The FDOT has officially entered the “Transit Miami No B.S. Zone”
Several weeks ago I received the below email from Kenneth Jeffries, Transportation Planner Florida Department of Transportation District Six. This email came in response to an article about the benefits of protected bicycle lanes that appeared in the Economist, which I sent to Mr. Gus Pego, FDOT District 6 Secretary, over a month ago.
Thank you for your interest in bicycle facilities on state roadways. The Department seeks to provide the safest possible facility for all users of the transportation system. Our statewide design standards do not preclude the construction of protected bicycle facilities.
Our designers have evaluated protected bicycle facilities as part of roadway projects in the past where they can be designed to within Department standards. The recently completed Resurfacing, Restoration, and Rehabilitation (RRR) project on SR A1A/MacArthur Causeway was designed per FDOT Design Standards, which includes on-road bicycle lanes. Providing protected bicycle lanes would likely require reconstruction and widening, which would incur significant costs beyond the scope of the RRR project. If you are interested in a protected bicycle facility along this roadway, I recommend that you contact staff at the Miami-Dade Metropolitan Planning Organization to plan, program, and prioritize funding for such a facility.
Thank you again for your interest in this subject. Please feel free to contact me directly with any future questions/comments regarding bicycle facilities on state roadways.”
Oh boy (deep breath).Where do I even begin?
Well, for starters, Mr. Jeffries stated that the Department seeks to provide the safest possible facility for all users of the transportation system? This was clearly not the protocol on the MacArthur Causeway, Biscayne Boulevard , Brickell Avenue, Coral Way or…..the list goes on and on…you get the point. How can the FDOT honestly say that these aforementioned state roadways are safe for anyone to ride a bicycle, especially a child? What a joke.
On a positive note, I’m glad to hear that the FDOT’s statewide design standards do not preclude the construction of protected bicycle facilities, but I have yet to see them wholeheartedly embrace this facility type. Actions speak louder then words, we have yet to see any action-just lip service.
Contrary to what Mr. Jeffries stated above, providing protected bicycle facilities on the MacArthur Causeway would not require reconstruction and widening. How about reducing the travel lanes? The current design speed of 50+ mph would be reduced with narrower lanes (accidents that seem to shut down the MacArthur Causeway on a monthly basis would also drop) and the extra few feet taken from the travel lanes could then be allocated to a protected bicycle lane. Sounds like a no brainer eh? Looks like I managed to find a solution that is inexpensive (paint), which does not require a road expansion project (expensive), and will actually achieve the FDOT’s stated objectives to make the transportation system as safe as possible for all users (drivers, cyclists and pedestrians). The BS and the reindeer games must stop FDOT.
We need your help on this one TMers! Please take a second to write a quick email to Mr. Gus Pego and invite him and his family to take a bike ride with Transit Miami on the MacArthur Causeway. I’ll bet the ranch he won’t take us up on this offer. The existing bike lane on the MacArthur Causeway essentially leads cattle on bicycles to slaughter. No sane person should ride a bicycle on the MacArthur Causeway unless they must.
*It should also be noted that I requested the MacArthur Causeway design plans from the FDOT over a month ago. They provided me with these illegible plans.I submitted a second request for the plans, but have not heard back from them.
60 Responses to A MacArthur Causeway Protected Bicycle Lane? The FDOT Passes the Buck (again)…
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Tony Garcia- I agree 100% with you that we should focus on expanding our existing Metro service instead of adding more modes of transit. However, I feel as though Metro service in the form of heavy rail to South Beach, is unreasonable for a couple reasons (as much as I would love it).
1. Miami Beach already has this no-transit attitude. The thought of an elevated Metro line down Alton or Washington would alone stop anything from happening in South Beach.
2. Heavy rail, as we all know, is more expensive than light rail or a tram line. Although the demand is there, perhaps a “Metrorail” branded light rail line to South Beach is better.
