The Transportation Support Document
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The Transportation Support Document The inventory and analysis in the Support Document provides the foundation for the Plan portion of this Chapter. The Support Document is not adopted. INVENTORY AND ANALYSIS Overview This Transportation Chapter considers the physical and spatial needs of a City that is over 100 years of age and which is the home of approximately 54,639 year-round inhabitants. The City contains over 500 miles of roadway under the jurisdiction of the Florida Department of Transportation, Sarasota County and local City streets. The City participates in the Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO) with other municipalities in Sarasota and Manatee counties. Fourteen bus routes, operated and managed by Sarasota County Area Transit (SCAT), operate within the City of Sarasota. The City includes 83.65 miles of designated bike lanes/routes and almost 16 miles of trails. The Inventory and Analysis of the Transportation Chapter is the data and information that underlies the City’s policies for maintaining and improving the City’s transportation infrastructure. A major issue, as identified by the Evaluation and Appraisal Report, is Transportation Mobility in the Downtown Environment. The City of Sarasota must make a policy decision regarding the Transportation Concurrency Exception Area and implementation of the Downtown Sarasota Mobility Study and Downtown Parking Master Plan. The Inventory and Analysis section is organized as follows: Roadway Functional Classification Thoroughfare Plan Concurrency Transportation Systems Management (TSM) Neighborhood Protection Vehicle Parking Other Automobile Issues Tamiami Trail Scenic Highway Multimodal Transportation Mass Transit Aviation Rail Bicycle Networks Pedestrian Facilities Water Taxi Downtown Master Plan Study Area TCEA Downtown Mobility Study Newtown TCMA Sarasota City Plan - Transportation Support Document Adopted - December 1, 2008 T - 51 Appendices to this Support Document are: Appendix 1: 9J-5 Requirements Index; Appendix 2: EAR Requirements Index; Appendix 3: Strategic Goals Index; Appendix 4: Comprehensive Plan Update Study, 2006; Appendix 5: TCEA Update Study, 2004; Appendix 6: Newtown Transportation Concurrency Exception Area Study, 2006; Appendix 7: Glossary; Appendix 8: Bibliography. Sarasota City Plan - Transportation Support Document Adopted - December 1, 2008 T - 52 ROADWAY FUNCTIONAL CLASSIFICATION SYSTEM Streets have two basic functions: moving traffic efficiently and providing access to private properties. The level of importance of these two opposing objectives depends on the street’s functional classification. Interstate 75 is at one end of the scale where approximately 99% of its purpose is moving traffic and providing access is about 1%. At the other extreme, a local residential street like Loma Linda Street west of Osprey Avenue, only 1% of its purpose is moving traffic and providing access is approximately 99%. Higher functional classification implies: • stricter access management requirements for developed properties, and • wider rights-of-way and cross-sections; • more lanes; and • streetscape appropriate to heavier traffic. As a result, functional classification has neighborhood implications. Strict access management can mean more driveways on neighborhood side streets. Widening streets can impact front yard setbacks. More intense land uses can impair neighborhood compatibility. These issues are discussed at greater length under “Neighborhood Protection.” Illustration T-3 shows the proposed future number of lanes as recommended in the 2005 Evaluation and Appraisal Report (EAR). The EAR was developed based on the City’s Capital Improvements Program, the MPO’s Transportation Improvement Program (TIP) and 2030 Long Range Transportation Plan, FDOT’s Adopted Work Program, and citizen input during the EAR workshops. The major arterials and all interstate connectors in the City are under State or County jurisdiction. This means that the Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) and Sarasota County design criteria supersede the City’s Engineering Design Criteria Manual in controlling the location and design of access onto these streets, from both abutting properties and intersecting City streets. The FDOT and County design standards are meant to provide adequate sight-distance and to minimize traffic conflict points. They do not reduce neighborhood intrusion. Illustration T-4 indicates the jurisdictional responsibility for each thoroughfare in the City of Sarasota. Existing and Future Functional Classification Illustration T-4 shows how the City’s streets are classified at the present time using FDOT criteria. The FDOT nomenclature differs somewhat from the classifications shown on the