July 10, 2026 • 21 mins
Greg Slater is the Executive Director & CEO of the Tampa Hillsborough Expressway Authority (THEA), where he leads one of Florida’s most innovative and dynamic transportation agencies. As an independent agency of the state, the Tampa Hillsborough Expressway Authority (THEA) owns, maintains, and operates four facilities within Hillsborough County: the Selmon Expressway, the Brandon Parkway, Meridian Avenue, and the Selmon Greenway. The agency is focused on driving innovation and improving mobility and safety throughout the Tampa Bay region.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Time now for CEOs you should know here on the
Ryan Gorman Show and joining me in studio, I have
Greg Slater, Executive director and CEO of the Tampa Hillsboro
Expressway Authority. You can learn more at Tampa dash Xway
dot com. Greg, thanks so much for taking a few
minutes to come in. Really appreciate it. And let's start
(00:20):
with what your agency is responsible for.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
Sure, sure, you know, we are an independent special district
of the state. There are a few of them around
the state, and really we were kind of established to
be able to bring transportation projects on board more quickly,
more efficiently through independent funding. And so you know what
we do is we own and operate the Leroy Salmon Expressway.
(00:43):
We have the extension that goes over a Gandhy Boulevard
towards Dallas County and that bridge. We have the reversible
express lane system that goes out towards Brandon. We also
own Meridian Avenue, Brandon Parkway, and the Leroy Salmon Greenway.
So you know, legislatively we're established to run and operate
those systems. We also have a broader kind of transportation
authority and we're governed by board of directors four of
(01:06):
which are appointed by the governor. The Mayor of Tampa
is on our board, one of the local county commissioners,
and then a local ft DOT secretaries on our board.
Speaker 1 (01:13):
So there have been a lot of upgrades in recent years,
a lot of projects that you've been working on. From
that part on Gandy where it goes over Gandy Boulevard.
That was a massive project. I remember because our radio
station was right there on Gandy as it was all unfolding.
So you know, every day we saw the progress that
(01:35):
was being made. Tell us about some of those expansions
and upgrades and things like that that have become so
important to people commuting on the express.
Speaker 2 (01:45):
Absolutely, and if you think about where we are and
the growth that we're seeing, the changes that we're seeing
the population around here, you know, we've probably got a
decade of construction in front of us and variety of
parts of the system. But you look at that Gandhy extension.
They opened that about a year before I got here,
but really a project that struggled for many, many years
in getting implemented because there were concerns from the business community.
(02:06):
There were concerns about kind of disruptions because heavily traveled Carter,
but THEA went in partner with the business community, partner
with the local businesses, but also developed a solution. It's
a little bit higher than a normal roadway, so you
can see the businesses. And if you look at today,
we've taken fifty percent of the traffic off of Gandy
Boulevard down below, we've eliminated fifty percent of the crashes
(02:29):
on Gandy Boulevard because they were crashes that were associated
with congestions. Yeah, and the traffic levels that we're seeing
on that system today are ahead of what we thought
we were going to be in twenty thirty.
Speaker 1 (02:42):
Those are some tangible results. Yeah, and I can tell
you you know, the way it was done, I think
pretty unique in building it over such a major roadway
like Gandy Boulevard. Again, it took a second to get done,
and I can understand the concerns among those. You know,
(03:06):
we're radio stations, so yeah, as long as we can
get in, and I remember there were some days where
it's like, all right, how am I making this turn
into the station? But now that it's done, that that
is a tremendous success.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
It sounds like absolutely and it's been the blueprint for
some of the other things that we're doing. You think
about it, We just want the traffic that's not stopping
at those businesses anyway. Yeah, the one that's going across.
If you look at the growth in this region, we
have growth in the economies between Tampa and Saint Pete.
We have more and more people that are living in
Saint Pete working in Tampa, right living in Tampa working
(03:38):
in Saint Pete's so it's two ways. It's not as
much of a commuter anymore. We have growth in southern
Hillsboro County and that Apollo Beach Riverview sun City area,
oh yeah, into downtown.
Speaker 1 (03:48):
Brandon has really grown.
Speaker 2 (03:51):
So the so the project over Gandy Boulevard is the
blueprint for an early project development one we have right
now where we're looking extending the expressway all the way
down the median of three oh one into Apollo Beach Riverview.
It's really early, but we really think it could really
solve some of the traffic challenges that we see down there.
Speaker 1 (04:12):
Yeah, and we're joined here on our CEOs you should
know feature on The Ryan Gorman Show. Greg Slater, executive
director and CEO of the Tampa Hillsboro Expressway Authority can
learn more at Tampa dashxway dot com. How important is
it to try to get ahead of some of what
we're likely going to see, because it does feel like
(04:33):
in the Tampa Bay area for a long time we've
been pretty reactive where we haven't gotten ahead of the growth,
and then we're trying to catch up and it just
never seems to be enough. It sounds like what you're
talking about there in the Apollo Beach area and all
of that. There are already some issues, but it's getting
ahead of what's likely going to happen in the coming years.
