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Options to rebuild a critical 0.75-mile bridge linking downtown Sarasota to the barrier islands of St. Armands, Lido and Longboat keys will be presented during a Florida Department of Transportation public hearing next Thursday.
The hearing, which will include a presentation of the FDOT’s preferred option, will be Thursday, March 21, at St. Armands Key Lutheran Church, 40 N. Adams Drive. The project area is between Bird Key Drive and Sarasota Harbour West. The in-person open house will begin at 5 p.m. The virtual and in-person hearing and testimony portion will begin at 6 p.m. The meeting will also be available online.
The project area is between Bird Key Drive and Sarasota Harbor West. In addition to addressing the structural integrity of the spans, the aging twin bridges lack facilities needed for modern transportation needs and do not match recent and future improvements to the John Ringling Bridge between the mainland and Bird Key.
Constructed in 1958, the bridges are spaced 100 feet apart from center to center. Each bridge is 1,008 feet long and 37.5 feet wide. It is supported by 21 spans each 48 feet long, all consisting of four lines of precast concrete beams on concrete piles.
The maximum vertical clearance under the bridges is approximately 12 feet above average high water. Several sections of the deck were replaced on the westbound bridge in 2016 along with other repair work throughout the years.
Project alternatives include replacing the twin bridges with a single bridge at $63.7 million or new twin bridges at $71.5 million.
The single bridge alternative would replace the two existing bridges with a single structure for all lanes of travel. The travel lanes on the new bridge will be the same 11-foot width as on the existing bridges. Ten-foot outside shoulders will accommodate bicyclists, and a 14-foot shared use path would be added to each side of the bridge.
FDOT holds public hearing on possible upgrades to Little John Ringling Bridge in Sarasota
Engineers and staff with the Florida Department of Transportation have unveiled their recommendations for improvements to the Little John Ringling Bridge in Sarasota.
The in-person open house was held at St. Armand's Key Lutheran Church on North Adams Drive.
A virtual and in-person hearing and testimony portion followed. Staff presented what a new bridge could potentially look like if the community decided to go that route.
Currently, the Little Ringling Bridge is just a narrow two-lane road that connects Bird Key to St. Armand's Key. The potential new designs discussed at Thursday's presentation include options to both widen and elevate the bridge.
"If there is anybody who's walking on the bridge, there's only room for one at a time to pass," Tony Britt, the vice commodore at Bird Key Yacht Club, said.
Britt has lived on Bird Key for the past four years. He and his wife ride their bicycles along the bridge regularly. He said it is a very popular axis, especially for pedestrians, folks exercising and families riding bicycles and the sidewalk gets quite cramped.
"You literally have to get off your bicycle. You stand aside and let that person, pass or run or whatever they're doing," Britt said.
The bridge located between Bird Key Drive and Sarasota Harbor West is along the existing Ringling Boulevard or State Road 789 and has no shoulders or designated bike lanes.
The bridge was also built decades ago in 1958. It's visibly worn out with age and its structural integrity is questionable.
"It's also antiquated and it doesn't have the appeal like in the beauty of the John Ringling Bridge, which I think adds a lot to Sarasota skyline," Britt added.
The bridge is also the only connection from downtown Sarasota to Bird Key, St. Armand's Key, Lido Key, and Long Boat Key.
Potential plans include options of a brand new single bridge or a set of twin bridges with up to 14 feet of shoulders for both bicycle and pedestrian lanes. These modernized options would come with overall improved aesthetics and functionality.
"Having an incline, which would allow motors to go underneath that bridge, and I think to make the whole thing far more efficient and far more valuable to the greater community," Britt said.
The cost implication for replacing the bridge would come up to between $63 million and $72 million.
The FDOT's presentation also includes a third, lower-cost option which proposes 5-year intervals for upgrades and maintenance of the existing bridge.
"It's an investment and I think that's the thing that people have to realize, it's investing 18 to 24 months but it's going to be here for another 50, 60 years, a beautiful addition to the community," Britt said.
In February, the Bradenton area's existing single-family home market saw nearly 9% more sales than a year earlier, along with a 2% increase in the median price to $499,990.
