UPDATE: This item has been pushed from the December agenda to January 2022. So they’re still in the process of wrestling. Just FYI.
The City of Orlando is looking to enter an Interlocal Agreement with Orange County regarding the operation and ownership of a section of Virginia and Corrine drives. Which should excite anyone who lives in Ivanhoe Village, Mills 50, Audubon Park, or Baldwin Park because that means they’ll be able to resurface it (we assume).
According to an item on the December 6 City Council agenda, the agreement would see the transfer of ownership of Virginia Drive from Orange County to the City of Orlando between Ferris Avenue and Bennett Road.
Residents along the corridor and even a citizen group called the Corrine Calming Coalition (Facebook | Website) has been lobbying the City to redraw the street for years (we first wrote about it HERE in 2015) but the main hold up has reportedly been that the County-owned that stretch of road and wasn’t interested in surrendering it unless they knew the City would only change it according to their stipulations – stipulations that focused on moving cars as fast as possible on a County Road, not slow things down and reduce traffic counts.
The City has already carried out a Corrine Drive Complete Streets Study to redo the 2-mile corridor and now that the City is in control of the street, there’s nothing standing in the way except money.
According to our contacts at City Hall, we could see at least the resurfacing of Virginia and Corrine drives as early as next year, provided City Council approves the agreement, which you can download or read below if you’d like.
The Coalition’s Agenda is set. They will do what their “planners” want to do, come hell or high water. The people that will suffer are the residents of the area, having to wait in traffic during rush-hour periods. When asked how they know their estimates will be correct for travel times, they said “once its done, we’ll do another study”. When asked why not just put up bob’s barricades on Virginia and Corrine for 3 months to study, they said “it will skew the numbers, as they won’t be real”.
Their stats/data are not indicative of true numbers/scenarios. They are put together simply in order to point towards their solution. When asked about it, they get snippy.
Look at the true impact of making Virginia between Mills and Corrine 2 lanes instead of 4. Talk about a bottleneck, stepping on a hose. And to hear “driverless vehicles” argument from the planners is simply ridiculous! I’ve been waiting for the flying car since the 60’s!
I am a longtime student of traffic congestion. Have been urging Tanya Wilder to upgrade signalization so as to reduce braking before and idling at red light at empty intersections. Can I send you my latest rant?
You’re welcome to post it in the comments here!