Passion Drives Progress at PSTA with Planning Manager, Jacob Labutka

00:00 Stop Requested.

00:01 Levi McCollum: Welcome to Stop Requested, the podcast where we discuss everything Transit.

00:05 Levi McCollum: I’m your co host Levi McCollum, director of operations at ETA Transit.

00:10 Christian Londono: And I’m your co host Christian Londono, Senior Customer Success Manager at ETA Transit.

00:21 Levi McCollum: Hey Christian, how are you today?

00:23 Christian Londono: Doing excellently by how about yourself?

00:26 Levi McCollum: I’m doing very well. I’m very excited for this episode of Stop Requested.

00:31 Levi McCollum: We’ve got a special guest coming on for an interview, Jacob Labutka, the planning manager at Pinellas Suncoast Transit Authority.

00:40 Levi McCollum: Jacob, how are you doing?

00:42 Jacob Labutka: I am great this morning. Thanks for having me on.

00:45 Levi McCollum: Yeah, absolutely. This is really a pleasure.

00:47 Levi McCollum: You and I have known each other for quite a while and I don’t think we’ve had an in depth

00:52 Levi McCollum: conversation quite like the one we’re going to have here.

00:55 Levi McCollum: So I’m really excited to learn about what’s going on at PSTA.

01:00 Levi McCollum: And starting with your journey, how did you get to PSTA? What is your background? Can you give us a

01:06 Levi McCollum: little bit of the details there so our listeners can get to know you?

01:11 Jacob Labutka: Sure, I’d be happy to. I think to get to my origin story, we’ll turn back the clock to the

01:16 Jacob Labutka: late 90s early aughts with young Jacob.

01:20 Jacob Labutka: I before I really even knew much about public transit, I think I was always into the idea of transportation

01:29 Jacob Labutka: and maps specifically. So I did a couple of very like nerdy things as a kid.

01:34 Jacob Labutka: So I would create my own cities and then just draw them out on loose leaf paper.

01:39 Jacob Labutka: And I was very into, you know, just the layout of the cities and how many lanes a roadway have

01:45 Jacob Labutka: and have your main arterials in your neighborhood streets.

01:47 Jacob Labutka: And I was just had a lot of time to myself so drew lots of maps and then I had

01:53 Jacob Labutka: a collection of blocks and Hot Wheels and I would construct my own cities and roads from this hot, these

02:02 Jacob Labutka: Hot Wheel blocks or no sorry, the blocks and then I put the Hot Wheels in there.

02:07 Jacob Labutka: Of course sadly they were, none of them were transit hot wheels and they were all probably single occupancy hot

02:13 Jacob Labutka: wheels. But you know, you have to start somewhere and then probably around the same time.

02:19 Jacob Labutka: I grew up in South Louisiana in a mid sized city called Lafayette.

02:23 Jacob Labutka: And I think my first experience with transit that I think was formative in my now career choice would be

02:31 Jacob Labutka: going a couple hours drive down Interstate 10 to New Orleans that we would frequent as a kid and that

02:38 Jacob Labutka: was my first experience with urbanism that frankly wasn’t just, you know, a massive parking lot.

02:44 Jacob Labutka: I mean there were, you know, there are some Cute areas of my hometown.

02:47 Jacob Labutka: But I think like many American cities, there’s just a lot of development patterns outside of the urban core that,

02:54 Jacob Labutka: you know, you have your shopping malls and plazas and restaurants that with too much parking.

03:00 Jacob Labutka: So it was interesting to see that while New Orleans Metro certainly has some of those types of areas that

03:06 Jacob Labutka: the urban core and the historic district takes up a lot of the city.

03:10 Jacob Labutka: And there’s so much history around the city and the way development and land use happened prior to 1918s, that

03:24 Jacob Labutka: just depended a lot more on walkability and streetcars.

03:28 Jacob Labutka: The streetcar, I think, was my first transit trip, and I just fell in love with just being able to

03:33 Jacob Labutka: ride the streetcar. Little me was excited just to be in something that wasn’t a car.

03:39 Jacob Labutka: And I think that was very formative in just influencing my love of cities, my love of transit.

03:48 Jacob Labutka: And so I really took that and ran with it.

03:50 Jacob Labutka: And I think later on in high school, I knew I wanted to go into planning, and then it was

03:55 Jacob Labutka: through college and grad school that I really narrowed down my love for public transit.

04:01 Jacob Labutka: And so that’s kind of where I ended up or how I ended up to where I’m at now.

04:06 Jacob Labutka: I went to Rutgers for grad school and narrowed down on my second year studies of public transit planning.

04:12 Jacob Labutka: Had a really great internship in the summer of 2015 at the Cleveland RTA.

04:17 Jacob Labutka: And I think it was in those years that I actually, I had issues with my car that I brought

04:22 Jacob Labutka: up to New Jersey. And so I was totally reliant on public transit and, you know, really saw the impact

04:29 Jacob Labutka: it had both on my own ability to get around, but the impact it could have on communities and realized

04:35 Jacob Labutka: that it was the career choice for me.

04:37 Jacob Labutka: And so at the end of my grad school career, I was looking for jobs all around the country, and

04:42 Jacob Labutka: I wasn’t being too picky because I was running out of student loan money and I, you know, needed to,

04:47 Jacob Labutka: of course, make an income to, To.

04:49 Jacob Labutka: To live. And thankfully, this opportunity in Florida appeared just at the right time.

04:53 Jacob Labutka: So we’re going on eight and a half years, and it’s completely changed the course of my life being able

05:00 Jacob Labutka: to advance in this opportunity here.

05:03 Levi McCollum: Nice. Well, I know that you’ve made a significant impact on psta, and we’re going to get into some of

05:09 Levi McCollum: those projects that you’ve been a part of for those eight and a half years in just a little bit.

05:14 Levi McCollum: I want to go back to something that you said, though, about your childhood, because I’m curious.

05:18 Levi McCollum: Sounds like you had A lot of very tactile experiences with public transportation.

05:23 Levi McCollum: Were you a fan of video games that you had to simulate a city like SimCity or some of the

05:30 Levi McCollum: others? Just curious.

05:32 Jacob Labutka: So I played those a little bit and I think I like the idea of SimCity.

