Tampa — Streetcar Extension Opens Nov. 12

Rail Transit Online, October 2010

A 1/3-mi. (0.54 km) extension of the TECO Line Streetcar to Whiting Street near the center of downtown Tampa is scheduled to open on Nov. 12.

Officials of Tampa Historic Streetcar Inc. and Hillsborough Area Regional Transit hope the relocated terminus will bring badly-needed ridership to the financially-struggling streetcar operation.

Unless next year's operating budget can be balanced, the streetcar's much-diminished endowment fund would be tapped again; it has already sunk from $5 million to less than $1 million.

'We know it is going to run out," THS Chairman David Mechanik told the Tampa Bay Business Journal. 'We are trying to beef up advertising, and we are looking at service cuts."

Among the proposals being considered are lengthening headways, accepting alcohol and tobacco advertising for the first time and making the streetcar's website more attractive to advertisers.