampa. But it seems more remote than ever, as localities are at odds over wider highways and ferry boat grants. Leaders even disagree over whether they should raise property taxes so Hillsborough’s bus agency can fund its current threadbare routes through 2030.
But Stephens hopes to leverage his status as leader of one of the region’s most powerful transportation hubs.
Read more at the Tampa Bay Times