05:38 Jacob Labutka: My issue with games like that though, is that I’m not a big customizer.

05:43 Jacob Labutka: Like, I want, like, like I just want to like, you know, select a building, select something and just put

05:49 Jacob Labutka: it down there. Like I’m not, you know, I don’t want to decide like what the fence is or the

05:54 Jacob Labutka: windows on the. Or, you know, really getting that level of detail.

05:57 Jacob Labutka: And I think for those reason, those reasons that didn’t particularly interest me, admittedly I’m maybe half ashamed to say

06:06 Jacob Labutka: this, is that I think as a child I would play.

06:09 Jacob Labutka: I mean, I did like, you know, role playing games that weren’t necessarily related to urbanism.

06:14 Jacob Labutka: Although, you know what, I take that back because I was really into like the, the Final Fantasy series growing

06:20 Jacob Labutka: up. And I think in all of those games you walk everywhere, right? I mean, not to say you mean

06:25 Jacob Labutka: sometimes you might ride like a, like a fantasy animal, like a chocobo or something, but you know, there’s not

06:30 Jacob Labutka: like getting in your car and okay, let me go to the parking lot in Midgar, the big city.

06:38 Jacob Labutka: Final fantasy 7. So I like, let me.

06:39 Jacob Labutka: Where can I find parking so I can beat Sephiroth? Like, no, there was no, like, there was none of

06:45 Jacob Labutka: that, right? Like you’re getting in like the airship or you’re getting on a train or whatnot.

06:51 Jacob Labutka: So I think the way I navigated the world in those games certainly, you know, influenced my take on urbanism.

07:00 Jacob Labutka: But then admittedly there were other games like Grand Theft Auto I may have delved into a little bit that

07:05 Jacob Labutka: was definitely more car dependent. And you do obviously drive everywhere.

07:10 Jacob Labutka: But I did always, like, in those games there is always transit.

07:16 Jacob Labutka: I mean, I guess, you know, there’s the buses that you can just steal, which I certainly wouldn’t advocate for,

07:21 Jacob Labutka: you know, stealing a bus. But they did also maintain a train line, so.

07:25 Jacob Labutka: So you could board a train somewhere in the game and go somewhere else.

07:28 Jacob Labutka: So I mean, while cars were dominating, there’s always that little bit of transit that I would always try to

07:34 Jacob Labutka: seek out. But anyway, so that’s a long winded way of describing how video games influenced my perception of the

07:44 Jacob Labutka: world and the urbanism that we have to seek out in fantasy games that maybe are lacking in many of

07:50 Jacob Labutka: American cities.

07:52 Levi McCollum: Yeah, well, I mean, it sounds like you’re telling me that there’s no Geography of Nowhere and Final Fantasy, so

07:58 Levi McCollum: I think that’s a good thing.

07:59 Levi McCollum: Right. Well, you know, hey, I’ve got another fun question just before we get into the details of those projects.

08:07 Levi McCollum: If your career were a transit map, what color would your line be and where would your next transfer be?

08:14 Jacob Labutka: I think for color, I’m going to go with purple, which, as you saw when my camera was on earlier,

08:18 Jacob Labutka: I’m wearing a purple shirt today.

08:19 Jacob Labutka: I think I’ve always like the color purple, and it’s also my birth stone is amethyst, which is obviously very,

08:26 Jacob Labutka: very purpley. So. And I think I just, I like wearing purple and I like purple things.

08:30 Jacob Labutka: And where my transfer would be, I would say to answer that would be.

08:35 Jacob Labutka: So I know I’m on the purple line, right? And I’m going very happy on the purple line.

08:39 Jacob Labutka: I know eventually I’m going to have to maybe transfer it to another line.

08:44 Jacob Labutka: And I see where some of the transfers down the line are, but I haven’t decided what, what my destination

08:51 Jacob Labutka: is. And so obviously I need to know what my destination is to determine my transfer.

08:57 Jacob Labutka: So I’m at the point in my career where I’m happy on the purple line, but looking for what transfer

09:05 Jacob Labutka: opportunity would suit me best?

09:07 Levi McCollum: I see. I love it. Well, like Krishna and me, you are also a transportation slash transit nerd.

09:13 Levi McCollum: So this is going to be a fun conversation.

09:15 Jacob Labutka: I’m here for it. Yeah. And.

09:18 Christian Londono: And the thing is, when you’re writing that purple line right in.

09:21 Christian Londono: In you’re looking for the next transfer is, is you’re looking at also at the projects and, and the opportunities

09:28 Christian Londono: to get involved with newer things and, and you know, all that enriches your background and it just expands your

09:35 Christian Londono: horizons. And you know, as a planner, you’re involved with many projects, some that come into fruition, some that, Some

09:43 Christian Londono: that are very idealistic, some that are kind of immediate, and you’re kind of put in charge of something that

09:50 Christian Londono: needs to happen almost right away.

09:53 Christian Londono: So I want to know about some of those projects that you’re involved with today at psta.

10:00 Christian Londono: And my question is, what projects or planning efforts at PSTA are you most excited about right now?

10:10 Jacob Labutka: Oh, let’s see. There’s just so many things I’m working on right now, but to narrow it down a little

10:15 Jacob Labutka: bit, so probably what I’m the most excited about right now is, and this is a project I’ve been working

10:20 Jacob Labutka: on for the last two years that about every five years we, as an agency which we typically call our

10:28 Jacob Labutka: Community Bus Plan. We take a comprehensive look at our network and find opportunities to change routes, change service times,

10:37 Jacob Labutka: to reflect changes, changing travel, changing demand.

10:41 Jacob Labutka: And certainly in past efforts, we’ve made modifications based on the results of those bus planning efforts.

10:49 Jacob Labutka: That being said in this last round that was just approved by the board in March, that we’ve called our

10:54 Jacob Labutka: Connected Community Bus Network, I would say this is probably the most comprehensive redesign of our system that we’ve had

11:02 Jacob Labutka: probably in decades. And I’ve had coworkers who’ve been here for much longer than I have tell me in their

11:09 Jacob Labutka: opinion that they think, you know, this has been needed for a while to help modernize the system.

