South Fort Myers roads top traffic list.

S. Fort Myers roads top traffic list.

INTERSTATE 75Interstate 75 would have probably topped the list of the county's busiest roads. But state transportation officials will not have the 2005 traffic counts ready until May. In 2004, 82,000 daily vehicles used I-75 just south of Daniels Parkway in south Fort Myers. That tops U.S. 41 at Jamaica Bay, the busiest recorded location so far in 2005, by more than 15,000 cars per day.


Half of the 10 busiest Lee County roads that overwhelmed drivers in 2005 are in south Fort Myers, according to county traffic counts released this week."That's where the majority of the growth is, so it's no surprise," said Dave Loveland, a transportation manager with the Lee County Department of Transportation.The News-Press examined the numbers to learn what Lee's five busiest north-south and east-west roads are and how much traffic has increased on these roads.
The added traffic lengthens the time of commutes, creates more accidents and causes more frustration."We try not to even go out there during rush hour, but it's getting so that there isn't any quiet time," Bonnie Ochocki said.
Ochocki, 69, lives with her husband, Ron, in Jamaica Bay, a mobile home community off U.S. 41 just south of Gladiolus Drive.Lee County traffic engineers recorded 66,900 daily vehicles on that stretch of 41 in 2005, the highest in the county. That's 3,200 more daily cars, compared with 2003 counts.
The breakdown through the rest of the county's regions produced these numbers:• Cape Coral had the fourth- and fifth-busiest roads, with 56,700 vehicles driving Del Prado Boulevard at Four Mile Cove and 54,200 using Cape Coral Parkway west of Palm Tree Boulevard. The section on Cape Coral Parkway is up 13,000 daily cars from two years ago, while Del Prado is up 3,000 during that same time.
• Fort Myers had the second-busiest road, with 65,700 vehicles traveling on Colonial just west of Interstate 75. Just north of Colonial on Metro Parkway in Fort Myers, 36,900 vehicles were recorded, making Metro the ninth-busiest road. Just two years ago, 10,300 fewer cars traveled that part of Colonial, while 6,700 fewer were using Metro.• Lehigh Acres' main thoroughfare ranked eighth in the county, as 40,200 cars used Lee Boulevard east of Immokalee Road. This stretch saw the biggest traffic jump of the 10 busiest roads, with a boost of 13,900 cars since 2003.
• No roads in south Lee County made the top 10, a strange fact because of the daily congestion drivers see there and the construction they encounter on U.S. 41 in Bonita Springs.
GROWTH & TRAFFIC
Many retail attractions along 41 from Daniels Parkway south to Gladiolus Drive call out to drivers in south Fort Myers.The Bell Tower Shops have restaurants, clothing stores and a 20-screen movie theater. Barnes & Noble Booksellers and a Target anchor a shopping center across the street. Farther south, at 41 and Gladiolus Drive, a Wal-Mart, a Lowe's and a Home Depot occupy three of the four corners."This area is the retail center of the county," said Wayne Daltry, the county's Smart Growth director.
This shopping core draws thousands of people per day.In the spaces around it, people are moving into new homes.
There's Bell Tower Park, just north of 41 and Ben C. Pratt/Six Mile Cypress Parkway, Laguna Lakes and Gladiolus Preserve at the west end of Gladiolus and the Gateway development at the east end of Daniels Parkway. Those developments account for nearly 3,000 homes.South Fort Myers residents share the roads with drivers from Cape Coral, where the population has surged to 150,000, and Lehigh, which has surpassed 50,000 people.New roads add to the traffic too.
The Daniels Parkway extension opened in 2000 and gives the new Gateway and Lehigh residents access to south Fort Myers.Treeline Avenue opened last year, connecting Daniels and Corkscrew Road. That gives residents in Estero and San Carlos Park a third north-south route, along with 41 and I-75, to head to south Fort Myers.
Don't forget the new Southwest Florida International Airport, either. The new airport, off Treeline Avenue, brings more visitors, which history has shown means more residents.Ody Faife, the assistant manager at the Colony Place condos, has seen the impacts."In the morning, because we're so close to I-75, it looks like a parking lot," she said.
Her workplace is just east of Ben C. Pratt/Six Mile Cypress Parkway on Daniels, where 65,000 daily vehicles drove by, making Daniels the second busiest east-west roadway in 2005.Two years ago, 10,900 fewer vehicles used this stretch of road.
ACCIDENTS, ASPHALT
The most crash-prone crossroads in Lee County coincided with high traffic counts.
County traffic engineers recorded 124 accidents at Cypress Lake Drive-Daniels Parkway and U.S. 41, the highest sum in 2005. The intersection was the site of 111 crashes in 2004, again No.1 in the county.The second-worst intersection was at Gladiolus-Ben C. Pratt/Six Mile Cypress and 41, with 106 crashes. That's just north of Jamaica Bay, where engineers recorded the most traffic in 2005.Del Prado and Veterans Parkway ranked third in crashes, with 92. And Del Prado was the fourth-busiest county road last year.
More asphalt is the solution.State officials will start widening I-75 through Lee County from four to six lanes next year.
County officials want to build a new east-west road from Summerlin to State Road 82 just south of Gladiolus.Those are just two of the projects planned. More than half a dozen pages of projects are in the county's 2030 plan.Options are important.
"All over Fort Myers, Cape Coral, everywhere," Faife said, "traffic is bad."