Speaker 2 (04:55):
Absolutely, and trying to have the resources that you need
when you need them is always in a challenge, you know,
you're always kind of catching up a little bit. But
one of the things that we're very focused on, and
with this kind of decade of construction and a work
program that we're deploying, is we have to focus on
where this region is going. Like, we can't just rebuild
the system exactly the way it was right The growth
(05:16):
is here, travel patterns have changed. This is a different
city in downtown Tampa than it was ten years ago.
Speaker 1 (05:22):
One hundred percent. I can tell you growing up here,
going to USF and and all of that, Downtown Tampa
was nothing. I mean it was a couple of buildings
where people work, but there was nothing there. It has
finally started to realize its potential.
Speaker 2 (05:36):
I'll give you a great example. We have backups on
the southern portion of the Expressway today coming into downtown.
We never had that before. So we have a project,
our Waiting Street Extension project that's going to take that
ramp out by Benchmark Arena.
Speaker 1 (05:49):
Oh, I'm familiar with a lot of people are so
you know, it's a telling story when Tampa Peedee kind
of closes the ramp off during a hockey game.
Speaker 2 (05:57):
Right, So we're going to take that out. We're going
to buil a new ramp over where Whiting Street dead ends,
and then we're going to extend Waiting Street all the
way through the meridian where the old flour mill used
to be. And then what so, what that new ramp
does is it accommodates one hundred percent of that game
day traffic and that traffic that's coming into downtown. So
bringing them in so you can park and then kind
(06:19):
of go out throughout the city. Right.
Speaker 1 (06:21):
See, those are the kinds of things. Yeah, that will
make a big difference in terms of people's experience, you know,
enjoying some of what Tampa or St. Pete or any
of these areas have to offer. I want to get
to how the Selman Expressway has become a connected vehicle
test bed. What exactly does that mean? You know.
Speaker 2 (06:42):
So several years ago USDOT put a call out and
what they did was they put a call out and
said we're looking for innovative connected vehicle deployments. They chose
three locations. We were one of them in downtown Tampa.
So we went through and we up to program where
you could sign up, you could get a discount on
(07:03):
your tolls, and you could be cut we would have
aftermarket connected vehicle technology installed in your car. So, you know,
just a little anecdote here, Brandon Honda was the first
location in the entire country that installed after market connected
vehicle technology.
Speaker 1 (07:18):
Oh wow.
Speaker 2 (07:19):
And so we had a deployment of thousands of vehicles
that were using the system.
Speaker 1 (07:24):
People it's their personal cars participating in this.
Speaker 2 (07:28):
Absolutely and so in our system. So our system is
equipped with it's called rsu's roadside units, that's connected vehicle technology.
You have the connect the connectivity in your car, and
so when you look at this, you have three categories
of connected vehicles. You have vehicle to vehicle technology, so
how is your car communicating with other cars? That is
(07:48):
advancing a little bit slower. You know, auto manufacturers intellect
to play in the same sandbox differen and so that
that kind of deploys a little bit slower. You have
the vehicle to infrastructure technology, which was really where ours
was focused. And how are you communicating and your infrastructure
telling us, So for instance, we can give you feedback
(08:10):
that says, hey, you're using that curve a little bit
too fast, or you're coming up on this there's this
stop light coming up that you can't see it. Start
to slow down. And so it was really designed around
giving vehicles and drivers the most amount of information possible
to make safe choices. And it really was remarkable the
results that we got from it. Wrong way driving, those
(08:32):
types of really horrific travel issues. Really we learned a lot,
and really what we found was it gave us a
data source for things that we never had a data
source before, like near misses. So if somebody almost gets
in a crash, you don't really see it because they
just kind of recover and they go, yeah, But the
system gave us that data that we're able to really
really understand.
Speaker 1 (08:52):
Were you able to see where I'm assuming where some
of this stuff is more likely to happen to.
Speaker 2 (08:58):
Yes, And so you start to see, really, okay, we're
having two or three near missus a week here, what
do we have going on here? Let's not wait for
a crash to happen before we make this system better.
And then the third part was it's what's called Vita X.
So that's vehicle to everything. So that's your car communicating
with a pedestrian or somebody on a bicycle or somebody
(09:19):
really being able to kind of travel without a car.
So you know what we did was we said, okay,
this is a great program. We're a dedicated pilot by
the US DOOT, we're a designated area. And it created
a real opportunity for us where we said, you know what,
we have a closed system, we're a small system. We
can really be an incubator for this technology. We can
(09:42):
be an incubator. And so today we have relationships with
auto manufacturers, technology companies that come out and frankly, all
the Expressway authorities in Florida, Orlando, Central Florida Expressway, and
then Florida Turnpike Enterprise. We all are doing it now.
Florida Turnpike has an amazing facility out towards Orlando to
really test equipment and taking that into real world examples.
(10:05):
So you know, I'll give you a real world example.
We during that pilot program, we had camera technology connected
to the crosswalks in front of the courthouse on Twig
Street and it would give warnings that hey, there are
pedestrians in the crosswalk that maybe you're making a right
turn and you can't see, or maybe you're kind of
coming through and you can't see. It was so successful
(10:26):
we said, you know what, I think there's real application
to that. Downtown. We have a lot of ramps downtown
that feed into really dense surban environments that weren't den
urban environments ten years ago. And so you're coming off
of these ramps. The bro Rain Morgan Street ramp over
towards the Arena is a great example of that. So
what we're doing now is we're equipping all of those
crosswalks with that camera technology and when there are pedestrians
(10:49):
in that crosswalk. There's going to be a light at
the top of the ramp that'll start flashing and tell
you slow down that there are pedestrians in there.