11:14 Jacob Labutka: Because I think over time we’ve made, you know, incremental service modifications to certain routes that were designed decades ago,

11:24 Jacob Labutka: which, you know, did have a purpose at the time.

11:26 Jacob Labutka: But obviously development patterns have changed, travel patterns have changed.

11:30 Jacob Labutka: So, so this was a really great comprehensive effort to kind of start from scratch and reinforce things that are

11:38 Jacob Labutka: working today. But maybe not maybe, but make changes to make the system more clear, consistent, connected, easier to understand,

11:48 Jacob Labutka: more straighter, direct routes where possible.

11:51 Jacob Labutka: Because there are certain routes that I think were modified over time to maybe meander based on particular demands or

11:58 Jacob Labutka: particular stops. And, and so while that certainly served a purpose at the time, I think we all, at least

12:07 Jacob Labutka: everybody on this podcast, knows that the best transit are those lines that are in a straight line that connect

12:13 Jacob Labutka: to a variety of destinations that people want to go to.

12:17 Jacob Labutka: And so I think that was a big effort for us to create more of a network.

12:24 Jacob Labutka: And so while some people more or not more, some people may need to make a transfer where they didn’t

12:30 Jacob Labutka: today. But I think for a lot of people, having that corridor based travel makes more sense.

12:37 Christian Londono: Yeah. And you know, a couple of things.

12:40 Christian Londono: First of all, I really like the name.

12:43 Christian Londono: I think the name is clever in many ways.

12:46 Christian Londono: Connected Community Bus Network. I think that that Community Bus Network is what I like the most because you’re pretty

12:53 Christian Londono: much in the name saying a few things.

12:55 Christian Londono: One is that the service is for the community, is the community that owns the service and should direct what

13:02 Christian Londono: the service should be. And then second, it’s also telling me that the community is involved in making these decisions.

13:10 Christian Londono: Right. As transit planners in different transit agencies, we’re constantly working on small improvements, maybe some routes, some segments, some

13:22 Christian Londono: frequencies. But then what I’m understanding from this project, and correct me if I’m wrong, this is kind of like

13:27 Christian Londono: a system redesign where you look in holistically at all the routes.

13:33 Christian Londono: Is that correct?

13:34 Jacob Labutka: No, that is, that is absolutely correct.

13:36 Jacob Labutka: And I think to your point, Christian, this was definitely a community driven plan.

13:40 Jacob Labutka: And this was over three phases, over a year and a half, two years, where you know, we started off

13:46 Jacob Labutka: by engaging the community in trying to prioritize how they think transit should be planned in the county.

13:54 Jacob Labutka: So asking questions like how far stop apart should bus stops be? Should we what’s the balance between investing in

14:01 Jacob Labutka: more frequent corridor based services or maintaining geographic coverage? And so I think it was through eliciting the input of

14:11 Jacob Labutka: the community and just kind of those basic transit planning questions that we then develop scenarios for what the system

14:16 Jacob Labutka: could look like in a, you know, corridor based frequency system and a coverage system that still utilizes our same

14:24 Jacob Labutka: budget, because this is all within our existing budget.

14:26 Jacob Labutka: And I think, you know, I think my goal for the connected community bus network is that this is the

14:33 Jacob Labutka: baseline for which we can make future improvements and add more premium transit services.

14:38 Jacob Labutka: But I think this is, you know, a good start to improve the network while also knowing that we have

14:46 Jacob Labutka: more work to do. And. But you know, as I said, this is definitely huge public engagement, community driven plan

14:53 Jacob Labutka: and process.

14:54 Christian Londono: And I would imagine even the bus operators were greatly involved.

14:59 Christian Londono: So tell me, you know, this project is really interesting and I’ve spoken with some different transit agencies around the

15:09 Christian Londono: country that are getting ready. They’re gearing up for the same assistant redesign look at holistically at the routes.

15:16 Christian Londono: So where are you in the implementation process? How far is it for being implemented? Is it already implemented or

15:23 Christian Londono: you getting ready? You guys have a date of mind when the plan will go into effect?

15:28 Jacob Labutka: So we at our March 2025 board meeting just about a month and a half ago, the board approved the

15:35 Jacob Labutka: final plan of what the network is going to look like and where the routes will go.

15:40 Jacob Labutka: So, so once we had that board approval, we then immediately hit the ground running to do everything that we

15:45 Jacob Labutka: needed to do to implement the system.

15:47 Jacob Labutka: So right now our target date is this fall, sometime around October.

15:52 Jacob Labutka: And so we’ve had probably have meetings pretty much every week discussing different topics related to the implementation.

15:59 Jacob Labutka: So like right now, at least, my team and I this month are working on a lot of the mapping

16:04 Jacob Labutka: and taking where the routes are going to go and making it into a new system map, making it into

16:10 Jacob Labutka: new of stick maps to both for public facing items down the road, but more immediately to help with that

16:16 Jacob Labutka: internal training because this is obviously a new system and a lot of routes are going to be changing.

16:21 Jacob Labutka: So our operations team and our bus operators are going to need ample time to ensure that they know about

16:27 Jacob Labutka: the new system. So really working on that route specific mapping and turn by turn directions now will help inform

16:35 Jacob Labutka: what that training looks like. But then there’s lots of other things including, you know, what is the public, public

16:40 Jacob Labutka: involvement plan look like? There’s the scheduling of the routes, there’s putting in new bus stops, taking out bus stops.

16:46 Jacob Labutka: I think there’s a lot that will go into it.

16:49 Jacob Labutka: So we’re going to be pretty busy over the next six or so months as we get ready for a

16:53 Jacob Labutka: fall implementation.

16:56 Christian Londono: That sounds very exciting and I wish you a lot of success with that project.

16:59 Christian Londono: I’m pretty sure it’s going to be transformative.

17:03 Jacob Labutka: Thank you. Yes, we hope the same.

17:04 Jacob Labutka: I will say my running joke with the Connect Community Bus network is that we call it ccbn, which every

17:10 Jacob Labutka: time I say CCBN it sounds like a Canadian news network.

17:13 Jacob Labutka: But it’s so much more than that.

17:17 Levi McCollum: For our listeners who are not as familiar with the Pinellas area and Pinellas county and the larger Tampa Bay

17:26 Levi McCollum: region, I’m curious to learn how those, those changes to your service are going to impact connections to other counties

17:36 Levi McCollum: in the area. And is there.

