Miami Lakes planners hear Vision Zero safety plan after USDOT grant, focus on 57th Avenue crash spike
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Summary
Consultants told the Planning & Zoning Board the town used about $304,000 in U.S. DOT funds to develop a Vision Zero action plan and an updated Transportation Master Plan. The analysis found most collisions concentrated on 57th Avenue and proposed targeted countermeasures, public outreach and funding options; no formal action was taken.
Consultant Jesus Fuentes, speaking at a Planning & Zoning Board meeting, outlined a federally funded Vision Zero safety plan and an updated Transportation Master Plan designed to reduce traffic deaths and severe injuries in Miami Lakes. Fuentes said the town secured about $304,000 from the U.S. Department of Transportation for a comprehensive safety evaluation and used the same data to update the transportation master plan.
Fuentes said the work uses a safe‑system approach — “safer roads, safer cars, post care” — and presented crash data covering recent years. He said the analysis counted 783 crashes in the baseline period analyzed and highlighted that 57th Avenue is a persistent crash hotspot. “You have a concentration of the crashes on 57th Avenue,” Fuentes said, and he told the board that crash types include sideswipes, rear‑end collisions, left‑turn crashes and pedestrian collisions. He noted a marked rise in 2024 that the study team is investigating.
Why it matters: The town’s analysis identifies a small set of corridors where relatively modest, targeted changes could reduce injuries and deaths. Fuentes said the team’s high‑injury network captures roughly nine miles of roadway where about 85% of crashes are concentrated. The presentation emphasized that many of those high‑injury segments are on roads owned by FDOT or the county, so Miami Lakes will need coordination and memoranda to request state and county countermeasures.
What the plan proposes: Fuentes outlined a mix of near‑term, low‑cost fixes and longer investments — signal timing and minor geometry changes to improve flow, pedestrian daylighting and higher‑visibility crossings, about 15 miles of new bicycle facilities to create connected protected routes, and roughly 16 miles of sidewalk infill (the town currently has about 72 miles of sidewalks overall). He also recommended design‑based traffic calming and safe‑routes‑to‑school measures around nearby schools.
Public engagement and next steps: The team described a broad outreach program (farmers market events, senior bingo, Chamber of Commerce, Vision Zero talks) and a public dashboard and comments map accessible by QR code. Fuentes said bilingual surveys and the public comments map would remain open through November 30. He said the implementation plan is expected in December and that the team will return to the board in January with an implementation and funding strategy that will draw on county mobility fees, CITT funds, FDOT work‑program allocations and federal grants.
Board members’ questions focused on jurisdictional limits along 57th Avenue and where the town can act versus where FDOT or the county must be engaged. Members also pressed on transit reliability and the effects of removing an east–west municipal connection; Fuentes acknowledged on‑demand services can suffer long waits and cancellations and that improving reliability is a core challenge.
Fuentes said the plan will sequence countermeasures so the town can pursue the pieces it controls while coordinating with county and state agencies on FDOT roads. The board did not vote on the plan at the meeting; staff said the council will consider formal adoption of applicable plan components after continued public engagement.