Speaker 1 (10:56):
It's kind of like, and again we're doing our CEOs
you should feature here on The Ryan Gorman Show, joined
by Greg Slater, executive director and CEO of the Tampa
Hillsboro Expressway. Authorready kind of like those crosswalks that I
think so many of us have seen where the pedestrian
hits the button and it flashes. But this the pedestrian
wouldn't have to do that. It's automatic detection.
Speaker 2 (11:16):
We will detect you, and then two things will happen.
That normal light will come on like at the crosswalk, yeah,
but another flashing light will come on at the top
of the ramp that you can't see this crosswalk yet. Yeah,
and you should start to slow down now.
Speaker 1 (11:29):
Wow. And that's important I think too, because, like we
were talking about earlier, downtown Tampa, there are more pedestrians
than there used to be. And I think, you know,
during my time living in downtown Chicago for a couple
of years, when you're navigating downtown Chicago and you're driving,
you're kind of used to the fact that they're a pedestrian.
(11:50):
You're just on alert as you do here. Sometimes you're
going from you know, a highway where it's just cars
and stuff, and then all of a sudden you've got
these you know, we've got e bikes, we've got e scooters. Right,
all of that adds a different component to it. So, yeah,
that's very helpful and could help keep people safe.
Speaker 2 (12:08):
Yeah, you know, it's just we're trying to match the
infrastructure as we're really rebuilding the entire Sellmon Expressway system
over the next decade, matching that infrastructure with what we're
seeing in this region today, you know, and that that
comes in a variety of different ways. You know, when
the expressway if you've ever spent time on the Selmon Expressway,
one of the challenges that we have is those merge
areas are real short, These standards are very different.
Speaker 1 (12:30):
And person, I don't know, every time I'm driving by,
the person can't figure out if they're going to go
or if they're going to slow down. So yeah, that's right,
and so I don't know how you fix that problem.
Speaker 2 (12:40):
But but so you know, the challenge that we have
in front of us and where we're focused is okay, one,
we have to address this growth. But two, where do
we have ramps that we need ramps? Where do we
not have ramps that we need ramps? Where? Where do
we take them out?
Speaker 1 (12:53):
Where?
Speaker 2 (12:53):
What's the system look like today for the population that
we have today versus where it was fifty six years ago?
Speaker 1 (13:00):
Right?
Speaker 2 (13:01):
You know?
Speaker 1 (13:01):
Great? Where's it going?
Speaker 2 (13:02):
Yeah? I mean even I'll give you a small example,
like operationally, next week, our reversible express lane is going
to start to open at five am, and then we're
going to do a shift at noon, and so we
change those hours, okay, because so the afternoon shift years
ago was was so people downtown could get to the
Brandon mall right, Like that's not a big demand today,
(13:25):
right right?
Speaker 1 (13:26):
Right? And is this part of that that tracking traffic
patterns that the technology has allowed for absolutely?
Speaker 2 (13:34):
So for us for us to do what we need
to do, I need a three hundred and sixty degree
view of our customer and a three hundred and sixty
degree view of our system. What is your door to
door trip? We may be one part of that, but
how can I influence the signal systems? How can I
build the intelligence into it? And so we started to
see people backing up trying to see demand growing at
(13:56):
three am. So if you live in Brandon, or you
live in a be and you're using the expressway to
get down to Micdale Air Force Base, maybe you're out
there at three o'clock in the morning. You know, our
our service members don't have the same hours as the restaurants.
Speaker 1 (14:09):
Or if you do a really early radio shots, that's right.
Speaker 2 (14:13):
And so we said, well, let's change, let's look at this,
let's study the data, and now we're going to open
it at five, and we're going to do a midday
shift at noon and really match where the demand is.
Speaker 1 (14:23):
Uh. Autonomous vehicles that component. Have you done anything in
that space with the Salman tell us about that?
Speaker 2 (14:32):
Yeah, So our original pilot back then was all about
autonomous vehicles, and we started really testing them on the system.
Speaker 1 (14:39):
So I thought, so, I just want to be a reversible.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
Express lane is really designed well for you can kind
of shut it down in the middle of the day
and kind of run those testing quays, okay and things
like that. So you know, today, you know we've got
Waimo now in town. I read yesterday they're going to
start kind of deploying autonomous shuttles. The robo taxi is
right on their heels. There's some really interesting companies that
(15:02):
I've been kind of watching and talking to. One is
called Glideways, and they're like autonomous like minibus kind of operations.
Speaker 1 (15:10):
And so we've got the autonomous trucking companies come in.
I mean, I know that a lot of that's being
tested I think in Texas, but it's going to be
coming here.
Speaker 2 (15:17):
But it's really kind of you know when you think
about what we do right, like, I want to be
able to bring people from outside the city into the
city and then disperse throughout, and that could be autonomous vehicles.