That said, a Metro line from Downtown along the MacArthur to Lincoln Rd up Alton Road would be amazing. Imagine how much ridership would skyrocket if this line went straight to MIA/Central Station? Food for thought…
@Kevin: Yes Heavy Rail is expensive, but not necessarily more than light rail. The cost of these systems cannot be compared apples-to-apples. Heavy rail carries more people for a similar O/M cost. In addition, building the system to the beach would require an expanded ROW so the normal cost difference between Light Rail and Heavy is negligible. Also, keep in mind that you would only need one or two stops (@ Alton and @ Collins) to reach most of the population of South Beach. Once there, everything is within a 10 min walk. So we dont have to have an extensive system on the beach. Definitely something to think about…
I am liking all this discussion: with the exception of the racist remarks re: Baylink. Yes, Miami Beach has a long history of racism and anti-semitism, but that is not why Baylink will not start operating in 2014 as planned. It was a simple matter of political will trumping the will of the people,(there was a public vote, you may not know), with an underhanded move at the MPO involving a quid pro quo. The studies that were done at the time showed the ridership was there. The money was there, with a dedicated funding source. The infrastructure on the MacArthur was there for the crossing, and very little ROW was needed: and not for the rail line itself, which would have gone in the roadway, but for the electric and braking stations required for the operation. Now, what will it take to get the plan back on track? The CDT money has been spent on the Marlins Ballpark and will be spent on building casinos/um/conventions centers in Miami. The infrastructure on the Mac was used up for the tunnel and the corruption and bad management at MDT continues unabated, making the Federal Government out as a partner. We will need a private company to come in to plan, build and operate any expansion to a rail-based public transportation system for Miami Beach. Finally, the transfer-adverse reasoning holds no barrier as a mode choice. Go anywhere else in the world and you see that transferring from public transit mode to mode is the norm and accepted. If enough people got out of their cars and took to the streets more often and elected public officials who walked sometime instead of driving everywhere we would see a different future. But if we continue to value our SUV’s and free parking above all, that is all we will get.
The email was responded to by the jeffries account. It said he same thing about required lane width, but of course that minimum lane width is only so high because the MacArthur is designed as a limited access highway. Technically, and here’s why we can’t bitch too much, the MacArthur IS in fact 395, a highway, until of gets to Watson island, and is built as an interstate until it gets to the stoplight for the islands/the Miami-Miami Beach border, which is where I used to think the transition was until I saw the a1a sign just past the tunnel area.
Here is the phone number from the email in case someone is feeling really bold behind the keyboard. 305.470.5445
I-395 stops and starts at the western two lanes at The Herald waterfront site. A-1-A starts and ends there. The entire Mac is A-1-A.
I’m fine with Baylink, as long as it’s a tram, light rail or (maybe even) a heavy rail line. As long as the Baylink line has a clear, single line to Gov’t Center and not some convoluted, loop-like line throughout Downtown. Also, whatever the rail type, Baylink should be built within the (future) Miami Streetcar lines. We can’t have a Metromover, Metrorail, Baylink, buses and the Miami Streetcar. We need to pick.
Metrorail > Light rail (inc. “Baylink” and the “Miami Streetcar” plans) > Metromover
Three modes is enough. Otherwise, the efficiency of all these systems is null.
Well, effectively it’s an FDOT Superhighway, but I suppose it is technically signed as A1A at that point so there is no gap between its connection to 1. I’m sure that’s the only reason it starts there, so its seamless with 1 on paper.
Regarding Baylink:
I ride the “S” bus to work in Coral Gables 3 days per week. I get on at Alton Road in South Beach and transfer at Government Center to Metrorail and then ride the Coral Gables trolley.
Though this is only based on my experience, rail transit to the Beach would be 100 times better than that bus. In the afternoon at 5:00 the bus is so crowded, the driver literally has to turn people away to wait for the next one. People have to push and fight to get on the bus, rather than wait for the next one. The other problem is that the bus has to sit in traffic, just like a car, making the journey even longer.
Buses and trains to South Beach cannot be compared. That bus is a NIGHTMARE, but it is all we have. The travel time could be cut in half with a train in its own right-of-way and it could accommodate all of the people who need to ride it. For anyone who thinks rail to South Beach is a waste, I suggest they commute by bus. I know every bus rider with me would agree.
Also, if anyone has seen the causeway, you know that it is constantly congested, gets backed up every weekend, and will only become more crowded once the Port of Miami tunnel is open.
Regarding bike lanes:
It should not matter why they are built and built well. It does not matter if the protected lanes are used by commuters or tourists or anyone else. The point is that they are part of a “complete street” and we should not have to fight to get them. Asking FDOT for safe and adequate infrastructure should not have to be justified or debated.
Okay, in the last post you made that got deleted and shouldn’t have, you had a point. But this post is stupid. Bus lanes would require as much or more of a MacArthur causeway widening than a rail line.
Comments from myangeldust have been deleted because he/she is not interested in having a discussion based in facts. Disagreement is ok – but let’s base the discussion in facts, not conjecture / bigotry / racism…etc. This isn’t the herald website – I have zero tolerance for stupidity.