For the month, 547 homes changed hands, up from 503 a year earlier, according to the Realtor Association of Sarasota and Manatee.
But at the same time, sales were taking longer: 57 days to contract, versus 39 days last year.
The trend to a more balanced market, favoring neither buyer nor seller, was more evident with 2,641 active listings, compared to 1,732 a year ago, a 52% increase.
"With increasing inventory, the real estate market is becoming more balanced for buyers and sellers. Rising median home prices and extended days on the market signal a healthier, stabilizing market, offering buyers and sellers ample time to negotiate," Tony Barrett, the local Realtor Association president, and broker/owner of Barrett Realty, said in a news release.
Nationally the median existing-home sales price rose 5.7% from February 2023 to $384,500 this February.
"Additional housing supply is helping to satisfy market demand," Lawrence Yun, chief economist for the National Association of Realtors, said in a news release.
"Housing demand has been on a steady rise due to population and job growth, though the actual timing of purchases will be determined by prevailing mortgage rates and wider inventory choices," Yun said.
Bradenton-area townhouses and condos
Sales of condos and townhouses in the Bradenton area were flat in February with 196 units being sold, up only one from February of 2023, while the median price fell 5.5% to $349,494.
The median time to contract was 52 days, up 79% from 29 days a year ago.
Active listings were up a whopping 87 % to 1,469 units from 786 last year.
There was a 6.2-month supply of inventory, up from a 3.4-month supply last year.
Sarasota single-family home sales
Sarasota saw an 11% increase in the sales of existing single-family homes: 577 sold in February compared to 520 last year.
The median price rose 2.5% to $507,500.
The median time to contract was up 96% to 40 days.
For prospective buyers, the good news was that active listings increased 86% to 3,337, and the supply rose 79% to 5.2 months, compared to three-month supply a year ago.
Sarasota townhouses and condos
Although there were 9% fewer sales in February than a year ago — 270 versus 297 — the median price was up 1.2% to $389,750.
The time to contract was up sharply, 121%, taking 42 days in February, versus 19 days a year ago.
Active listings were up 128% to 2,119, compared to 929 a year ago.
There was also a 6.7-month supply of inventory, versus a 2.8-month supply a year ago.
Prior to a City of Sarasota commission meeting on Thursday, dozens of residents gathered outside of the meeting to protest proposed development for Ken Thompson Park.
At a commission meeting on Feb. 5, Ride Entertainment made a presentation to the board on turning the park into an attraction. According to that presentation it would include a possible restaurant, nine-hole golf course, splash pad and an Aerobar. The Aerobar takes residents into the are over 100 feet and rotates them around.
According to Elliott HimelFarb, a Lido Shores resident, Ken Thompson Park welcomes many residents daily to enjoy the water, walk around, and take in the fresh air.
“It’s a very nice natural space. Its unspoiled and it’s doing the job I think it was intended to do,” said HimelFarb.
According to Ride Entertainments presentation, they would maintain the park and it would also provide the city with a new source of revenue, among other benefits. Himelfarb said the idea is appalling.
“It’s appropriate for some places. I believe it is not appropriate for what is a nice open park,” said Himelfarb.
Bill Farber, the President of the Lido Shores Property Owners Association said a big concern is traffic. Farber added its already bad enough without developing the park.
“The idea of putting an amusement park on a two-lane road that is the only road that connects all of these communities including 10-mile-long Longboat Key with the whole rest of civilization, is unfathomable,” said Farber.
According to Himelfarb, the group does not plan to stop fighting to protect Ken Thompson Park. He said the topic is on the agenda for a meeting in April, which the group will speak at during public comment.
ABC7 did reach out to Ride Entertainment for comment and did not hear back.
The Bradenton Beach Sewer Improvement Project continues, with lane shifts scheduled for this week.
Starting March 18, both lanes of Gulf Drive South will be shifted west between 6th Street South and 8th Street South. The lane shift is expected to continue through late March or early April, according to a press release.
Also during this time, 7th Street South will be closed to traffic. There will be temporary parking on the west side of Gulf Drive South, as well as a free shuttle service for residents and guests of that street.