You could take the dash program that the Downtown Partnership
puts out. Now take a robotaxi or a waym or
get on a scooter or a bike and you know,
be able to kind of navigate your way through downtown.
(15:39):
And so I think what people really need to really
focus on is we need all of the above to
solve the transportation system.
Speaker 1 (15:45):
Yeah, and you also have an area that it's very
spread out, so you know you're not talking about like
some kind of subway system coming anytime soon. So you know,
these different options, trying to figure out how to make
them workable for us really important. We're joined on our
CEOs you should know feature here on The Ryan Gorman
Show by Greg Slater, Executive director and CEO of the
(16:07):
Tampa Hillsboro Expressway Authority. You can learn more at Tampa
Dashxway dot com. Last thing, I want to touch on
the urban trail system beneath the Salman. Big plans for that.
What are you looking to do?
Speaker 2 (16:23):
Yeah, it's part of this massive seven hundred and seventy
million dollar work program seven hundred and sixty seven million
dollar work program that we have. Almost eighty five percent
of that is construction, so you know, i'll talk about
underpasses and that and that kind of way through downtown.
We're active in construction today with three or four hundred
million dollar advancement of the South Salmon piece, so you know,
(16:46):
on in the southern half of the expressway, we're adding
another lane in each direction. We're adding noise walls to
those residential areas. You know, Thankfully, I think people are
more excited about the noise walls than they are about
the extra lane. But we're also redoing all thirteen of
those underpasses to really write pedestrian infrastructure, really gateways to
Bay Shore and gateways into some really historic neighborhoods into Tampa.
(17:10):
Then when you get into that Hillsboro River Bridge area
by the Riverwalk, right, so you know you've got the
Hillsboro River Bridge, you've got the pendry coming up now
the Convention Center. Yeah, we've focused on creating an iconic
structure there. So you know, I pick on my partners
at the State where I say, you know, I'm sick
of watching Monday night football and seeing the Skyway bridge, right,
(17:31):
give me, give me something downtown that we can really
show off and kind of light up and change that
skyline a little bit and then address an infrastructure need there.
And so as we replaced that bridge, we're going to
be connecting the Leroy Salmon Greenway to the West Riverwalk
to the East Riverwalk. So all of that will come
together around the conventions are nice. Downtown. We've got these
really based, technology based projects to really activate the downtown Viaduct.
(17:55):
But we've got this really cool pedestrian trail, the Leroy
Salmon Greenway, that goes through all the way through downtown
all the way over to Ebor City over in near
twenty second Street, and so it's this two to three
mile by compedetrian path. Well, we have a dog park
out back of our expressway and there is somebody in
that dog park twenty four to seven. We built it
(18:16):
years ago, the ten year anniversary. We had a local
deputy sheriff that put himself in between a drunk driver,
wrongway driver and a family, saved the family and was
killed in the process. And he had a love for animals,
and we built this dog park in his honor, and
we continue to honor that sacrifice. In fact, really interesting,
(18:37):
his sister is now a SHARE's deputy in that designment
and they're from the New England area. But what a story.
And so I always like to remind people why that
dog park's there. But we've got this master plan to
develop a series of parks all the way through downtown.
Think about that. You've got the high Line in New York,
the Underline in Miami. Birmingham Malabana did amazing stuff with
(19:02):
creating like little skate parks and things like that downtown.
So what we said was, let's lay out a master plan.
The first one is our twelve Street park, which is
really laying out a lot of community space, reimagining stormwater
management pond really between Channel Side and Ebor City over
near twelve Street. Gasworks is coming in and there's a
gold gym there, all of that. Activate all of that
(19:22):
into public space, keep going down to Ebor Harbor and
then all the way out and then downtown.
Speaker 1 (19:27):
So you wore Harbor is going to be there are
lots of plans for that too. Yeah, amazing.
Speaker 2 (19:31):
And then the port is expanding with another cruise terminal
and so all of that is happening and being able
to really activate the space under the expressway with parks,
pickleball courts, open recreational.
Speaker 1 (19:44):
Area because under an expressway is something that you know
a lot of people probably don't really think much about.
You know, we're so used to seeing right kind of
is what it is. But you've got a different vision
for it.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
And really what we're thinking about is think about two things.
One is one of the greatest commodities we have here.
F it is shade. I can give you shade right.
Speaker 1 (20:03):
The other thing is is bit we can get is with.
Speaker 2 (20:06):
An urban expressway, it really comes through a downtown urban area.
If you can activate those areas under the expressway. Really
thoughtfully connect those communities underneath the expressway. You can really
do a lot to activate your downtown. You know, my
theory is, over the course of my thirty year career,
is our roadway, our bridge, our transit line, whatever it is,
(20:28):
can't be the centerpiece of what we're doing. Our community
has to be the centerpiece of what we're doing, and
we're there to make that more accessible, make that, make
people more mobile, give people opportunities, really create a space
where they can get where they want to get, no
matter what mode of travel they want to take.
