Lee strains to make roads meet growth

Lee County's road problems, not surprisingly, are following the area's rapid growth.

When 2006 property values were announced a few weeks ago, the value of land in the Lehigh Acres fire district had risen by 85 percent. That came on the heels of a 98 percent boost the year before.

Now the area is looking at a development moratorium because nearby roads cannot handle the new traffic.

The county's struggles with road problems created by rapid growth are outlined in its new annual concurrency report, which examines and rates county infrastructure. Under the concept of concurrency, new development is prohibited if it would overwhelm nearby infrastructure like roads.

This year's report gives a failing grade to two stretches of Immokalee Road, also known as State Road 82. That means no new development can be permitted if it adds traffic to Immokalee Road.

At least that's what it should mean. When the county made a deal with the Lehigh Corp. to settle a lawsuit back in 1992, it gave the company, the developer of most of the east county community, concurrency vesting for all platted lots. About half the sprawling Gateway development is likewise vested.

That means that even though there are more than 1,300 cars per hour on a road designed to carry fewer than 1,100, the permits, the development and the traffic will keep coming.

"It's not a huge surprise that it's Level of Service F," said county Community Development Director Mary Gibbs. "You can ask anyone that has to drive out there."

The county has let the state borrow the money to design improvements to the road, and is proposing to pay for two left-turn lanes at the busy Daniels Parkway intersection, but there is no construction money budgeted to widen the road.

"The road is failing, but Lehigh is exempt," Gibbs said. "This is a big issue. A big problem. It's the worst of all scenarios."

That's the way county Smart Growth Director Wayne Daltry sees it, too. Daltry was the director of the Southwest Florida Regional Planning Council 14 years ago when the lawsuit was settled.

"I remember screaming and moaning and rending my clothes," he said.

Commissioner John Albion, whose district includes Lehigh, said it's his understanding the county has no choice in the matter. He said the county Metropolitan Planning Organization didn't help the situation when it recently voted — over his objection — to make State Road 78 a higher priority than State Road 82.

"You don't do what the MPO did," he said. "You don't allow a road to leapfrog that has half the trips."

Dave Loveland, the county's road planning chief, said with the design work under way, there is some hope the state will find funding for State Road 82.

"We hoped to kick-start it by paying for the design," he said.

Immokalee Road is the county's biggest current concurrency problem but not its only one. Portions of Bonita Beach Road, Alico Road and Corkscrew Road were rated at D or lower, and large stretches of Interstate 75 failed outright. Parts of U.S. 41 also fell below state standards.

Those state standards call for roads to function at Level of Service C or higher. The county shoots for the less-than-lofty standard of D.

Concurrency continues to be an issue for Wal-Mart and other developers looking to build on the last stretch of U.S. 41 in Estero. A handful of developers have promised to pay the interest if the county will borrow $25 million to get the stretch between Corkscrew Road and San Carlos Boulevard widened to six lanes. Otherwise, the developers will have to wait until at least 2007.

The stretch of U.S. 41 from Old 41 to Corkscrew fared worse. That stretch got a B in 2005, a C in 2006 and is projected at D in 2007, even with the long-awaited widening complete.

U.S. 41 from Corkscrew Road to San Carlos Boulevard is rated B, but barely. The road is seeing about 1,800 cars per hour now and is designed to carry around 2,100. Wal-Mart would add 500 or more trips and the road would flunk.

Bonita Beach Road gets a grade of C along most of its length, but it falls to D between Vanderbilt Drive and U.S. 41. Loveland said the figures from the past few years haven't shown the kind of problem that locals complain about, but the county knows there are problems there.

Commissioners are scheduled to accept and adopt the new concurrency report on June 20. A moratorium for unplatted lots in Lehigh Acres and for other development not exempted would begin then.