17:39 Levi McCollum: Yeah, go ahead.

17:39 Jacob Labutka: No, no. That’s a great question.

17:41 Jacob Labutka: So currently in our system, so Pinellas county for, you know, for our listeners who may not be as aware.

17:47 Jacob Labutka: So Pinellas county is the most densely populated county in the state of Florida.

17:52 Jacob Labutka: So we have 24 different municipalities, some of our largest municipalities being cities like St.

17:57 Jacob Labutka: Petersburg, Clearwater, Largo, Pinellas Park. There’s, you know, a lot of travel happening between many of these cities and many

18:05 Jacob Labutka: of these destinations in the county.

18:08 Jacob Labutka: And then of course we have connections to some of our neighboring counties.

18:13 Jacob Labutka: So probably are the most number of connections we have are over to Hillsborough county, particularly Tampa.

18:19 Jacob Labutka: We currently have two express routes and a local route that goes over to Tampa.

18:25 Jacob Labutka: And then we also make connections with other systems that provide service into Pinellas County.

18:31 Jacob Labutka: So go Pasco. The Pasco county transit system has two routes that come in from the north and, and intersects

18:36 Jacob Labutka: with some of our routes in Tarpon Springs and then to the south.

18:40 Jacob Labutka: I don’t think there’s too much transfer activity from this route.

18:43 Jacob Labutka: But Manatee County Transit System has a route that only operates a few times a day which the primary purpose

18:51 Jacob Labutka: of that route is to connect folks from the Bradenton Manatee county area to the Bay Pines VA center in

18:58 Jacob Labutka: St. Pete. So it does interface with our system at A few locations.

19:02 Jacob Labutka: But I would suspect just based on the intention of the service and the scheduling of that, there’s probably not

19:09 Jacob Labutka: too many connections made. So to now answer your question of how the CCBN will impact those connections, so I

19:16 Jacob Labutka: would say a lot of those connections are staying the same.

19:18 Jacob Labutka: Because I know one of the things we’ve heard a lot out of this plan and comments in the outreach

19:23 Jacob Labutka: of things that people would like to see more of is, you know, improve connections, both cross county for faster

19:29 Jacob Labutka: travel times as well as improved connections to some of the adjacent counties, particularly Hillsborough county, where Tampa is.

19:38 Jacob Labutka: And so I think while this plan does move the needle a little bit in that direction, I think since

19:43 Jacob Labutka: this is a cost neutral proposal, there’s only so much we’re able to do to improve that cross county service

19:50 Jacob Labutka: because some of these routes that go between St.

19:52 Jacob Labutka: Petersburg and Tampa or Mid county and the Largo area in Tampa does do require, would require a lot of

20:00 Jacob Labutka: resources to increase the frequency. So right now both of those routes have about 10 to 12 trips a day.

20:05 Jacob Labutka: So if you were to expand frequency on those services within our existing budget, you’d have to take from the

20:13 Jacob Labutka: local routes here in Pinellas County.

20:15 Jacob Labutka: Right. Because it’s very much a trade off exercise and a cost neutral planning environment.

20:21 Jacob Labutka: So while we didn’t add any resources to those routes, we know that in the future that it’s going to

20:27 Jacob Labutka: be a very much a regional conversation of how we can come together with our regional partners to increase the

20:33 Jacob Labutka: funding on that. So it’s not just relying on the existing budget we have in place.

20:39 Jacob Labutka: That being said, so I would say the express routes are largely staying the same.

20:46 Jacob Labutka: One thing that I’d like to work on though, in parallel to this effort that hasn’t been planned yet, is

20:52 Jacob Labutka: that we currently have a route that goes from downtown St.

20:54 Jacob Labutka: Pete to Tampa. And so there’s a segment that goes between northern St.

20:59 Jacob Labutka: Pete from an area called Gateway Mall to downtown St.

21:01 Jacob Labutka: Pete. And something I’m currently exploring the feasibility of is can we take those resources from that segment and add

21:09 Jacob Labutka: it to the weekend to where we can currently have a few, maybe add a few weekend trips because right

21:15 Jacob Labutka: now those services both are only on the weekdays.

21:18 Jacob Labutka: So I’d like to explore the feasibility of taking that service from that segment between downtown and Gateway Mall and

21:24 Jacob Labutka: seeing if we can expand weekend service because we have several frequent routes that connect downtown to that Gateway Center.

21:30 Jacob Labutka: So while it would involve a transfer, the routing would actually be such that the travel times overall probably be

21:36 Jacob Labutka: about the Same. Anyway, so this.

21:39 Jacob Labutka: And then the other thing that is actually happening that will improve cross county travel in north county is that

21:44 Jacob Labutka: we have a route that goes along State Road 580 that right now just connects from a mall area called

21:50 Jacob Labutka: Countryside Mall in Dunedin and, and travels through the city of Altmar and then connects to a transfer center on

21:57 Jacob Labutka: the edge of Tampa and Hillsborough County.

21:59 Jacob Labutka: And so one of the ways this will improve cross county travel is that every route in our network, with

22:04 Jacob Labutka: the exception of the express routes and on demand zones, will operate seven days a week.

22:09 Jacob Labutka: Because right now we have a lot of services that drop off on the weekends, particularly Sundays, and we have

22:14 Jacob Labutka: a lot of services that don’t go past 6 o’ clock.

22:17 Jacob Labutka: So a goal of this effort is to reallocate service where we have better spans and, and so where we

22:22 Jacob Labutka: have more of our routes, particularly our hourly routes that right now end around six, maybe extending those another two,

22:28 Jacob Labutka: three hours and in addition adding that weekend service on Sundays.

22:33 Jacob Labutka: So that route that goes, you know, to Tampa now and north county will operate seven days a week.

22:39 Jacob Labutka: And in addition we’ve made a route change that combines it with another one of our routes to where there

22:44 Jacob Labutka: will actually be a route that doesn’t exist today that will connect downtown Clearwater and then we’ll travel north through

22:52 Jacob Labutka: the city of Dunedin and along State Road 580 and we’ll continue onto that route that goes to the city

22:58 Jacob Labutka: of Altmore, all the way to Tampa.

