South Florida Needs to Emulate Pembroke Pines Approach re Roads/Traffic: ACTION!

My comments follow the article.
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www.sun-sentinel.com/community/news/pembroke_pines/sfl-flbpines12xxsbdec16,0,1462881.story
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
Pembroke Pines rebuilding I-75 ramps at Pines Boulevard
Lanes to be closed weekends, nights; work to go on 14 months
By Michael Turnbell
December 16, 2008

Pembroke Pines
When the Pines Boulevard interchange at Interstate 75 opened in 1985, the area was considered out in the boondocks.

The Pines interchange, like others along I-75, was built to rural standards with high-speed curves and little space for merging onto the connecting road.

But what worked then doesn't hold up under today's traffic-choking volumes.

That's why the city is replacing the interchange's wide, curving ramps with straight ramps — one exit for both eastbound and westbound traffic — that join Pines Boulevard at right angles similar to exits on Interstate 95 in south Broward County.

"When you come off 75, everybody's moving at a high speed and then they have to quickly merge over to the left onto Pines," said Pembroke Pines Mayor Frank Ortis. "It's a huge safety issue."

The new ramps will create two, four-way intersections on each side of the overpass and lead drivers exiting I-75 to a traffic light, instead of directly onto Pines Boulevard.

Four new traffic signals are planned for Pines Boulevard — two at the new exit and entry ramps and two at 145th and 148th avenues, which are the entrances to new shopping centers on the east and west sides of I-75.

On the east side, drivers headed in and out of the new Shops of Pembroke Gardens, built by Duke Realty Corp. of Cincinnati, are using a temporary signal at Pines at 145th.

On the west side, developer KRG/CREC of Indianapolis can't open Cobblestone Plaza shopping center until the traffic signal at Pines Boulevard and 148th is installed.

Ortis said he has asked the state to activate the 148th Avenue signal ahead of the project's January 2010 completion.
Drivers can expect lanes and ramps to be closed at night and on weekends.

"We are asking motorists to be patient while we reconfigure the interchange during the next 14 months," said city engineer Joe McLaughlin said.

Although Pines Boulevard is a state road, the city agreed last year to take over the job from the Florida Department of Transportation to accelerate the road work.

The city is paying for the $11 million project upfront. The state will reimburse the city in 2012, when it originally expected to have funds available to do the work. Developers on both sides of I-75 are contributing $2.6 million plus covering any cost overruns.

Michael Turnbell can be reached at mturnbell@sunsentinel.com, 954-356-4155 or 561-243-6550.
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I loved when this first opened up because going north on the new I-75 on my way back up to Chicago/Evanston, after coming back home for the holidays down here (at my mother's then-place near The Falls, at S. Dixie Highway and S.W. 136th Street, once you got up towards then-western Pines, you could really, really FLY!!!

The only place in South Florida where that was true.

It was very similar at the time to parts of I-75 South, south of Tampa-St. Pete going towards Port Charlotte, where I'd always make a pit-stop on my trips south and visit a friend, who had already become a popular high school English teacher in his first job.
That was back when Charlotte County was the fastest-growing county in the whole country, full of Midwestern transplants, can-do enthusiasm and Cubs and Reds ball caps.

Miles and miles of wide roads with no cars on them!
Especially at night!!!

Those roads were so much fun to ride.

Sometimes, you wouldn't see another car for 2-3 miles, and when you did, they were going at least 80 or so.

And naturally, almost without exception, at least once before you got to Palm Beach County, you'd hear the great beginning storm percussion of Christopher Cross' Ride Like the Wind, so you'd have no choice but to turn up the volume and sing along, especially the iconic Michael McDonald back-up vocals. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pt9wULOlc6o

I was born the son of a lawless man.
Always spoke my mind with a gun in my hand.
Lived nine lives
gunned down ten.
Gonna ride like the wind.

And I got such a long way to go.
To make it to the border of Mexico.
So I'll ride like the wind.
Ride like the wind.
Ride like the wind.


Our little Broward mini-Autobahn!
How I do miss it!

In the past 20 years, the closest thing I've experienced to that kind of fun driving, especially after being in the cramped Washington, D.C. area, where speed is just an abstract idea, was heading west on I-66 on Fall Sunday afternoons when the Redskins weren't playing, and my friends and I would head out to the bucolic hills and mountains of West Virginia for the day.

We'd get up early Sunday morning and after the prerequisite stop at the IHOP or Denny's and back on the road by 8 a.m., as long as we studiously avoided the areas known for attracting the "brunch crowd" or "horse crowd" going west, we were set for a nice steady speed with music to relax and just unwind.
(That's one of the things that I miss the most about being down here, surrounded by flat land and traffic -that tangible sense of movement with winding hills )

And coming back to Arlington, with the sun going down over the hills and the foliage whizzing past us, and starting to pick up WBZ-Boston or WCBS-New York on our car radio around 7 p.m., well, it was easy to forget for a while what sort of new mini-crisis would greet us the following day, the big Beltway news story which you'd have to have an informed opinion on.

I especially recommend that you consider the comments below of Pembroke Pines Commissioner Angelo Castillo, within the context of his longer comments:

"...Implementing better traffic management solutions citywide continues to be a top priority for all of us at City Hall. I think it's important to note that while other cities talk about traffic, we in Pines are actually doing things to make things better. That's what our residents demand -- action, not talk...."

That guy is 100% right.

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