Speaker 1 (20:43):
A lot of exciting things happening. It's our CEOs you
should know. Feature here on The Ryan Gorman Show, joined
by Greg Slater, Executive director and CEO of the Tampa
Hillsboro Expressway Authority. You can learn more at Tampa Dashxway
dot com. Greg. Really fascinating conversation, Thanks so much for
taking the time to come in.
Speaker 2 (21:03):
Absolutely happy to be here.
Time now for CEOs you should know here on the
Ryan Gorman Show and joining me in studio, I have
Greg Slater, Executive director and CEO of the Tampa Hillsboro
Expressway Authority. You can learn more at Tampa dash Xway
dot com. Greg, thanks so much for taking a few
minutes to come in. Really appreciate it. And let's start
(00:20):
with what your agency is responsible for.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
Sure, sure, you know, we are an independent special district
of the state. There are a few of them around
the state, and really we were kind of established to
be able to bring transportation projects on board more quickly,
more efficiently through independent funding. And so you know what
we do is we own and operate the Leroy Salmon Expressway.
(00:43):
We have the extension that goes over a Gandhy Boulevard
towards Dallas County and that bridge. We have the reversible
express lane system that goes out towards Brandon. We also
own Meridian Avenue, Brandon Parkway, and the Leroy Salmon Greenway.
So you know, legislatively we're established to run and operate
those systems. We also have a broader kind of transportation
authority and we're governed by board of directors four of
(01:06):
which are appointed by the governor. The Mayor of Tampa
is on our board, one of the local county commissioners,
and then a local ft DOT secretaries on our board.
Speaker 1 (01:13):
So there have been a lot of upgrades in recent years,
a lot of projects that you've been working on. From
that part on Gandy where it goes over Gandy Boulevard.
That was a massive project. I remember because our radio
station was right there on Gandy as it was all unfolding.
So you know, every day we saw the progress that
(01:35):
was being made. Tell us about some of those expansions
and upgrades and things like that that have become so
important to people commuting on the express.
Speaker 2 (01:45):
Absolutely, and if you think about where we are and
the growth that we're seeing, the changes that we're seeing
the population around here, you know, we've probably got a
decade of construction in front of us and variety of
parts of the system. But you look at that Gandhy extension.
They opened that about a year before I got here,
but really a project that struggled for many, many years
in getting implemented because there were concerns from the business community.
(02:06):
There were concerns about kind of disruptions because heavily traveled Carter,
but THEA went in partner with the business community, partner
with the local businesses, but also developed a solution. It's
a little bit higher than a normal roadway, so you
can see the businesses. And if you look at today,
we've taken fifty percent of the traffic off of Gandy
Boulevard down below, we've eliminated fifty percent of the crashes
(02:29):
on Gandy Boulevard because they were crashes that were associated
with congestions. Yeah, and the traffic levels that we're seeing
on that system today are ahead of what we thought
we were going to be in twenty thirty.
Speaker 1 (02:42):
Those are some tangible results. Yeah, and I can tell
you you know, the way it was done, I think
pretty unique in building it over such a major roadway
like Gandy Boulevard. Again, it took a second to get done,
and I can understand the concerns among those. You know,
(03:06):
we're radio stations, so yeah, as long as we can
get in, and I remember there were some days where
it's like, all right, how am I making this turn
into the station? But now that it's done, that that
is a tremendous success.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
It sounds like absolutely and it's been the blueprint for
some of the other things that we're doing. You think
about it, We just want the traffic that's not stopping
at those businesses anyway. Yeah, the one that's going across.
If you look at the growth in this region, we
have growth in the economies between Tampa and Saint Pete.
We have more and more people that are living in
Saint Pete working in Tampa, right living in Tampa working
(03:38):
in Saint Pete's so it's two ways. It's not as
much of a commuter anymore. We have growth in southern
Hillsboro County and that Apollo Beach Riverview sun City area,
oh yeah, into downtown.
Speaker 1 (03:48):
Brandon has really grown.
Speaker 2 (03:51):
So the so the project over Gandy Boulevard is the
blueprint for an early project development one we have right
now where we're looking extending the expressway all the way
down the median of three oh one into Apollo Beach Riverview.
It's really early, but we really think it could really
solve some of the traffic challenges that we see down there.
Speaker 1 (04:12):
Yeah, and we're joined here on our CEOs you should
know feature on The Ryan Gorman Show. Greg Slater, executive
director and CEO of the Tampa Hillsboro Expressway Authority can
learn more at Tampa dashxway dot com. How important is
it to try to get ahead of some of what
we're likely going to see, because it does feel like
(04:33):
in the Tampa Bay area for a long time we've
been pretty reactive where we haven't gotten ahead of the growth,
and then we're trying to catch up and it just
never seems to be enough. It sounds like what you're
talking about there in the Apollo Beach area and all
of that. There are already some issues, but it's getting
ahead of what's likely going to happen in the coming years.
Speaker 2 (04:55):
Absolutely, and trying to have the resources that you need
when you need them is always in a challenge, you know,
you're always kind of catching up a little bit. But
one of the things that we're very focused on, and
with this kind of decade of construction and a work
program that we're deploying, is we have to focus on
where this region is going. Like, we can't just rebuild
the system exactly the way it was right The growth
(05:16):
is here, travel patterns have changed. This is a different
city in downtown Tampa than it was ten years ago.