22:59 Jacob Labutka: So it’ll be a pretty long route, but it’ll provide a quicker cross county connection for northern Pinellas county and

23:07 Jacob Labutka: northwestern Hillsborough county that doesn’t exist today, that you can only do via transfer.

23:11 Jacob Labutka: Anyway, that was a long winded answer to your question.

23:14 Jacob Labutka: But that is how we are looking to improve cross county connections.

23:17 Levi McCollum: Yeah, I appreciate the thoroughness though.

23:20 Levi McCollum: You know, that gives us a much better idea of how you’re interconnected with those other transit operations in the

23:28 Levi McCollum: larger Tampa Bay region. And I know with as fast as Tampa Bay is growing that you have to have

23:34 Levi McCollum: that regional approach.

23:36 Christian Londono: So looking at the regional connections is very important.

23:40 Christian Londono: Definitely. Great. You know, part of the network redesign is making sure that the people that are currently writing the

23:50 Christian Londono: system, they’re not going to be negatively impacted.

23:54 Christian Londono: Right. There are going to be a few that are going to be impacted.

23:58 Christian Londono: That’s expected and is important as part of these efforts to educate elected officials because they will have some constituents

24:07 Christian Londono: potentially reaching out and they’ll be maybe not very happy with some of the changes.

24:14 Christian Londono: But everybody has to focus on the big picture, right? Like, the changes are going to favor the most of

24:21 Christian Londono: the writers, reducing travel times, creating directness, and also make the service more attractive for choice writers.

24:31 Christian Londono: And maybe there’ll be new people that be like, oh, this now makes more sense for me.

24:34 Christian Londono: Let me, you know, jump into the public transit system.

24:37 Christian Londono: But my question I want to ask because sometimes through the system redesigns, you’re breaking routes, you’re interlining sometimes, or

24:46 Christian Londono: you’re breaking one long route into two routes.

24:49 Christian Londono: So how do you guys handle the transfers? And how do you make sure that as you are realigning some

24:56 Christian Londono: of these routes and maybe creating new routes, the public is not going to be burdened with the new system?

25:06 Jacob Labutka: Yeah, no, absolutely. And I think this is going to be a significant part of our implementation plan.

25:10 Jacob Labutka: Over the next six months. There’s going to be a continuous public education campaign where we’ll be continuing to, you

25:18 Jacob Labutka: know, speak to our board so they can, you know, inform their constituents as needed.

25:23 Jacob Labutka: Actually, just a few days ago, I presented to the city of Oldsmar City Council to talk to them about,

25:29 Jacob Labutka: like, what the changes look like, and so that way their constituents are informed.

25:33 Jacob Labutka: So I think we’re going to continue to have meetings like that.

25:36 Jacob Labutka: Actually, also, another one I did was I went out to St.

25:39 Jacob Labutka: Petersburg College because they have a lot of campuses scattered across Pinellas county and discussed what the changes mean for

25:45 Jacob Labutka: them. So I think continuing to have those conversations in as many places as possible will be helpful to spread

25:50 Jacob Labutka: the message. We’ll also be doing a lot of direct engagement with our riders.

25:54 Jacob Labutka: So I think we’ll have people actually at transfer centers, people riding the buses, a lot of digital engagement through

25:59 Jacob Labutka: our social media channels, and particularly through the transit app, that’s our endorsed trip plan app that a significant percentage

26:07 Jacob Labutka: of our ridership uses. So we definitely want to be in as many places as possible.

26:12 Jacob Labutka: So people are, to the extent possible, not surprised on day one.

26:16 Jacob Labutka: And I think, you know, I think it’s always a learning curve and it takes some time for folks to

26:21 Jacob Labutka: adjust. And I know the first couple days are always.

26:24 Jacob Labutka: It’s always a lot for people to get used to the new system.

26:27 Jacob Labutka: But I think the goal here is that we know on the front end that this is a system that

26:33 Jacob Labutka: improves connections and access to opportunity, which we measured through how this increases job access.

26:40 Jacob Labutka: So in planning this, we looked at the number of jobs that can be reached within an hour in our

26:46 Jacob Labutka: current system versus the proposed system.

26:48 Jacob Labutka: So on weekdays, just in the middle of the day, there is a Modest increase of about 6%.

26:53 Jacob Labutka: But what we really see the impact of this planning effort and the new system is on evenings and Sundays

27:00 Jacob Labutka: where that increase is closer to 24%.

27:03 Jacob Labutka: And so that’s where you really see some of the impacts of this new network that will be potentially more

27:12 Jacob Labutka: reliable, more usable for more people, since it’s, you know, more clear and consistent and providing longer spans of service

27:19 Jacob Labutka: and service seven days a week that people can rely on.

27:22 Jacob Labutka: And I think through those improvements that of course there will be some people that will maybe need to do

27:29 Jacob Labutka: additional transfer or walk a little further to a bus stop, but it’s to a network that frankly is more

27:35 Jacob Labutka: usable for more people.

27:37 Levi McCollum: Let’s zoom into the St. Pete area.

27:41 Levi McCollum: I know we’ve talked a little bit about the regional interconnectivity, but can you explain to our listeners about the

27:50 Levi McCollum: SunRunner project and how big of a deal this is and the St.

27:53 Levi McCollum: Petersburg community? I, I know that there’s, you know, like with any project you have a little bit of push

27:59 Levi McCollum: and pull, right? A lot of proponents, some opponents, but can you just give us the sort of lifespan of

28:06 Levi McCollum: this project and where, where it’s at now?

28:10 Jacob Labutka: Yeah, no, I think, and this is a probably another example of something that goes back to close to my

28:15 Jacob Labutka: childhood, before I even knew what St.

28:17 Jacob Labutka: Petersburg, Florida was or that it even existed.

28:20 Jacob Labutka: So I know there have been studies going on for going back decades of that cited the need for more

28:26 Jacob Labutka: high capacity east west transit in St.

28:30 Jacob Labutka: Petersburg. And so over lots of community conversations and planning work, we developed the routing for the SunRunner bus rapid

28:40 Jacob Labutka: transit route, which at the time was called the Central Avenue BRT when it was kind of first conceived in

28:47 Jacob Labutka: more officially in the 2010s that would connect St.

