Killer crosswalks may remain for minimum two years

BY PRU SOWERS

KONK LIFE STAFF WRITER

Despite two deaths that occurred in two separate crosswalk incidents on North Roosevelt Boulevard this year, Key West officials can’t complete the safety changes they want until 2021.

Commissioners want state transportation officials to install what is known as HAWK, a High-intensity Activated Cross Walk signal at all six of the new pedestrian crosswalks along the recently-paved section of North Roosevelt Blvd. HAWK uses a series of traffic lights – yellow to prepare drivers to stop and red to stop – once a pedestrian has pushed a button at the crosswalk, activating the lights. While state law requires cars to stop for pedestrians in a crosswalk, the fast-moving traffic on North Roosevelt has made it difficult for drivers to see someone crossing the street or, in many cases, one car stops but the car in the next lane does not.

State transportation officials have tried to help, first by agreeing to install the HAWKs and then by accelerating the project completion from 2023 to 2021 after commissioners, City Manager Jim Scholl and Key West Police Chief Donie Lee urged an earlier time frame. District Six Transportation Secretary James Wolfe also agreed to let the city pay the estimated $1.775 million project cost upfront, with the state reimbursing it later, as a way to expedite the project.

But even with all those efforts, the design and construction of the HAWKs will likely take another two to three years to complete, according to Key West Engineering Director Jim Bouquet. The design phase will take at least eight months to complete because state transportation engineers need to be involved, he said, pushing the bid portion of the project back to at least May 2019.

“Given my experience working with FDOT [Florida Department of Transportation], because all of this would have to go through their review procedures and everything else, I think you’re still probably looking at a good eight months to a year before you could get the design done,” Bouquet told commissioners.

“In order to get it done, there’s a lot of underground work that needs to be done. So, the design phase is going to take time to alter those crosswalks,” Scholl said.

Commissioners also asked Scholl whether at least one of the crosswalks – the one in front of Keys Plaza, home to Kmart and other stores – could be removed. An 81-year-old man was killed while trying to cross the busy boulevard in that crosswalk in September. An earlier fatality occurred in February, when a 61-year-old man was killed trying to cross the boulevard in a crosswalk in front of the Publix grocery store in Searstown.

“We’ve asked for urgent consideration from FDOT,” said Commissioner Sam Kaufman. “How much would it take to take out the Kmart crosswalk? That crosswalk needs to go. There’s no reason to have that crosswalk.” Kaufman said pedestrians could use the nearby crosswalk at the corner of Kennedy and North Roosevelt, which had a traffic light, to safety cross the street.

“I agree with Commissioner Kaufman. It [Keys Plaza crosswalk] is too close to the other one to need to be there. But we’ve lost that argument before,” Scholl said.

The city manager added he will continue to press state transportation officials to accelerate their efforts to make the boulevard safer for pedestrians. But the project timeline was clearly frustrating to several commissioners.

“Did they [state officials] discuss the fact we lost someone, that there was a fatality again on our crosswalks and how we really need to do something,” said Commissioner Richard Payne. “How many lives is it going to take before we get around to having this done?”

City Commissioners originally asked FDOT to modify the North Roosevelt crosswalks in November 2015, shortly after the state completed its three-year redesign and repaving of that busy thoroughfare.

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