“This is crazy.”
That was my immediate reaction upon seeing the ill-conceived design of the entryway and exit on the developer’s site plan for a 10-building, 318-unit apartment complex on west side of Indian River Boulevard, south of 37th Street.
More than a month later, it’s still mindboggling – trying to understand how anyone familiar with Vero Beach and the increasing traffic flow along that much-traveled road could possibly believe it would be a good idea to:
- Allow drivers leaving the premises to make a left turn – across two lanes of southbound traffic that tends to ignore the posted 45-mph speed limit – onto the northbound boulevard.
- Require those drivers to dart into an acceleration lane they can use to merge into northbound traffic, which often includes motorists moving toward the left-turn lane at 37th Street on their way to Cleveland Clinic hospital or the surrounding medical complex.
- Ask exiting drivers to attempt these maneuvers on a busy stretch of highway that bends to the west, severely restricting the sight line to the north, while also contending with northbound drivers turning left into the development.
And without a traffic signal.
To those of us who regularly drive Indian River Boulevard in that area, it’s more than irresponsible. It’s dangerous. It’s a game plan for disaster, especially during our busy season, when our roads are crowded with part-time residents, tourists and other visitors.
It’s along Indian River Boulevard that the return of our seasonal neighbors is most noticeable on the mainland, particularly during the daytime hours.
“I see this intersection as being one of those things that, in season, our residents are going to say: ‘What were they thinking?’” said Jeb Bittner, chairman of the Vero Beach Planning & Zoning Board.
Bittner, a retired developer, was concerned about not only the perils of the left turn onto the boulevard, but also the stacking of vehicles in both the northbound acceleration lane and the left-turn lane at 37th Street.
There’s also potential for trouble when vehicles crisscross, as drivers in the acceleration lane merge to the right while motorists in the northbound lanes veer left to turn onto 37th Street.
According to the site plan, the apartment complex’s driveway would be only 900 feet south of the 37th Street intersection – in an area where development has been booming.
There are all kinds of new residential offerings, including single-family homes and hundreds of other apartments, as well as the burgeoning Vero Orthopaedics facility.
In addition, the wildly popular Quail Valley Club is adding a fourth campus on eight acres near the intersection of the boulevard and 41st Street, where it plans to build courts for pickleball, padel, bocce and even squash, along with a fitness center, swimming pool, café and spa.
All this growth already is having a noticeable impact on the flow of traffic on the boulevard, north of the Barber Bridge.
The proposed entryway and exit of the planned apartment complex to the south of 37th Street will only make a bad situation worse – and possibly treacherous.
Anyone want to mention the emergency vehicles regularly rolling through the area?
“This is going to be a pretty significant cluster-…,” Bittner said, politely opting to not finish the thought.
Yet, Bittner dutifully cast the deciding vote in the board’s 3-2 decision last month to approve the site plan for the 26-acre development, which will be located at 3601 Indian River Boulevard, east of the hospital and southeast of the 777 Building.
He had no choice.
“I definitely have concerns about the intersection, but we can’t vote based on personal preference,” Bittner said. “The site plan submitted was consistent with the city’s Comprehensive Plan, and it met all the requirements and codes. Legally, we had no alternative but to approve it.
“Otherwise,” he added, “the developer could sue the city.”
Not that the city has any meaningful say in the site plan’s entrance and exit, anyway: The development sits within the Vero Beach limits, but its driveway intersects with Indian River Boulevard, which is a county road.
That means the plans for the development’s ingress and egress must meet the traffic engineering requirements of the county’s Code of Ordinances – and, ultimately, be approved and permitted by the county staff.
That process is ongoing.
But the developer’s representatives, testifying before Bittner’s board at the Oct. 16 quasi-judicial hearing at City Hall, said they followed the county’s standards and used information from a county-conducted traffic study to design the entrance, exit and acceleration lane.
They said the design contained in the site plan complied with the county’s code.
In fact, City Planning Director Jason Jeffries, who recommended the board’s approval of the site plan, said the county staff had reviewed the design and that he had not been informed of any objections.
“If they had a problem, they could have relayed their concerns to us,” Jeffries said. “They didn’t.”
The county hasn’t made any decisions yet.
Both Alex Laffey, a county traffic engineer, and David Schryver, the county’s assistant public works director, said during a phone interview last week the site plan – specifically, the development’s ingress and egress – was still under review.
They said community members had voiced concerns about the safety of intersection’s design as illustrated in the developer’s plan, and that the staff is taking a hard look at the left turn onto the boulevard.
They’re also examining the sight-line challenges drivers would confront when departing the property, even when making right turns.
“We are aware of these issues, and we believe they’re valid, so we’re going through them,” Schryver said. “We want to find the best solution.”
One possible alternative the county staff is examining would allow only right turns out of the development but provide access to the boulevard’s northbound lanes via a U-turn lane to the south – if there’s enough room to do so without negatively impacting traffic flow.
“We have to look at that,” Schryver said.
Another option the county might want to consider would be to allow the developer to build a northbound, one-way, exit-only driveway that connects the property to 37th Street. (The site plan already includes such a road, but it’s for emergency-use only.)
Departing drivers would then have the opportunity, after turning right onto 37th Street, to proceed eastbound and turn north or south onto the boulevard.
That might appear to be a practical solution, but, for that to happen, the county would need to grant the developer a code variance – because any such road would connect with 37th Street too close to the boulevard intersection.
We’ll leave that to the county professionals, who we trust will come up with something better than what’s in the site plan.
