Midtown Interchange | |
---|---|
Location | |
Miami, Florida | |
Coordinates | 25°48′44″N80°12′22″W / 25.812222°N 80.206111°W |
Roads at junction | I-95 SR 836 |
Construction | |
Type | Stack interchange |
Maintained by | Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) Miami-Dade Expressway Authority (MDX) |
The Midtown Interchange, [1] [2] located in the Civic Center and Overtown [3] neighborhoods of Miami, Florida, is the convergence of three major motorways: I-95, I-395 (which connects to the MacArthur Causeway to the east), and the Dolphin Expressway (SR 836).
Since its opening in 1968, eight lanes have been added to I-95 and an undersea tunnel below Biscayne Bay has been added from the end of I-395 near Museum Park. The tunnel serves as a direct freeway connection to the PortMiami, expected to alleviate freight traffic in Downtown Miami. It was originally the largest stack interchange in Miami until 2016, when it was surpassed by the Dolphin–Palmetto Interchange. [4] [5]
As of 2019, most of the interchange is being rebuilt as part of the Signature Bridge project for I-395 that also includes double decking the eastern end of the Dolphin Expressway. [6] The near one billion dollar project is not expected to be completed until the late 2020s.
Interstate 95 (I-95) is the main north–south Interstate Highway on the East Coast of the United States, running from U.S. Route 1 (US 1) in Miami, Florida, north to the Houlton–Woodstock Border Crossing between Maine and the Canadian province of New Brunswick. The highway largely parallels the Atlantic coast and US 1, except for the portion between Savannah, Georgia, and Washington, D.C., and the portion between Portland and Houlton in Maine, both of which follow a more direct inland route.
Interstate 395 (I-395) in Virginia and Washington, D.C., is a 13.79-mile-long (22.19 km) spur route of I-95 that begins at an interchange with I-95 in Springfield and ends at an interchange with US Route 50 (US 50) in Northwest Washington, D.C. It passes underneath the National Mall near the US Capitol and ends at a junction with US 50 at New York Avenue, roughly one mile (1.6 km) north of the 3rd Street Tunnel. Despite its proximity to I-395 in Maryland, the route is unrelated and unconnected.
Florida State Road 9 (SR 9) is a state road in the U.S. state of Florida. While SR 9 is mainly used as a state designation for Interstate 95 in Florida from the Golden Glades Interchange in Miami Gardens to the Georgia border, a signed SR 9, which is locally known in the Miami area as West 27th Avenue, Unity Boulevard, and historically Grapeland Boulevard, extends 13 miles (21 km) from the Coconut Grove section of Miami to the Golden Glades Interchange. The segment of I-95 south of the Golden Glades Interchange carries the designation of State Road 9A.
Interstate 240 (I-240) is a 19.27-mile-long (31.01 km) auxiliary Interstate Highway in the US state of Tennessee that forms a bypass around the southern and eastern neighborhoods of Memphis. Combined, I-240 and its parent, I-40, form a contiguous beltway around most of Memphis. I-240 runs from I-40 in Midtown Memphis to I-40 and Sam Cooper Boulevard in East Memphis. Throughout its length, it provides access to I-55, multiple U.S. and state routes, and the Memphis International Airport. The segment between the western terminus and I-55 is a north–south route, and the segment between I-55 and the eastern terminus runs east to west. Throughout its length, I-240 is designated as the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Expressway, the W.B. Fowler Sr. Expressway, and the Avron B. Fogelman Expressway.
State Road 826 is a bypass route around the greater Miami area, traveling approximately 30 miles (48 km) in a northeasterly arc from U.S. Route 1 in Pinecrest to its terminus at State Road A1A in Sunny Isles Beach. Between its southern terminus and the Golden Glades Interchange, State Road 826 is known as the Palmetto Expressway, a heavily traveled freeway with portions of the road carrying in excess of 250,000 vehicles a day. Unlike many of the other non-interstate freeways in Miami-Dade County, the Palmetto Expressway is untolled. East of the interchange, State Road 826 is a surface road connecting North Miami and North Miami Beach to Sunny Isles Beach over the Intracoastal Waterway.
State Road 924 (SR 924) is an 8.5-mile (13.7 km) east–west highway connecting I-75 and SR 826 in Hialeah and SR 909 in North Miami. The westernmost 4.85 miles, named Gratigny Parkway, is a controlled-access toll road maintained by the Miami-Dade Expressway Authority ; the easternmost 3.6 miles (5.8 km) is a surface street also known as Gratigny Road. Despite its relatively short length, SR 924 is a major east–west artery in northern Miami-Dade County.
The Golden Glades Interchange, located in Miami Gardens and North Miami Beach, Florida, United States, is the confluence of six major roads serving eastern and southern Florida. It is named after the original name of North 167th Street, Golden Glades Road.
The Dolphin East-West Expressway is a 15.4-mile (24.8 km) freeway, with the westernmost 14 miles (23 km) as an all-electronic tollway signed as State Road 836, and the easternmost 1.292 miles (2.079 km) between Interstate 95 (I-95) and SR A1A cosigned as Interstate 395 (I-395).
