New Tampa Projects Top MPOโ€™s Priority List As Cross Creek Blvd. Widening Wraps

Construction continues along Bruce B. Downs Blvd. in Tampa Palms, but it may not be the last of it for southern Tampa Palms, even after the current project wraps in 2017.
Construction continues along Bruce B. Downs Blvd. in Tampa Palms, one of the Hillsborough County MPO’s top transportation project priorities.

By Matt Wiley

Determining which transportation projects take priority over others is a complicated process debated by several local planning groups. Recently, the latest five-year transportation plan for all of Hillsborough County was approved and several ongoing and future New Tampa road projects sit on top of the Hillsborough County Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO)โ€™s 2015-19 Transportation Improvement Plan (TIP) priority list. One such project should even be completed as youโ€™re reading this issue.Continue reading

Former New Tampa Sweetbay A Hotspot For Semi Trucks

*sweetbay trucksBy Matt Wiley

For more than two years, the former New Tampa Sweetbay supermarket (located off Bruce B. Downs [BBD] Blvd. next to Home Depot), has been sitting vacant. Yet, most days, itโ€™s not uncommon to see the parking lot full of vehicles. However, these are not the cars and SUVs of suburban grocery shoppers, but semi tractor trailers, utilizing the open parking lot as a place to take a break from the road.Continue reading

New Tampa Vet Alex Dillman Retires

U.S. Army Staff Sergeant Alex Dillman and his wife Holly, who live in Cory Lake Isles, listen to a speaker at Alexโ€™s retirement ceremony on May 21 at the Gibbons Alumni Center at USF in Tampa.
U.S. Army Staff Sergeant Alex Dillman and his wife Holly, who live in Cory Lake Isles, listen to a speaker at Alexโ€™s retirement ceremony on May 21 at the Gibbons Alumni Center at USF in Tampa.

By Matt Wiley

A thunderous round of applause erupts from a room of men and women in uniform, elected officials, friends and family members standing to face a soldier seated under an American flag. Decorated in medalsโ€”including the Purple Heartโ€”Cory Lake Isles resident Staff Sergeant Alex Dillman listens as many in the room speak and salute him for his service and the sacrifice he made during his more than 10 years as an enlisted soldier in the U.S. Army during a retirement ceremony at the University of South Florida in Tampa on May 21.Continue reading

My Sister Bonnie, aka โ€˜Lady Wolverine,โ€™ On Her Way To Recovery

neck 2By Gary Nager

Long-time readers of this publication know that I have only one sibling โ€” my sister Bonnie โ€” who lives in Villanova, PA. Because itโ€™s probably been a dozen years since I wrote anything about her in these pages, you may not know that Bonnie won her first of about 30 amateur, all-natural (drug-free) bodybuilding titles in her 30s and 40s, the last about a dozen years ago.ย Continue reading