HILLSBOROUGH COUNTY, Fla. — If you look 25 years into the future, what would you see here in Hillsborough County?
Transportation officials hope a survey they want you to take today will lead to major traffic improvements decades from now.
Everyone’s got a gripe when it comes to transportation—roads riddled with potholes, speeding cars, dangerous intersections, too much traffic—it’s overwhelming.
“Anytime an agency does an analysis of what are the worst places in the country, all of Florida comes to the top of the list," said Johnny Wong, the Executive Director of the Transportation and Planning Organization. "Among the metros across all of Florida, Hillsborough County is towards the top of that list. So, we’re pretty bad.”
It's a reputation we’d prefer to not have and it’s why transportation officials are turning to you, the driver, the neighbor, the employee, the loved one, here in Hillsborough County for answers. What do you want transportation to look like in Hillsborough County 25 years from now?
“To specifically drill down, asking folks to tell us what are their top transportation priorities, whether it’s infrastructure maintenance, reducing crashes, bus service," Wong said.
Your answers will be part of the transportation road map for the county. Of course, how to fund these projects is also a big part of the plan, and they want your input there too.
“Once we identify what the community priorities are, we’re also asking them if they have suggestions of what would be a source to fund all of those improvements," Wong said. "We know this county has a ton of needs [and a] limited budget, so we’re going to have to make tough decisions about where that money is going to come from.”
The survey only takes about five to 10 minutes to complete and is open from now until April 15, which is about six weeks to collect input.
"The challenge of course is to make sure we’re getting in touch with all of the communities that we haven’t heard from yet. So while it’s six weeks, we’re still kind of under the gun to make sure we have as many conversations as possible," Wong said.
There are many incentives to take the survey too. TPO will enter you into a raffle to win prizes like Bucs tickets, concert tickets for Bad Bunny, a family pack of tickets for MOSI and more.
If you're interested in taking the survey, click here.
