TAMPA BAY
Sean doesn’t have a car. He did, but his DUI has made it impossible for him to drive throughout Tampa Bay.
The 34-year-old, who asked that we withhold his last name, says he didn’t like the idea of asking friends for rides all the time, so he buckled down and opted for public transportation. Fortunately for Sean, who lives in Tampa, the nightmare experience he expected never unfolded.
“Once you get the hang of it it’s actually pretty easy to use,” Sean says, speaking about the public transit system on both sides of the bay. “True, there is plenty of room for improvement, but it seems to get me from point A to point B, and that’s all I need.”
Sean carpools to work in Clearwater with a co-worker, but if he wants to check out a club or go to dinner, he’s relying on public transportation.
“I met a few friends for drinks over in Clearwater at the Pro Shop Pub not too long ago,” he says. “There’s a bus station right down the block from there so I hopped on and made my way home.”
True he had to make a bus change, but Sean said the buzzed ride home wasn’t difficult at all.
“I probably wouldn’t use it again for something that far from my house,” he says, “but I always use the trolleys in Tampa.”
The Pinellas Suncoast Transit Authority offers buses throughout the county—and a few called 300x that cross the bay and stop in Tampa. In Tampa, the Hillsborough Area Regional Transit, or HARTline, takes over.
“I’ve had a few friends join me on the ride from Ybor to Channelside on the HARTline trolleys,” Sean says. “It’s the easiest way to get from one place to another and they didn’t have to worry about parking.”
The group, he said, also didn’t worry about encountering another DUI because everyone stayed at a friend’s apartment in Ybor City.
Bus routes in both Hillsborough and Pinellas counties can service the LGBT community. Churches and clubs are all mostly within a block or two of a bus stop and once a rider learns a route, the times rarely change. During the week, routes begin as early as 4:15 a.m. and run until almost 11:30 p.m. Weekends have similar schedules, but don’t start until after 6 a.m.
“Of course I want my car back and I miss that freedom of coming and going when I want,” Sean says. “But really, the buses haven’t been too bad for this gay boy. Now that I know how it works, there’s probably a good chance I’d use it again in the future if I need to.”
Prices for Tampa Bay public transportation vary by route. Specific prices can be found on the appropriate service’s Web site.
ORLANDO
There’s no great way to talk about this without sounding like a total princess, so I’m just going to come out and say it: I’ve never ridden a city bus before. As a person who cares about the environment and likes to save money, I’ve considered it, but I’m intimidated, so I just kept driving my car to and from work every day. When it came time to talk transportation in Watermark, I decided to dive into the deep end and volunteered to ride Orlando’s Lynx system for one day, making my way to LGBT points of interest around town.
First stop: Bank of America tower downtown, to park my car. I know, irony, but I wanted to check out the main bus station and understandably, they don’t offer vehicle parking. The garage cost me 8 bucks, nearly double the price of the $4.50 bus day pass. A single route costs $2 and 30-day pass is $50.
Matthew Friedman, Lynx spokesman, said affordability is a key component driving improvements, as are fighting traffic congestion and environmental concerns. The Lymmo system, a free bus service that circulates the outskirts of downtown, was created specifically to alleviate congestion and parking problems. Lynx is also the only bus service in the country to blend and own its own bio-fuel, a project which earned a $2.5 million grant from the state.
“If a hurricane wipes out Orlando’s gas supply, we’d be able to run the busses for a short period of time,” said Friedman.
The Lynx building is hard to miss, since it is built to mimic waves and is really architecturally unique. I entered the Lobby and located the route maps I’d need for the day before approaching sales and asking for a day pass.
Mistake no. 1: Day passes are only sold on the buses. (Longer-term passes can be purchased in the lobby.)
She told me where to find my first bus of the day and I pulled a 20 out of my wallet, ready to buy my pass.
Mistake no. 2: The automated machines aboard the busses only accept exact change.
I made an about face and went back into the Lobby, then back on board the bus, day pass in my pocket.
My first stop was the Parliament House on Orange Blossom Trail. I planned to spend a little time observing everyone else on the bus but it only took about two minutes to get to my destination and I realized I had no idea how to stop this bus. I noticed the cords along the window, but was too chicken to pull one because what if they were just for emergencies? What if I set off an alarm? Fortunately for me, there were some people boarding at my stop so I just started to move toward the door.
Mistake no. 3: Board in the front of the bus, but disembark through the doors toward the back. A robotic voice set me straight.
There is a Lynx stop right outside of the Parliament House. When you look up routes online, Parliament House gets name-checked as a destination, and it’s the only place I visited all day actually mentioned in the trip planning program.
Mistake no. 4: I should have brought more sunscreen. Many of the stops have shelters but not all of them, and when the sun came out, the waits became brutal.
My next stop was Theater Downtown, and I got there easily enough. Just as I was starting to feel good, like I had mastered the Lynx system, things took a bad turn. I couldn’t find the next stop. Fortunately there are stops every two blocks, so if you can find your route, the specific stop doesn’t matter. Well, I found my route and a reasonable stop, but by this point, I was so turned around I wasn’t sure what direction the bus would be going. I took a deep breath and boarded the next bus that came by, but the driver told me that I should get off and board a different route.
Mistake no. 5: Getting off that bus. I should have listened to my gut. The drivers will try to help you—there is even friendly signage on some buses explaining as much—but they don’t know everything.
About an hour (and two miles on foot) later, I was straightened out and headed toward The Center on Mills Avenue, another destination with a bus stop right in front. By this point I was an expert at pulling the cord to stop the bus. If bus-cord-pulling was an Olympic event, I’d win a gold medal.
My final objective, before heading back to the main station, was to be dropped off in Thornton Park. The route takes riders down Robinson, right along Lake Eola, and I was so busy deciding when I wanted to pull the cord that I ran out of Robinson and the bus made a quick turn, headed right back to the main station. Rather than backtrack, I opted to wrap up my adventure with tired feet, a sunburned nose, and a little understanding of public transit in downtown Orlando.
