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Access Concerns Delay School OK

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By KEVIN WIATROWSKI

The Tampa Tribune

Published: June 13, 2008

LAND O' LAKES - Pasco County officials handed the developers of the proposed Imagine charter school another delay Thursday because of questions about how students will safely access the school.

The charter school's third Development Review Committee delay came a day after planning commissioners granted the school a temporary rezoning that will let the developers open this fall in an office complex now under construction on State Road 54 just east of the entrance to the Ballantrae subdivision.

The charter school plans to lease a 36,000-square-foot building proposed for just less than 4 acres west of U.S. 41 on Morgan Road. School officials plan to open with 482 students in kindergarten through eighth grade and plan to add another 240 as the school grows. School officials expect to draw students from Hillsborough, Pasco and Hernando counties.

The location has provoked repeated delays as county officials and the developers try to reach a compromise regarding access to the proposed school and potential conflicts with the CSX railroad line that lies between U.S. 41 and the planned facility.

As part of the school project, county officials want the developers to add gates where Morgan Road crosses the railroad tracks. They also want a traffic signal on U.S. 41 to provide safe access to the site for cars turning left from U.S. 41.

Attorney Tim Hayes, who represented the developers, balked at those demands, calling them "killer conditions."

"We can't control CSX for FDOT," Hayes said, referring to the Florida Department of Transportation, which has final say over new signals on U.S. 41.

Hayes said his clients were willing to set aside $500,000 toward a new signal and railroad crossing gate if they are approved by the other players. Until that happens, he said, the school officials would hire sheriff's deputies to direct traffic on the six-lane highway during pickup and drop-off times at the school.

"We have to make that site safe or nobody's going to go to school there," Hayes said.

Members of the Development Review Committee were unconvinced that strategy would work and pressed for the traffic signal.

Even if FDOT allowed a traffic signal timed to work only during peak school times, it likely would not do so without a deal allowing gates at the CSX crossing, said Susan VanHoose, growth management coordinator for FDOT's Tampa office.

That deal could take up to two years, VanHoose said. A similar deal between CSX and Wal-Mart for a site on U.S. 41 south of S.R. 54 took three years.

After a lengthy debate with the developers, DRC members delayed further action on the proposal until July 24 so county staff can speak with other communities that have Imagine schools to get a sense of the traffic burden they create.

Reporter Kevin Wiatrowski can be reached at (813) 948-4201 or kwiatrowski@tampatrib.com.

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