City’s Thoroughfare Plan. The City’s “Interstate Connectors” and “Major Arterials” are called “Principal Arterials” by FDOT. The City’s “Major Collectors” and “Minor Collectors” are called “Urban Collectors” by FDOT. Because the City’s classifications are more precise than FDOT’s, all future references to functional classification in this Chapter (excluding Illustration T-4) will use the City’s nomenclature. Sarasota City Plan - Transportation Support Document Adopted - December 1, 2008 T - 53 Interstate connectors are the first functional class. They connect the City directly to an I-75 interchange. The City has three interstate connectors: University Parkway, Fruitville Road and Bee Ridge Road. Major arterials are designed to move inter-city and intra-city traffic, while minor arterials are for intra-city movements and separate neighborhoods. US-41 and US-301 are major arterials in the City of Sarasota. Major collectors link and connect neighborhoods. Major collectors in the City include Siesta Drive and Myrtle Street (east of US-41). Minor collectors act as funnels from local neighborhood streets. In the City, minor collectors include Lime Avenue (north of Ringling Boulevard) and Osprey Avenue (south of 10th Street.) Finally, local residential streets provide individual parcel access and are not shown on the Thoroughfare Plan. These Thoroughfare Plan designations are mapped in Illustration T-1 and listed by name in the table in Illustration T-2. These maps represent the recommended future functional classifications for the City of Sarasota’s thoroughfares. The desired typical cross-sections for future thoroughfares are listed below. During roadway design, the number of lanes and median widths are set on a case-by-case basis with a preliminary engineering study. In the case of major arterials, some right-of-way widths are specified as 90-feet and others as 100 feet wide. Interstate Connector 6 lanes with 14-foot median 118-ft. ROW Major Arterial 4 lanes with 22-foot median 90-100-ft. ROW Minor Arterial 4 lanes with 15.5-foot median 90-foot ROW Major Collector 4 lanes with No median 75-ft. ROW Minor Collector 2 lanes with 10-foot median 60-ft. ROW Local Residential Street 2 lanes with No median 50-ft. ROW Alleys 2 10-ft lanes with No median 20-ft ROW Sarasota City Plan - Transportation Support Document Adopted - December 1, 2008 T - 54 THE CITY’S THOROUGHFARE PLAN The City of Sarasota Thoroughfare Plan has been amended many times since its original adoption in 1972. The original system was based largely on proportional spacing, with major arterials spaced farthest apart and minor collectors spaced more closely. The concept of proportional spacing of arterials, collectors, and local streets at specified distances is an appropriate traffic engineering practice. However, it does not account for other goals such as streetscape, access management, pedestrian/bicycle-related improvements and transit considerations. Moreover, changes in traffic volume and circulation patterns required an update to confirm whether the roads are actually functioning as the Thoroughfare Plan intended. The City of Sarasota’s 2006 Thoroughfare Plan is found in Illustration T-1. Illustration T-2 is the Thoroughfare Table with the names and functional classifications of City roadways. At the direction of policymakers, City staff have removed a number of streets from the Thoroughfare Plan. South School Avenue, South Shade Avenue, South Orange Avenue, and Circus Boulevard were all considered minor collector roadways. To accomplish the goal of protecting neighborhoods, those streets were removed from the Thoroughfare Plan. This has the effect of making the City’s grid network of streets, particularly in south Sarasota, less efficient. It also has implications for concurrency analysis. With fewer road segments to assign trips to, the concurrency model creates even higher volumes on major roadways like South Tamiami Trail, Tuttle Avenue, and Bahia Vista Street. Those higher volumes make it more likely that proposed development and redevelopment will “break the bank” for level of service and will not be able to proceed. It can be confusing to understand how the number of lanes relates to functional classification. As noted above, the higher the classification, the wider the right-of-way must be. However, the cross-sections suggested in the Engineering Design Criteria Manual are not mandatory. It is possible to recommend, as in the case of Myrtle Street, a two-lane street on a 75-foot right-of-way which could accommodate four lanes. The LOS on Myrtle Street is expected to remain adequate, thus the widening to 4 lanes is not needed. The City of Sarasota has greatly increased its development over the years including a bustling New Urbanist downtown center. In many cases, development has occurred such that