By: Mariel Carbone | WCTV Eyewitness News

February 28, 2019

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (WCTV) -- The city-county Blueprint Intergovernmental Agency is moving forward with plans to invest in Tallahassee's southside.

Under its penny sales tax plan, Blueprint will fund a Starmetro super stop at the intersection of Orange Avenue and Meridian Road. This is part of its $4 million Orange Avenue Meridian Road place making plan. Currently, the lot, which is county owned, sits vacant and has become a place where people gather and loiter. Some, even set up shop to sell food out of trailers.

"This is an eye sore for our community. It certainly does not reflect

the community at all. And we want a facility here that will reflect what's actually happening on the southside of Tallahassee," said City Commissioner and Blueprint Chair Curtis Richardson.

The new bus facility will serve as a place where people can transfer buses, like downtown at C.K. Steele Plaza. It'll include covered seating, as well as ADA parking space. However, funding for the project won't be available until 2020.

In the meantime, Blueprint has approved $300,000 to begin cleaning up the site and create a pop up park. Efforts include debris removal, trash cleanup, new lighting and sidewalks along Polk Street and more. The ground has been leveled to prevent pockets of flooding. And restrooms will be built.

Resident Arthur Johnson, who takes the bus from that intersection several times a week, welcomed the upcoming changes.

"You have fights over here, fights over there," said Johnson. "It'll slow down traffic, there's a lot of kids that come through here."

Still, others said the area needs more than just a new bus facility.

"What the area needs is things to occupy people that don't have anything to do," said Shawn Johnson, who sets up shop at the lot daily selling fresh seafood. He said the new facility will impact him, forcing him to move his setup.

The Starmetro project is part of millions of dollars worth of investment happening on the southside. Just down the road on Orange Avenue, the Tallahassee Housing Authority is redeveloping its Orange Avenue apartment complex. And, even further down is where the new veterans clinic is located.