28:51 Jacob Labutka: Petersburg to the beach communities. And so we compared several different beach communities to determine where the best destination would

29:00 Jacob Labutka: be for it. And ultimately it was landed on to end in the St.

29:04 Jacob Labutka: Pete beach area and traveling through the cities of St.

29:07 Jacob Labutka: Petersburg, South Pasadena and ending in St.

29:09 Jacob Labutka: Pete Beach. And so once we formalized the routing, we worked closely with the Federal Transit Administration through their capital

29:16 Jacob Labutka: investment grant program to secure the share of the funding needed to construct the features that would make this a

29:23 Jacob Labutka: premium service. So doing things like more enhanced stations with shelter protection and totems with real time signage information, putting

29:34 Jacob Labutka: in things like transit signal priority to speed up the bus in case it’s delayed, as well as putting in

29:41 Jacob Labutka: the bus and turn lanes into the project that would, that created semi dedicated lanes for buses that, you know,

29:50 Jacob Labutka: could operate without interference from other traffic, with the exception of emergency service vehicles.

29:56 Jacob Labutka: And as the name bus and turn implies, keeping the lane open for turning movements, which I think that was

30:02 Jacob Labutka: the part of the project that was interesting to explain and certainly had a lot of community conversations about the

30:08 Jacob Labutka: pros and cons of that. But ultimately, I think it’s been something now that we’ve launched since fall of 2022

30:14 Jacob Labutka: and are going on about two and a half years of service now.

30:17 Jacob Labutka: I think people are starting, a lot of people starting to see the positive impacts it’s having both in terms

30:23 Jacob Labutka: of ridership and travel times along the corridor for folks taking transit.

30:28 Jacob Labutka: But it’s also an example of something that has improved the corridor as a whole by certain metrics.

30:34 Jacob Labutka: So one of the things that was looked at was the number of collisions along the corridor before and after

30:40 Jacob Labutka: sunrunner. And while I can’t recall the exact percentage at this time, there was, I know, probably 30, 40%.

30:46 Jacob Labutka: I can go back and find the exact numbers.

30:47 Jacob Labutka: But there has been a decrease in the total number of traffic collisions in the corridor just from putting in

30:53 Jacob Labutka: this bus stop a transit route.

30:55 Jacob Labutka: So I think by a lot of measures, safety in terms of development opportunities.

31:00 Jacob Labutka: I mean, I think I’ve even seen listings on Zillow that reference the presence of the sunrise.

31:07 Jacob Labutka: So I think it’s become a selling point and an amenity in the city in a lot of ways.

31:12 Levi McCollum: That’s amazing. And it just shows the power of good public transit.

31:17 Levi McCollum: You mentioned the capital improvement grant money.

31:21 Levi McCollum: I know that PSTA is one of the leaders, at least in Florida transit, maybe nationally, in receiving grant money.

31:30 Levi McCollum: It seems like every time there’s discretionary funding, PSTA is at least in the running and usually wins some money.

31:41 Levi McCollum: Part of that, it seems, with your new facilities or with the brt, some of it is also with your

31:48 Levi McCollum: fleet as well. And I know you’ve been one of the on the bleeding edge, so to speak, for electrifying

31:55 Levi McCollum: your fleet. Can you give us some more insights into, you know, how you’re going about this electrification and is

32:02 Levi McCollum: it something that you see, you know, continuing in the future?

32:06 Jacob Labutka: Yeah, no, absolutely. So our fleet modernization electrification journey started probably a little before I came on board in 2016,

32:15 Jacob Labutka: that we made an initial investment as an agency in the technology.

32:21 Jacob Labutka: I believe we received some mitigation money from the BP oil spill from 2010.

32:28 Jacob Labutka: And so I think there was some funding available to for projects with an environmental benefit to help offset the

32:35 Jacob Labutka: issues with the incident. And so I believe there was a Certain amount of money that we were able to

32:40 Jacob Labutka: use for an on route charger that was installed at our transfer facility adjacent to our main campus.

32:48 Jacob Labutka: And then I believe as an agency we came together and bought kind of with our own money, kind of

32:53 Jacob Labutka: the first electric bus or two to try out the technology and assess its operations.

32:59 Jacob Labutka: And then since then, I think from making that initial investment, we’ve been able to leverage our experience with the

33:06 Jacob Labutka: technology to expand the fleet and to find these grant funding sources to help expand the fleet and reduce the

33:14 Jacob Labutka: burden of paying for the additional vehicles out of just our traditional formula dollars from the federal government.

33:20 Jacob Labutka: And so we’ve been successful in getting multiple rounds of low and no emission and bus facilities to discretionary grant

33:28 Jacob Labutka: funding from the Federal Transit Administration.

33:30 Jacob Labutka: So most recently we received a $27.8 million grant to expand both our all electric and our hybrid electric bus

33:38 Jacob Labutka: fleet. And I think we’re going to continue to go in that direction of, you know, we’ll still maintain a

33:44 Jacob Labutka: subset of hybrid electric vehicles, but also still expand our electric bus fleet just to make sure that we have

33:50 Jacob Labutka: buses that can meet the needs of different routes or different circumstances.

33:55 Jacob Labutka: There are different things that we have to be involved in as an agency.

33:59 Jacob Labutka: And then one other grant source that was another kind of mitigation fund was the, there was a Volkswagen mitigation

34:09 Jacob Labutka: trust fund that was established after some issues that Volkswagen had going back probably 10 plus years.

34:17 Jacob Labutka: And so there was about a $2 billion pot of money that was set up as a result of kind

34:27 Jacob Labutka: of needing to mitigate. And so some of that money was, you know, disturb this.

34:36 Jacob Labutka: Sorry, I’m going to try that again.

34:37 Levi McCollum: Okay, no worries, no worries.

34:39 Jacob Labutka: Anyway, so one of the case.

34:41 Jacob Labutka: 1, 2, 3. So one of the other grant programs that are funding sources that was established was the Volkswagen

34:48 Jacob Labutka: mitigation trust fund that was developed kind of similar to the BP fund I mentioned earlier to provide some environmental

34:58 Jacob Labutka: mitigation for some issues that Volkswagen had kind of in the last 10 plus years.