Interstate 95 (I-95) is part of the Interstate Highway System and runs from Miami, Florida, to the Canada–United States border near Houlton, Maine. In the US state of New York, I-95 extends 23.50 miles (37.82 km) from the George Washington Bridge in New York City to the Connecticut state line at Port Chester. The George Washington Bridge carries I-95 across the Hudson River from New Jersey into New York City. There, I-95 runs across Upper Manhattan on the Trans-Manhattan Expressway for 0.81 miles (1.30 km) through Washington Heights. It continues east across the Harlem River on the Alexander Hamilton Bridge and onto the Cross Bronx Expressway. In the Bronx, I-95 leaves the Cross Bronx at the Bruckner Interchange, joining the Bruckner Expressway to its end. North of the interchange with Pelham Parkway, it then continues northeast via the New England Thruway out of New York City into Westchester County and to the Connecticut state line, where I-95 continues on the Connecticut Turnpike.
The Miami-Dade Expressway Authority (MDX) is an independent agency created in December 1994 by the State of Florida and the Miami-Dade County Commission. Since 1997 MDX has operated and maintained five expressways formerly operated by the Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT):
State Route 164 is a 7.27-mile-long (11.70 km) primary state highway in the U.S. state of Virginia that connects the northern parts of Suffolk and Portsmouth with Newport News and Hampton via Interstate 664 (I-664) with Downtown Portsmouth and Norfolk through either the Downtown or Midtown Tunnels.
Route 11 is a freeway in east-central Connecticut, serving traffic between the Hartford and New London areas. Route 11 originally was planned run from Colchester to Waterford. However, only about half of the highway was constructed; one end is in Salem. As a result, many people in New London County, who would have benefitted most from the original project, derisively refer to the highway as "Route 5½" for its half-done construction.
Interstate 95 (I-95) is the main Interstate Highway of Florida's Atlantic Coast. It begins at a partial interchange with US Highway 1 (US 1) just south of downtown Miami and heads north through Jacksonville, and to the Georgia state line at the St. Marys River near Becker. The route also passes through the cities of Fort Lauderdale, West Palm Beach, Port St. Lucie, Titusville, and Daytona Beach.
Interstate 75 (I-75) is a part of the Interstate Highway System that runs from the Hialeah–Miami Lakes border, a few miles northwest of Miami, to Sault Ste. Marie in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. I-75 begins its national northward journey near Miami, running along the western parts of the Miami metropolitan area before traveling westward across Alligator Alley, resuming its northward direction in Naples, running along Florida's Gulf Coast, and passing the cities of Fort Myers, Punta Gorda, Venice, and Sarasota. The freeway passes through the Tampa Bay area before turning inward toward Ocala, Gainesville, and Lake City before leaving the state and entering Georgia. I-75 runs for 471 miles (758 km) in Florida, making it the longest Interstate in the state and also the longest in any state east of the Mississippi River. The Interstate's speed limit is 70 mph (110 km/h) for its entire length in Florida.
There have been plans in Florida for expressways, but some were never constructed due to financial problems, community opposition and environmental issues.
The Port of Miami Tunnel is a 4,200-foot (1,300 m) bored, undersea tunnel in Miami, Florida. It consists of two parallel tunnels that travel beneath Biscayne Bay, connecting the MacArthur Causeway on Watson Island with PortMiami on Dodge Island. It was built in a public–private partnership between three government entities—the Florida Department of Transportation, Miami-Dade County, and the City of Miami—and the private entity MAT Concessionaire LLC, which was in charge of designing, building, and financing the project and holds a 30-year concession to operate the tunnel.
The Greater Miami area, composed of the three counties of Miami-Dade, Broward, and Palm Beach, also known collectively as South Florida, is home to a wide variety of public and private transportation systems. These include heavy rail mass transit (Metrorail), commuter rail (Tri-Rail), automated guideway transit (Metromover), highways, two major airports and seaports, as well as three county-wide bus networks, which cover the entire urbanized area of South Florida. Census and ridership data show that Miami has the highest public transportation usage of any city in Florida, as about 17% of Miamians use public transportation on a regular basis, compared to about 4% of commuters in the South Florida metropolitan area. The majority of public transportation in Miami is operated by Miami-Dade Transit (MDT), which is currently the largest transit system in Florida and was the 14th largest transit system in the United States in 2011.
The Martin Luther King Freeway is a five-mile-long (8.0 km) stretch of U.S. Route 58 in the state of Virginia that connects State Route 164 and the Midtown Tunnel complex with midtown Portsmouth at London Boulevard, continuing past High Street near US 17 and ending at Interstate 264 (I-264) in a full interchange that opened on March 28, 2017.
The Dolphin–Palmetto Interchange, also known as 826–836, is a complex four-level stack interchange in Miami-Dade County, Florida. It primarily serves as a highway interchange between State Road 826 and SR 836, but also has ramps to surface streets such as SR 969 and Flagler Street.
Highway revolts have occurred in cities and regions across the United States. In many cities, there remain unused highways, abruptly terminating freeway alignments, and short stretches of freeway in the middle of nowhere, all of which are evidence of larger projects which were never completed. In some instances, freeway revolts have led to the eventual removal or relocation of freeways that had been built.