Road To Florida Keys Should Be Safer Now

Drivers no longer will have to grit their teeth when they travel the 18-Mile Stretch — the two-lane road between the mainland and the Florida Keys, known for deadly head-on collisions.

Wildlife is safer, too.

It took 25 years, but the controversial, $330 million road improvement project is finally done.

“If it avoids one death, it’s worth it,” said State Rep. Ron Saunders, who said he supported the project since its controversial beginnings in 1986.

A dedication ceremony was held Wednesday morning on the north side of the C-111 canal at mile marker 116.3 to celebrate the end of construction, which began in May 2005 after environmental groups lost a lawsuit to stop the project.

Martin Knopp, Florida’s Division Administrator for the Federal Highway Administration, called the much safer road a “great milestone.”

Eyeing Knopp and the crowd from the canal was an American crocodile, one of the protected species the road will help to protect with the building of 16 box culverts that allow for underwater crossings.

Four wildlife crossings also were built specifically to protect the endangered Florida Panther. In 2007, a panther was killed while trying to cross the 18-Mile Stretch before fences were in place.

An average of 16,100 vehicles travel the 18-Mile Stretch each day, said Gus Pego, District 6 Secretary of the state DOT.

Before the road project, Pego said there had been years when 10 to 14 people died during accidents on the Stretch, primarily from head-on collisions caused by impatient drivers.

The last divider was in place by Labor Day, and the road project was officially completed Monday with the last of the punch-list items finished, Pego said.

While there were only smiles at the dedication ceremony, it was a project that originally angered much of the Keys.

In 1986, the state Department of Transportation proposed and pushed for a four-lane highway, basically an extension of the Florida Turnpike that now ends in Florida City.

Strong opposition to the project came from national and local environmentalists and from many Keys elected officials and residents who were concerned that better roads with more lanes would bring more development to the environmentally sensitive island chain.

“It was so controversial that one resident tied himself to the bridge in protest,” recalled Heather Carruthers, now mayor of Monroe County.

But after two major legal battles spaced a decade apart, a compromise was reached. The road would remain two lanes, but with longer passing lanes, room on the northbound side for a second hurricane evacuation lane, a three-foot-high concrete divider, environmental improvements, wildlife crossings and fencing.

At the urging of a local resident, the divider was painted. Artist Wyland, who lives in Islamorada, chose the color: Belize Blue. The divider runs the entire stretch, actually 20.2 miles from mile marker 126.7 in Florida City to 106.5 in Key Largo.

The project also included building a 1.3-mile fixed-span bridge over Jewfish Creek to replace the creaky bascule bridge that was built in 1944 and caused traffic delays when it was raised for boat traffic to pass. The bridge was completed two years ago.

Carruthers said the road project took so long because the environment is so important to the people in the Keys.

“I hope when people go over the Jewfish Creek Bridge and see the gorgeous views and beauty, they will see why the environment is so important to us and respect it while they are here,” she said.

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