Speaker 1 (05:22):
One hundred percent. I can tell you growing up here,
going to USF and and all of that, Downtown Tampa
was nothing. I mean it was a couple of buildings
where people work, but there was nothing there. It has
finally started to realize its potential.
Speaker 2 (05:36):
I'll give you a great example. We have backups on
the southern portion of the Expressway today coming into downtown.
We never had that before. So we have a project,
our Waiting Street Extension project that's going to take that
ramp out by Benchmark Arena.
Speaker 1 (05:49):
Oh, I'm familiar with a lot of people are so
you know, it's a telling story when Tampa Peedee kind
of closes the ramp off during a hockey game.
Speaker 2 (05:57):
Right, So we're going to take that out. We're going
to buil a new ramp over where Whiting Street dead ends,
and then we're going to extend Waiting Street all the
way through the meridian where the old flour mill used
to be. And then what so, what that new ramp
does is it accommodates one hundred percent of that game
day traffic and that traffic that's coming into downtown. So
bringing them in so you can park and then kind
(06:19):
of go out throughout the city. Right.
Speaker 1 (06:21):
See, those are the kinds of things. Yeah, that will
make a big difference in terms of people's experience, you know,
enjoying some of what Tampa or St. Pete or any
of these areas have to offer. I want to get
to how the Selman Expressway has become a connected vehicle
test bed. What exactly does that mean? You know.
Speaker 2 (06:42):
So several years ago USDOT put a call out and
what they did was they put a call out and
said we're looking for innovative connected vehicle deployments. They chose
three locations. We were one of them in downtown Tampa.
So we went through and we up to program where
you could sign up, you could get a discount on
(07:03):
your tolls, and you could be cut we would have
aftermarket connected vehicle technology installed in your car. So, you know,
just a little anecdote here, Brandon Honda was the first
location in the entire country that installed after market connected
vehicle technology.
Speaker 1 (07:18):
Oh wow.
Speaker 2 (07:19):
And so we had a deployment of thousands of vehicles
that were using the system.
Speaker 1 (07:24):
People it's their personal cars participating in this.
Speaker 2 (07:28):
Absolutely and so in our system. So our system is
equipped with it's called rsu's roadside units, that's connected vehicle technology.
You have the connect the connectivity in your car, and
so when you look at this, you have three categories
of connected vehicles. You have vehicle to vehicle technology, so
how is your car communicating with other cars? That is
(07:48):
advancing a little bit slower. You know, auto manufacturers intellect
to play in the same sandbox differen and so that
that kind of deploys a little bit slower. You have
the vehicle to infrastructure technology, which was really where ours
was focused. And how are you communicating and your infrastructure
telling us, So for instance, we can give you feedback
(08:10):
that says, hey, you're using that curve a little bit
too fast, or you're coming up on this there's this
stop light coming up that you can't see it. Start
to slow down. And so it was really designed around
giving vehicles and drivers the most amount of information possible
to make safe choices. And it really was remarkable the
results that we got from it. Wrong way driving, those
(08:32):
types of really horrific travel issues. Really we learned a lot,
and really what we found was it gave us a
data source for things that we never had a data
source before, like near misses. So if somebody almost gets
in a crash, you don't really see it because they
just kind of recover and they go, yeah, But the
system gave us that data that we're able to really
really understand.
Speaker 1 (08:52):
Were you able to see where I'm assuming where some
of this stuff is more likely to happen to.
Speaker 2 (08:58):
Yes, And so you start to see, really, okay, we're
having two or three near missus a week here, what
do we have going on here? Let's not wait for
a crash to happen before we make this system better.
And then the third part was it's what's called Vita X.
So that's vehicle to everything. So that's your car communicating
with a pedestrian or somebody on a bicycle or somebody
(09:19):
really being able to kind of travel without a car.
So you know what we did was we said, okay,
this is a great program. We're a dedicated pilot by
the US DOOT, we're a designated area. And it created
a real opportunity for us where we said, you know what,
we have a closed system, we're a small system. We
can really be an incubator for this technology. We can
(09:42):
be an incubator. And so today we have relationships with
auto manufacturers, technology companies that come out and frankly, all
the Expressway authorities in Florida, Orlando, Central Florida Expressway, and
then Florida Turnpike Enterprise. We all are doing it now.
Florida Turnpike has an amazing facility out towards Orlando to
really test equipment and taking that into real world examples.
(10:05):
So you know, I'll give you a real world example.
We during that pilot program, we had camera technology connected
to the crosswalks in front of the courthouse on Twig
Street and it would give warnings that hey, there are
pedestrians in the crosswalk that maybe you're making a right
turn and you can't see, or maybe you're kind of
coming through and you can't see. It was so successful
(10:26):
we said, you know what, I think there's real application
to that. Downtown. We have a lot of ramps downtown
that feed into really dense surban environments that weren't den
urban environments ten years ago. And so you're coming off
of these ramps. The bro Rain Morgan Street ramp over
towards the Arena is a great example of that. So
what we're doing now is we're equipping all of those
crosswalks with that camera technology and when there are pedestrians
(10:49):
in that crosswalk. There's going to be a light at
the top of the ramp that'll start flashing and tell
you slow down that there are pedestrians in there.