35:02 Jacob Labutka: And so we were able to leverage a pot of funds.

35:06 Jacob Labutka: I think about 160, 70 million was specifically designated to the state of Florida.

35:10 Jacob Labutka: Florida. And so we were able to apply for that funding source and got probably about $18 million from that

35:17 Jacob Labutka: trust fund to also expand the electric bus fleet.

35:19 Jacob Labutka: So we’ve been really fortunate to be able to leverage both kind of our own investment and then I think

35:25 Jacob Labutka: making kind of our own investments and developing the expertise with the technology has made it us a very viable

35:31 Jacob Labutka: candidate to get a lot of these grant Programs we’ve been successful in going after.

35:37 Levi McCollum: That’s really interesting. And I’m surprised that every time I look at the grant announcements that there’s PSTA in there.

35:46 Levi McCollum: Maybe I shouldn’t be surprised anymore.

35:47 Levi McCollum: And I’m probably more surprised that you still have the same grants people because I would imagine that they’re being

35:54 Levi McCollum: poached.

35:55 Jacob Labutka: Yeah, I think we’ve been really fortunate.

35:57 Jacob Labutka: So since I came on board, I’ve led a lot of the discretionary grants.

36:03 Jacob Labutka: Probably about, I mean this is a guesstimate.

36:06 Jacob Labutka: Probably about 80 to 90% of the discretionary grants that we put out.

36:09 Jacob Labutka: I or my team have had some hand in.

36:12 Jacob Labutka: So I kind of handle the application side and we have a great team upstairs that have been with us

36:16 Jacob Labutka: for literally decades who kind of handle the grant reporting administration side.

36:21 Jacob Labutka: So I think we’ve kind of developed a good formula for developing a lot of these grant applications.

36:27 Jacob Labutka: And you know, we’ve done a lot even beyond modernizing the fleet.

36:30 Jacob Labutka: I mean we’ve gotten operating grants from the state to help test out new services such as our clutter ferry

36:38 Jacob Labutka: service that we have kind of.

36:40 Jacob Labutka: We’ve are now overseeing as of a few months ago.

36:43 Jacob Labutka: So that’s partially funded by service development grant funding to help with the operations for the first few years.

36:49 Jacob Labutka: We’ve also received other grants at the state level from the commuter Assistance program grant that actually was the genesis

36:55 Jacob Labutka: that helped start our autonomous vehicle demonstration program through our Autonomous Vehicle Advantage shuttle program that deployed autonomous technology on

37:04 Jacob Labutka: public roads here in a few locations a few years ago.

37:08 Jacob Labutka: We’ve also gotten other grants from the federal government that are related to technology.

37:13 Jacob Labutka: So we’ve gotten grants from FTA to incorporate our first last mile program into transit App.

37:19 Jacob Labutka: We recently received a very competitive award from USDOT from their smart grant program to automate the fair discount process

37:31 Jacob Labutka: for seniors and veterans using the federal platform login.gov so that way they don’t necessarily have to go to a

37:37 Jacob Labutka: customer service center to receive the fair discount.

37:40 Jacob Labutka: So we’re working on getting started on that now.

37:43 Jacob Labutka: So I think we’ve, we’ve. We also got a federal grant to put in for raise program for a new

37:50 Jacob Labutka: facility in downtown Clearwater. So clearly we’ve been very successful at it.

37:54 Jacob Labutka: And I think part of the keys to our success is for not all but a lot of these grant

37:59 Jacob Labutka: programs. It’s been over multiple iterations.

38:02 Jacob Labutka: So it’s not like we applied for it the first time and just magically got it.

38:06 Jacob Labutka: Particularly with some of these Loano grants.

38:09 Jacob Labutka: The Grant raise grant for the facility in Clearwater, the SMART grant.

38:14 Jacob Labutka: It probably took about two to three bites at the apple to had developed a successful application.

38:20 Jacob Labutka: So we’re really good about seeing the feedback from the federal government in the debriefing process and incorporating their changes

38:27 Jacob Labutka: and trying to drum up as much community support as possible and really get them what they’re asking for.

38:33 Jacob Labutka: And so I think through doing those things was kind of the key to our success with discretionary grants.

38:39 Levi McCollum: Oh, that’s excellent that you’ve been able to be that successful with getting the grants.

38:43 Levi McCollum: And that goes for other transit agencies or listeners in the audience.

38:50 Levi McCollum: Don’t give up. Keep applying for those grants.

38:52 Levi McCollum: The money at least for now is out there.

38:56 Levi McCollum: But yeah, super happy that one of the agencies in our state in Florida has been so successful in their

39:05 Levi McCollum: effort.

39:05 Jacob Labutka: I couldn’t agree more.

39:07 Christian Londono: Yeah, in charting the way for trying new technologies, I think for electrification leading, leading the consortium contract and allowed

39:18 Christian Londono: a lot of order systems to be able to kind of like follow the steps and copy some of those

39:23 Christian Londono: best practices. I mean that’s that that shows the great work the agency is doing and all the, you know,

39:31 Christian Londono: professionals that are part of it.

39:32 Christian Londono: Right. That are making all that work happen is just incredible.

39:37 Christian Londono: The same thing with brt. I mean you got national recognitions from the sunrunner and I know a lot of

39:43 Christian Londono: systems that are getting ready. They’re gearing up to start their BRT pilots and projects and being able to copy

39:52 Christian Londono: and mimic and learn from the best practices in this type of implementations are just incredible.

40:00 Christian Londono: How about we do some rapid fire questions related to transit? So let me start with the first one and

40:09 Christian Londono: what would you think or describe as the most underrated bus stop feature?

40:14 Jacob Labutka: Ooh, I would say, ooh, shade and cover because I know that especially in Florida, you know, it gets, it

40:22 Jacob Labutka: gets rather hot and at times so it’s nice to have protection from the sun and we also get our

40:27 Jacob Labutka: sudden rainstorms. But you know, people still need to travel even when that’s happening.

40:31 Jacob Labutka: So yeah, I would say shade and cover, which I think, you know, we try to do a good job

40:36 Jacob Labutka: of putting shelters out as many places as possible.

40:38 Jacob Labutka: But sometimes, you know, when I’m winning at a bus stop, I’ll take cover to nearby tree if I have

40:43 Jacob Labutka: to because sometimes there’s just not the right of way for cover.

