Monday, February 15, 2010

The Political Solution - Build more

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I-595

We don’t pay attention to what’s happening in the rest of the State. We have enough problems right here at home to gripe and worry about when it comes to over-development and sprawl. We do know that we are rapidly losing our quality of life in Florida.

We are now just a bundle of people living on top on each other. To solve that, developers just keep building in from the coasts and encroach on animal habitats and every square inch of land they can get their greedy little hands on. And the government is complicit and their answer to just about every woe we have in our State is to build—build anything anywhere. Create the jobs, get the growth, more money in the coffers.

Commissioner Golden recently said at the joint CRA meeting, that we should start fixing our roads before we worry about the rest. Usually government does just the opposite. One day it wakes up and says, Holy moly folks, we have a problem; let's build or widen another road. And this mindset continues; it is endless.

Developers have been allowed to come in with local municipal approval by changing Comprehensive plans and build large tracts of homes or commercial centers without considering the infrastructure. All of a sudden…boom…we have a traffic congestion problem or not enough roads to accommodate the population. How long has it taken to widen I-95 just here in Palm Beach County? It took seven years and nearly $400 million dollars and I still see barricades as I drive farther north. For years I hated to drive I-95.

What all this road construction does is buy us several years of reprieve all over our State because of the influx of people moving here and the never ending building in our State to accommodate the thousands of people migrating here. It is a constant game of catch-up and money that our State and the residents here can no longer afford.

Dr. Steve Rosen says about his neck of the woods-- "State goons are spending over a billion dollars to revamp Interstate I-595 that runs right in front of my business. When it first opened around 10 years ago, it was a nice drive. However, all it did was open West Broward County up to an explosion of development. Five years later, the road is clogged during rush hour.

So, the politicos came up with a solution: Use stimulus money and double deck the road-- widen the hell out of it too to accommodate the bulging traffic.

Why bother with all this? Simple. It opens the West end of the county up to even MORE burdensome unwanted development. I wonder how long, without Amendment 4, it would take before the road is once again maxed out.

This is the politico scumbag way. Too much traffic, widen the roads. They did this for years in Miami-Dead County. Now they can’t do it any more so what do they do, divide the road into toll and non-toll sections to suck even more money from us.

Amendment 4 is the only answer. These scum have run amok and are totally out of control."

3 comments:

  1. I completely agree that the overbuilding out west needs to stop. Growing up in Palm Beach County, I remember when such a fuss was made about stopping new development in the AgReserve. Look at how successful that was .

    But the way I see it, people are not going to stop moving to South Florida. In the past, you have supported proposals that limit building heights. So then where are all of these people supposed to live and work? If you don't want to build out west, then one of the only solutions I see is to build up.

    By no means am I advocating destroying every small building and replacing it with 50 story condos. However, I do think smart, green, well-designed, multi-story, mixed used buildings are a way of reducing the over-development of the western county while helping to save the environment. One cannot declare "Not In My Backyard" and push the burden of responsible growth on every other community in the State.

    Another possible solution, renovation of some of the existing structures that can support mixed use, such as 1000 Lake Ave.

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  2. Because of our high taxes, people are starting to discover other states to move to. Our economy now ranks 47th in the nation. We are over-built and developers are crying. Housing inventory sits on the shelf and will for years to come. Residents here have to pick up the tab for all this new construction that impacts just about everything--our electric--we're running out of natural resources such as water, building new roads to accommodate the influx, etc.

    Buying 1000 Lake Avenue will be a great investment. I'm all for it.

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  3. I would just like to clarify some incorrect information floating about:
    1. The I-595 Project is not being built with federal stimulus money.
    2. The three center reversible express lanes will not be double deck. They will be at ground level.
    3. The express lanes will not be tolled for a "source of revenue". They are tolled as a proven way to manage congestion. The tolls collected will most likely not even cover the construction costs for the express lanes.
    4. I-595 construction started in 1984 and was opened over 20 years ago in 1989.
    5. The southwestern portion of Broward was developed quickly in response response to the demand created from Miami-Dade residents relocation north after Hurricane Andrew in 1992.

    Should you be interested in kearning more abaout the upcoming I-595 Express Corridor Improvement Project, please go to www.i-595.com

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