Speaker 1 (10:56):
It's kind of like, and again we're doing our CEOs
you should feature here on The Ryan Gorman Show, joined
by Greg Slater, executive director and CEO of the Tampa
Hillsboro Expressway. Authorready kind of like those crosswalks that I
think so many of us have seen where the pedestrian
hits the button and it flashes. But this the pedestrian
wouldn't have to do that. It's automatic detection.
Speaker 2 (11:16):
We will detect you, and then two things will happen.
That normal light will come on like at the crosswalk, yeah,
but another flashing light will come on at the top
of the ramp that you can't see this crosswalk yet. Yeah,
and you should start to slow down now.
Speaker 1 (11:29):
Wow. And that's important I think too, because, like we
were talking about earlier, downtown Tampa, there are more pedestrians
than there used to be. And I think, you know,
during my time living in downtown Chicago for a couple
of years, when you're navigating downtown Chicago and you're driving,
you're kind of used to the fact that they're a pedestrian.
(11:50):
You're just on alert as you do here. Sometimes you're
going from you know, a highway where it's just cars
and stuff, and then all of a sudden you've got
these you know, we've got e bikes, we've got e scooters. Right,
all of that adds a different component to it. So, yeah,
that's very helpful and could help keep people safe.
Speaker 2 (12:08):
Yeah, you know, it's just we're trying to match the
infrastructure as we're really rebuilding the entire Sellmon Expressway system
over the next decade, matching that infrastructure with what we're
seeing in this region today, you know, and that that
comes in a variety of different ways. You know, when
the expressway if you've ever spent time on the Selmon Expressway,
one of the challenges that we have is those merge
areas are real short, These standards are very different.
Speaker 1 (12:30):
And person, I don't know, every time I'm driving by,
the person can't figure out if they're going to go
or if they're going to slow down. So yeah, that's right,
and so I don't know how you fix that problem.
Speaker 2 (12:40):
But but so you know, the challenge that we have
in front of us and where we're focused is okay, one,
we have to address this growth. But two, where do
we have ramps that we need ramps? Where do we
not have ramps that we need ramps? Where? Where do
we take them out?
Speaker 1 (12:53):
Where?
Speaker 2 (12:53):
What's the system look like today for the population that
we have today versus where it was fifty six years ago?
Speaker 1 (13:00):
Right?
Speaker 2 (13:01):
You know?
Speaker 1 (13:01):
Great? Where's it going?
Speaker 2 (13:02):
Yeah? I mean even I'll give you a small example,
like operationally, next week, our reversible express lane is going
to start to open at five am, and then we're
going to do a shift at noon, and so we
change those hours, okay, because so the afternoon shift years
ago was was so people downtown could get to the
Brandon mall right, Like that's not a big demand today,
(13:25):
right right?
Speaker 1 (13:26):
Right? And is this part of that that tracking traffic
patterns that the technology has allowed for absolutely?
Speaker 2 (13:34):
So for us for us to do what we need
to do, I need a three hundred and sixty degree
view of our customer and a three hundred and sixty
degree view of our system. What is your door to
door trip? We may be one part of that, but
how can I influence the signal systems? How can I
build the intelligence into it? And so we started to
see people backing up trying to see demand growing at
(13:56):
three am. So if you live in Brandon, or you
live in a be and you're using the expressway to
get down to Micdale Air Force Base, maybe you're out
there at three o'clock in the morning. You know, our
our service members don't have the same hours as the restaurants.
Speaker 1 (14:09):
Or if you do a really early radio shots, that's right.
Speaker 2 (14:13):
And so we said, well, let's change, let's look at this,
let's study the data, and now we're going to open
it at five, and we're going to do a midday
shift at noon and really match where the demand is.
Speaker 1 (14:23):
Uh. Autonomous vehicles that component. Have you done anything in
that space with the Salman tell us about that?
Speaker 2 (14:32):
Yeah, So our original pilot back then was all about
autonomous vehicles, and we started really testing them on the system.
Speaker 1 (14:39):
So I thought, so, I just want to be a reversible.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
Express lane is really designed well for you can kind
of shut it down in the middle of the day
and kind of run those testing quays, okay and things
like that. So you know, today, you know we've got
Waimo now in town. I read yesterday they're going to
start kind of deploying autonomous shuttles. The robo taxi is
right on their heels. There's some really interesting companies that
(15:02):
I've been kind of watching and talking to. One is
called Glideways, and they're like autonomous like minibus kind of operations.
Speaker 1 (15:10):
And so we've got the autonomous trucking companies come in.
I mean, I know that a lot of that's being
tested I think in Texas, but it's going to be
coming here.
Speaker 2 (15:17):
But it's really kind of you know when you think
about what we do right, like, I want to be
able to bring people from outside the city into the
city and then disperse throughout, and that could be autonomous vehicles.
You could take the dash program that the Downtown Partnership
puts out. Now take a robotaxi or a waym or
get on a scooter or a bike and you know,
be able to kind of navigate your way through downtown.
(15:39):
And so I think what people really need to really
focus on is we need all of the above to
solve the transportation system.