The $7.1 million project is funded by Manatee County, and will replace and relocate some of the gravity sewer system in South Bradenton Beach.
Construction for this project began in early 2023, and is anticipated to continue until late 2024, according to the project website:
To stop a few vacation rental bad actors, city commissioners adopted new ordinances that have spawned a new bureaucracy. This is America: Collectivist laws that snuff out individual liberty.
Thanks to the policy making of the Sarasota City Commission, the city now has extensive registration regulations for vacation rental homes — all intended to help end rude and noisy vacation renters who bother the homeowners next door.
Ha. Look at the accompanying box — at the explosion of the registration process these regulations have spawned. Here is one of the sad parts of this: If you stepped back and viewed that list of requirements, in effect, you would be looking at lawmaking in America today.
Over the course of 250 years, this is how American government has evolved — from protecting individual rights and liberty in the beginning to becoming a gargantuan authoritarian State that puts the collective ahead of the individual.
It’s yet another everyday example of how lawmakers elected by a majority (which is just a collective group in greater numbers than other groups) wield their given authority and power. The late Milton Friedman described this process in the 1970s like this:
Lawmakers embrace the grievances of a vocal few (e.g. campaign contributors, etc.) and then give birth to laws to right the perceived wrongs. This, in turn, spawns more laws to correct the unaddressed or unintended consequences of the previous laws. So over time, there is a growing bible of codes — codes that an expanding authoritarian bureaucracy must enforce.
A home in Cocoanut Bayou tops the week's sales at $7.7 million. Rodney Robert Ayer, trustee, and Jean Ayer sold the home at 265 Cedar Park Circle to Jeffrey Jones and Robin Kneeshaw, of Sarasota, for $7.7 million. Built in 1959, it has five bedrooms, six-and-a-half baths, a pool and 6,455 square feet of living area. It sold for $5.35 million in 2020.
About $1.1 million is on the line for New College of Florida as President Richard Corcoran is slated next week to present a "student success plan monitoring report" to state university system officials — after the school lost out on about $2 million in potential performance-based funding.
Corcoran will present the report, which details how the small liberal-arts school has worked to carry out eight goals it set last year, during a meeting Tuesday of the Budget and Finance Committee of the university system’s Board of Governors.
New College trustees in August laid out eight initiatives “to implement by March 2024 in order to improve first-to-second year student retention and post-graduation outcomes.” The initiatives included benchmarks such as goals of issuing $400,000 in scholarships to at least 200 students, as the school has looked to pump up enrollment.
Getting the university system Board of Governors to sign off on the report, which says New College has “fully implemented” seven of the eight initiatives, would authorize the release of $1,099,013 to the school. But that would account for only a portion of nearly $4.2 million in state performance-based funding that could have been available to New College.
Performance-based funding is earned by schools achieving scores based on various factors, including graduation rates, degrees awarded in areas of “strategic emphasis” designated by university system officials and percentages of graduates with bachelor’s degrees who are employed.
“New College of Florida’s score for 2023 was 65 points. If NCF had scored 70 points or higher, they would have been eligible for $4,198,026,” a document in the Board of Governors agenda said.
Based on the school’s score, New College was eligible to receive only about half of the $4.2 million. It was given just shy of $1.1 million in September for initially presenting its student success plan.
Receiving the second similar amount is contingent on the Board of Governors deeming that the report “demonstrates satisfactory progress” on the goals New College has set out.
Boaters in Sarasota got up close and personal with a great white shark on Sunday while the giant fish was gorging on the carcass of a whale that died after beaching itself off the coast of Venice earlier this month.
The day after the whale was towed out to sea, sharks were seen devouring what was left of the animal.
"For that whale to be able to get back to the ocean and complete its lifecycle was kind of a happy event for us, but definitely the last 24 hours 36 hours has been a bag of emotions for me, and I think it has been for most of the people at NOAA and Mote Marine," stated Craig Marcum with Sea Tow.
According to Storyful, Brian Paul Jung and his friends wanted to see the whale carcass and captured their encounter with the great white shark on camera.
In the video, the animal is seen headbutting their camera several times before chomping on the whale carcass.
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