Miami

Miami Dade Expressway Authority (MDX) has formally notified ETCC's performance bond issuer that the toll system contractor has failed to correct contract defaults in the toll system and is now in "material breach" of the contract.

Feel sorry for reporters in Miami. The nonsense of local reporting compels a Followup-Today of yesterday's Big Story - the corporate jet that landed on the Turnpike near Hollywood FL, north of Miami. In dailies the News Editor demands that Follow-Up. So whether or not they get anything today they have to file something today as the followup, even if it's nonsense.

But the Miami Herald outdid themselves in nonsense today with this lede:

Toll express lanes on I-95 north of Miami are described as "very impressive" and as "accomplishing almost everything that was hoped for them" and as "very close to forecast" by Robert (Bob) Poole.

We mentioned HNTB as general engineering consultant (GEC) to Miami Dade Expressway Authority for their ongoing conversion to all-electronic tolling (AET) or as it  is termed there Open Road Tolling.

In fact there are two GECs on this job, the other being EAC Consulting, a Miami firm.

EAC has been involved in the project for five years.

see http://www.eacconsult.com

The last cash customer went through the old 17-lane mainline toll plaza of the FL924 Gratigny Parkway of the Miami Dade Expressway Authority (MDX) in Opa-Locka in the northwest suburbs of Miami at 11:57pm Sunday, paying the $1.25 cash toll for a car. As midnight approached workers began moving big red construction barrels in toward the central lanes to block off the 'belly-out/belly-in' of the old mainline plaza.

Tolling is scheduled to begin in the two southbound express lanes on the far left side of FL/I-95 between the Golden Glades Interchange and downtown Miami Friday January 15 05:30. Tolls have been collected on two express lanes northbound in the afternoons since December 5 2008.

The South Miami Dade Busway, a 2-lane dedicated road for buses heading southwest out of Miami is likely to be studied for conversion to an express toll road. Miami Dade Metro Planning Organization seems set to vote for a study of alternatives at their July meeting. The busway runs in an abandoned railroad right of way almost alongside US1, known here as South Dixie Highway.

The $950m Port of Miami Tunnel project has collapsed because the chosen concessionaire Babcock & Brown can't raise the capital to close on the deal. Florida DOT's Miami district secretary Gus Pego is quoted in a stratement as saying the private partners "have been overwhelmed by the effects of the financial market (crisis) making delivery (of the tunnel project) unworkable."

Branded "95 EXPRESS" a pair of toll express lanes started tolling 6am Friday Dec 5 northbound on I-95 between FL836 near downtown Miami and the Golden Glades Interchange, a distance of about 13km (8 miles). Southbound twin lanes will be tolling in about a year and the lanes more than doubled in length by late 2010.

At Miami Dade Expressway Authority they are finding a little extra capacity in a busy segment of their Dolphin Expressway (FL836) by converting a shoulder to an auxiliary lane. The $800k project is about 800m (0.5 miles) long between the Palmetto Expressway interchange and NW72 St. The NW72 on ramp is also being widened and new guardrail installed.