Speaker 1 (15:45):
Yeah, and you also have an area that it's very
spread out, so you know you're not talking about like
some kind of subway system coming anytime soon. So you know,
these different options, trying to figure out how to make
them workable for us really important. We're joined on our
CEOs you should know feature here on The Ryan Gorman
Show by Greg Slater, Executive director and CEO of the
(16:07):
Tampa Hillsboro Expressway Authority. You can learn more at Tampa
Dashxway dot com. Last thing, I want to touch on
the urban trail system beneath the Salman. Big plans for that.
What are you looking to do?
Speaker 2 (16:23):
Yeah, it's part of this massive seven hundred and seventy
million dollar work program seven hundred and sixty seven million
dollar work program that we have. Almost eighty five percent
of that is construction, so you know, i'll talk about
underpasses and that and that kind of way through downtown.
We're active in construction today with three or four hundred
million dollar advancement of the South Salmon piece, so you know,
(16:46):
on in the southern half of the expressway, we're adding
another lane in each direction. We're adding noise walls to
those residential areas. You know, Thankfully, I think people are
more excited about the noise walls than they are about
the extra lane. But we're also redoing all thirteen of
those underpasses to really write pedestrian infrastructure, really gateways to
Bay Shore and gateways into some really historic neighborhoods into Tampa.
(17:10):
Then when you get into that Hillsboro River Bridge area
by the Riverwalk, right, so you know you've got the
Hillsboro River Bridge, you've got the pendry coming up now
the Convention Center. Yeah, we've focused on creating an iconic
structure there. So you know, I pick on my partners
at the State where I say, you know, I'm sick
of watching Monday night football and seeing the Skyway bridge, right,
(17:31):
give me, give me something downtown that we can really
show off and kind of light up and change that
skyline a little bit and then address an infrastructure need there.
And so as we replaced that bridge, we're going to
be connecting the Leroy Salmon Greenway to the West Riverwalk
to the East Riverwalk. So all of that will come
together around the conventions are nice. Downtown. We've got these
really based, technology based projects to really activate the downtown Viaduct.
(17:55):
But we've got this really cool pedestrian trail, the Leroy
Salmon Greenway, that goes through all the way through downtown
all the way over to Ebor City over in near
twenty second Street, and so it's this two to three
mile by compedetrian path. Well, we have a dog park
out back of our expressway and there is somebody in
that dog park twenty four to seven. We built it
(18:16):
years ago, the ten year anniversary. We had a local
deputy sheriff that put himself in between a drunk driver,
wrongway driver and a family, saved the family and was
killed in the process. And he had a love for animals,
and we built this dog park in his honor, and
we continue to honor that sacrifice. In fact, really interesting,
(18:37):
his sister is now a SHARE's deputy in that designment
and they're from the New England area. But what a story.
And so I always like to remind people why that
dog park's there. But we've got this master plan to
develop a series of parks all the way through downtown.
Think about that. You've got the high Line in New York,
the Underline in Miami. Birmingham Malabana did amazing stuff with
(19:02):
creating like little skate parks and things like that downtown.
So what we said was, let's lay out a master plan.
The first one is our twelve Street park, which is
really laying out a lot of community space, reimagining stormwater
management pond really between Channel Side and Ebor City over
near twelve Street. Gasworks is coming in and there's a
gold gym there, all of that. Activate all of that
(19:22):
into public space, keep going down to Ebor Harbor and
then all the way out and then downtown.
Speaker 1 (19:27):
So you wore Harbor is going to be there are
lots of plans for that too. Yeah, amazing.
Speaker 2 (19:31):
And then the port is expanding with another cruise terminal
and so all of that is happening and being able
to really activate the space under the expressway with parks,
pickleball courts, open recreational.
Speaker 1 (19:44):
Area because under an expressway is something that you know
a lot of people probably don't really think much about.
You know, we're so used to seeing right kind of
is what it is. But you've got a different vision
for it.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
And really what we're thinking about is think about two things.
One is one of the greatest commodities we have here.
F it is shade. I can give you shade right.
Speaker 1 (20:03):
The other thing is is bit we can get is with.
Speaker 2 (20:06):
An urban expressway, it really comes through a downtown urban area.
If you can activate those areas under the expressway. Really
thoughtfully connect those communities underneath the expressway. You can really
do a lot to activate your downtown. You know, my
theory is, over the course of my thirty year career,
is our roadway, our bridge, our transit line, whatever it is,
(20:28):
can't be the centerpiece of what we're doing. Our community
has to be the centerpiece of what we're doing, and
we're there to make that more accessible, make that, make
people more mobile, give people opportunities, really create a space
where they can get where they want to get, no
matter what mode of travel they want to take.
Speaker 1 (20:43):
A lot of exciting things happening. It's our CEOs you
should know. Feature here on The Ryan Gorman Show, joined
by Greg Slater, Executive director and CEO of the Tampa
Hillsboro Expressway Authority. You can learn more at Tampa Dashxway
dot com. Greg. Really fascinating conversation, Thanks so much for
taking the time to come in.
Speaker 2 (21:03):
Absolutely happy to be here.
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