State-of-the-art toll road: Florida's new Suncoast Parkway is designed for minimum impact on the environment and maximum use by nonmotorized traffic

Public Roads, Sept-Oct, 2003 by Raymond A. Ashe, Max D. Crumit, Kevin M. Hoeflich

Another advantage of the proactive partnerships was the reduction of cost achieved by including permit considerations in the earliest stages of the design process.

The same eagerness to address environmental considerations permeated every detail of the design, thanks to a three-ring binder of guidelines developed by the contractor's landscape architects and distributed to all of the consultants.

Recreation a Part of Design

Looking at a variety of older and newer highways around the country, the designers of the Suncoast Parkway were inspired by the tri-State Blue Ridge Parkway, Westchester Parkway and Northway Parkway in New York, the George Washington Parkway and I-66 in Virginia, I-75/I-85 in Georgia, I-70 and E-470 in Colorado, and 1-285 in California, among others.

A central component of the design is a 3.7-meter (12-foot)-wide recreational trail on the west side of the highway's right-of-way. The trail is buffered from the roadway as much as possible and includes numerous rest areas, a series of trailheads connecting with local recreational resources, and a variety of river, wildlife, and wetland interpretative and viewing areas. Conceived as a recreational resource for local residents adjoining the parkway and maintained with county resources, the Suncoast "Frail already has been nominated as a Millennium Trail by the White House Millennium Council and as a National Recreation Trail by the National Park Service.

Extension of the Environment

Special attention is paid to the subtleties of landscape design and the specific treatment of natural amenities, including selective clearing and the retention of existing features in the highway medians. The design treatment includes the use of light-brown concrete, dark brown guardrails and light posts, brown monotube roadway signs, and black vinyl-covered fencing. At wildlife crossings, a specially designed high wildlife fence topped with outriggers extends in a funnel shape along the highway perimeter to help direct animals toward openings created for them beneath the roadway.

The effect of driving on the Suncoast Parkway, especially in areas with views to the open landscape, is an unusual sense of transparency instead of the more-expected experience of a highway barrier between the motorist and the surrounding landscape. The guardrails, light posts, and road signs seem to disappear, leaving mainly the presence of the natural environment.

All land acquired to establish the Suncoast Parkway's right-of-way that resulted in small, unused lots after construction was sold later with prohibitions against erecting billboards and other signs in close proximity to the highway. This restriction helps ensure that this sense of harmony with the natural environment will be maintained on the Suncoast Parkway for years to come.

For more information, contact Max Crumit at 800-284-5182 or mdcrumit@pbsj.com. Contact Kevin Hoeflich at 407-532-3999 ext. 3431 or kevin.hoeflich @dot.slate.fl.us.

Raymond A. Ashe, Jr., is the manager of the Florida Turnpike Enterprise's Environmental Management Office and oversaw all aspects of the environmental permitting and mitigation on the Suncoast Parkway project.