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Miami
Herald
BY
JENNIFER BABSON Add thousands more vehicles to the equation some 35 miles north -- a likelihood if a number of development projects on the drawing board in and around Florida City materialize -- and some fear a nightmare. ''We are going to have to go north, and those new developments are going to have to go north,'' said Monroe County Sheriff Rick Roth, whose deputies helped guide the evacuation. "We are all going to be fighting for the space to get out.'' Though cranes and earthmovers mark a construction boom that stretches from Cutler Ridge to Homestead, a proposed development at the southernmost edge of this explosion has become a flash point for Keys residents. Last month, Miami-Dade County commissioners voted to override a veto from Mayor Carlos Alvarez that aimed to block Florida City's annexation of 1,727 acres outside of the county's Urban Development Boundary, which is designed to contain development and limit sprawl. Critics see it as the first major step toward moving the boundary, setting the stage for massive development of the area. About 85 percent of the annexed land, which is owned by a company called Atlantic Civil but under contract to home builder Lennar, encompasses a development project that could bring 6,000 homes and up to 18,000 new residents to the edge of Monroe County. The proposal has a number of hurdles to overcome before it returns to the commission for a vote, including a nonbinding review by the South Florida Regional Planning Council. In the Keys, where new development has been kept largely at bay for over a decade by legal challenges and strict building curbs, and where movement on the only main artery for more than 100 miles slows to a crawl on weekends, warning bells have begun to sound. ''It would be a parking lot,'' Irene
Toner, director of Emergency Management for Monroe County, said,
referring to evacuations if the development joins others already
under construction. ``If you look five years from now, I think they
would seriously have to consider widening that turnpike.'' Keys residents should not fret over a potential increase in day-trippers, Swakon said, because they will bring revenue to Monroe County. ''I don't understand how they can complain about the thing that drives their economy,'' he said. Much of the slowdown associated with the evacuation for Hurricane Dennis was blamed on two stoplights in Islamorada and some drawbridge openings. Police have since devised a solution: Next time they will manually control the stoplights and limit bridge openings. Still, for many, Dennis underscored a fragility in which environmental and quality-of-life challenges are intertwined along the island chain. The future, fears Upper Keys hotel operator Bill Stevens, may be as bleak as the signs that protrude from vacant land in and around Florida City, marking the big-dollar dreams of developers poised to add many thousands of residents to an area now frequented mostly by mosquitoes. ''It's going to devastate Key Largo and Tavernier, and it's far-reaching. It will be a domino effect,'' said Stevens, co-owner of the Matecumbe Resort, a 32-room motel whose rooms start at $85 a night. ''We like to be isolated. We don't want this area to become like another Kendall. It's rural out here. It's always been like that,'' said Mike Sagué, bartender and owner of Alabama Jack's, a local landmark located on Card Sound Road, a narrow byway that, along with U.S. 1, is the only link to the mainland. ``It's gonna be good for business, but we like to keep this place small.'' Monroe's County Commission has already passed a resolution expressing opposition to the project. Environmental opposition centers on the development's location -- very close to Biscayne National Park and the protected waters within it. A crocodile refuge is located a few minutes down Card Sound Road, and other endangered species, like the Florida panther, have been spotted in the vicinity. ''It's the tip of the iceberg. This project will signal a green light for rampant development down there,'' said Mary Munson, regional director for the National Parks Conservation Association. Also of concern: What impact, if
any, the development might have on the planned $8.4 billion Everglades
restoration project, which includes a provision to restore coastal
wetlands, and on nearby well fields that supply water to South Miami-Dade
and the Keys. Nonetheless, many fear the development's new arrivals -- who are almost certain to bring along boats when they move in -- will transform the Upper Keys into an even more congested playground. ''It turns the Upper Keys into a bedroom community for Miami-Dade,'' said Alan Farago, executive director of the Everglades Defense Council, and a force behind a coalition of about 50 community and environmental groups opposing the project. Some of the project's most adamant local critics hail from Ocean Reef, a gated community at the tip of Key Largo where homeowners have wielded considerable political clout to defeat other projects. ''We have a number of concerns, starting with hurricane evacuation. It's no fun at all to evacuate the Keys and then run into a roadblock right at the county line,'' said David Ritz, president of the Ocean Reef Community Association. "You could have 10 lanes heading to Dade County, but if they all came to a screeching stop because there is a huge city right there at the end, it doesn't make any sense at all." |