40:46 Jacob Labutka: But anyways, that’s why I would say it would be a good underrated bus stop feature.

40:52 Christian Londono: That’s a good one. So how about one planning tool or technology that you wish existed in transit today.

41:01 Jacob Labutka: Ooh,

41:05 Jacob Labutka: I feel like this would. I don’t, I don’t even know how possible this is, but I feel like a

41:08 Jacob Labutka: lot of times I’m asked the question, particularly with these new CCBN changes coming in, or, oh, what’s the ridership

41:16 Jacob Labutka: going to be like? What’s the writers are going to be like? And I pretty much say, like, there’s not

41:20 Jacob Labutka: really, there’s not anything I can give you to like an accurate guaranteed ridership number.

41:26 Jacob Labutka: And there are travel demand modeling tools that try to estimate ridership, but like, they’re not that great, in my

41:31 Jacob Labutka: opinion. So I feel like maybe this is a fantasy answer, but maybe something that can accurately predict writership.

41:38 Jacob Labutka: I mean, I guess it maybe need to have the involvement of a psychic or something to develop it, but

41:43 Jacob Labutka: something like that could be helpful.

41:47 Christian Londono: So I’ll describe it as AI Writership prediction.

41:52 Jacob Labutka: Yes, we’ll go with that.

41:54 Christian Londono: And finally, as far as our rapid fire questions, I want to ask you, what’s your favorite transit city or

42:02 Christian Londono: route?

42:03 Jacob Labutka: Let’s see. I would say my favorite.

42:07 Jacob Labutka: For my favorite transit city, I’m probably, you know what? Okay, the city is easy.

42:12 Jacob Labutka: My. For the city, I would say Chicago.

42:13 Jacob Labutka: I love the Chicago system. I love the L.

42:16 Jacob Labutka: And I’m a little biased because I have, I love.

42:18 Jacob Labutka: They have several stores in Chicago called Transit Tees where they have transit themed merchant shirts.

42:24 Jacob Labutka: I have several great shirts with the Chicago Metro system or trains on them and for routes to come to

42:31 Jacob Labutka: mind. So one I do love, even though the operations are a little slow, but it’s so scenic and it’s

42:37 Jacob Labutka: kind of what got me into transit.

42:39 Jacob Labutka: I love the St. Charles line streetcar in New Orleans.

42:43 Jacob Labutka: And then another very random route I like is the Red Line in Cleveland where I interned at the RTA

42:52 Jacob Labutka: about 10 years ago. I think I, I like that route because it helped me get the internship there.

42:59 Jacob Labutka: Not exclusively, but I remember one of the questions or in the interview we were talking about, you know, public

43:05 Jacob Labutka: transit and I had done my research about the Cleveland rta and one of the things that I like about

43:09 Jacob Labutka: it that I mentioned in the interview is that it was actually the first public transit rail link in the

43:14 Jacob Labutka: country to connect a city’s airport with its downtown.

43:18 Jacob Labutka: And, and the people in the interview panel actually did not know that.

43:21 Jacob Labutka: So I’d like to say that was partly the reason why I got the internship there that propelled my career

43:27 Jacob Labutka: in transit. And also I appreciate any service like that where I can quickly get, you know, from A city

43:32 Jacob Labutka: center to an airport.

43:34 Christian Londono: Yeah. Chicago is a very nice city, and the transit system is very robust.

43:38 Christian Londono: I also enjoy visiting and riding, and I hope I’ll do it in the near future.

43:44 Christian Londono: Again, I want to ask you one last question before we conclude with all the years you have now in

43:53 Christian Londono: transit. And one of the things that I can hear through your voice as you’re answering our questions is the

43:59 Christian Londono: passion that you have for your career and what you do.

44:04 Christian Londono: And my last question for you will be what continues to inspire you to do the work that you do?

44:12 Jacob Labutka: I would say what inspires me is just seeing what’s possible.

44:15 Jacob Labutka: I mean, both here locally and being able to do projects like the Sun Runner, and then on a national

44:21 Jacob Labutka: level, seeing that in an era where there’s some federal funding for transit, but that sometimes is not always certain

44:29 Jacob Labutka: or guaranteed, it’s great to see a lot of municipalities and a lot of counties that have, you know, voted

44:38 Jacob Labutka: on sales tax and other funding mechanisms to increase service in transit and to invest in transit.

44:46 Jacob Labutka: And so I think there really is an appetite nationally to change the way we travel and to improve the

44:54 Jacob Labutka: livability and the transportation networks of our cities.

44:57 Jacob Labutka: And just seeing some of the, you know, transformational projects in both here and throughout the country, I think kind

45:03 Jacob Labutka: of inspires me to keep on with the work as well as just being able to interact with other passionate

45:07 Jacob Labutka: folks like yourselves and seeing that there is a.

45:10 Jacob Labutka: A large nationwide community of us that really meaningfully care about transit in cities and want to make our communities

45:18 Jacob Labutka: more livable.

45:20 Christian Londono: That’s a great answer. That sounds very inspirational.

45:23 Christian Londono: It really reminded myself as well as why we’re part of this industry and our role in helping transit in

45:31 Christian Londono: the US Grow.

45:33 Jacob Labutka: Right.

45:33 Christian Londono: Like, even keep up with the.

45:35 Christian Londono: With the rest of the world.

45:36 Christian Londono: So thank you for that answer and thank you for participating of the podcast today, Jacob, and sharing your experience

45:44 Christian Londono: in your insights.

45:47 Jacob Labutka: Yeah, no, you’re very welcome. Thanks for having me on.

45:51 Christian Londono: And to our listeners also, thank you for tuning in and listening.

45:55 Christian Londono: I hope you found some inspiration in today’s episode.

45:58 Christian Londono: And, you know, if you want to get in touch with Jacob, by all means, reach out to Levi or

46:05 Christian Londono: myself, and we can put you in contact with Jacob so you can learn more about PSDA and all the

46:10 Christian Londono: great things they’re doing. So, again, thank you for tuning in.

46:13 Christian Londono: Thank you again, Jacob, for participating, and we’ll see you all in the next episode.

46:20 Christian Londono: Thank you.