We are going to break up our posts on the highly controversial proposals gathering momentum for a fake transit solution around the use of the CSX rail line.
Let's be clear: this is not about the CSX rail line (and the inter-local agreement between CSX, the state and the county--one of Governor Jeb Bush's final acts as governor): it is about moving the Urban Development Boundary (UDB).
The plot is simple enough: in recent years, land speculators bought property outside the Urban Development Boundary on the premise that friendly county commissioners (like Joe Martinez) would vote to move the boundary and allow them to reap vast profits, once zoning was in place. The promise--more suburban sprawl in farmland--is hundreds of millions if not billions of dollars of development value.
But in the face of a housing market crash, the promise doesn't matter so much as the cost: the carrying costs for developers of undevelopable land purchased at outlandish prices is enormous. Think of your anxiety, if you are a homeowner, of paying for a mortgage set at a value that you won't be able to realize in the open market and multiply it, one hundred thousand times.
From here, what you smell is burning cash, fed every month by worried land speculators to cover interest payments on undevelopable property. Never mind the Achilles heels of future development: water and traffic: just get the zoning changed.
The county commission is dealing with future water issues by refusing to deal with them, as suggested by the majority's antagonism to the South Miami Dade Watershed Study that will be the focus of their ire in early May.
Never mind that South Florida is in the grip of a drought that, in so far as Lake Okeechobee levels are concerned, is the worst in recorded history.
As for the daily traffic nightmare inflicted by the development community on hundreds of thousands of Miami Dade residents in Kendall and South Dade, developers are pushing the CSX rail conversion to commuter traffic purposes as the "solution".
But it is NOT existing residents who are going to be served: where does the CSX rail line go?
Developers need the CSX rail to speed the movement of the Urban Development Boundary and end the crisis of serving bank loans for land outside the UDB bought at highly speculative prices.
What you see on the above graphic, is a map from the Parkland Development of Regional Impact (Ed Easton and Lennar--indicated on the map as "site"). Look closely, and you will see Metrozoo: that's the furthest south extension of the CSX rail line according to the COUNTY.
The map does not include the UDB line, but the 'site' is outside it.
Also, what you don't see is 1) property ownership along the entire proposed route outside the UDB-- ie. who benefits, and 2) that the PARKLAND development WEST of Metrozoo, outside the UDB, depends on the CSX rail line and its EXTENSION to the Metrozoo.
If you click to the next page below, what you will see is how the timing of public meetings has been crammed close to upcoming hearings on the South Miami Dade Watershed Study, also forced into position (by Natacha Seijas) to align with new applications to move the Urban Development Boundary. One of the recommendations of the extensively researched watershed study: that no movement of the UDB is necessary until at least 2025. (While scandals rock the Performing Arts Center, the Miami Dade Housing Agency, Miami International Airport, on and on: this is what your county commissioners are focusing on.)
Housing market sales are suffering their worst collapse since the Great Depression, with no end in sight. Where is the water going to come from?
We don't take pleasure in pointing out that the building boom of the last six years sucked all the oxygen from the county commission and replaced it with laughing gas. The boom was built to a large extent on fraudulent mortgages, liar loans and relaxed lending standards, a euphemism for the collusion between lenders and builders that created a vast mismatch between supply of single-family, production homes and demand.
It is just unbelievable: you would think that elected county commissioners would take a close look at the unfolding market implosion and say, whoa we're going to take a step back. We're going to listen to our planners who were derided by high paid lobbyists and fancy power point presentations by engineers and consultants in the 2005 amendment cycle.
But that is not what is happening. Yes, the housing boom is over. Done. Kaput.
But in the alternate reality that prevails, everyone wants back in the game. It was so good while it lasted! It can't be over!
So what you are going to see, in the coming months at the county commission, goes like this: it's as though you were at a Miami Heat game, the clock expired, the game is over, the arena is empty, and the players refuse to leave the court.
Our unvarnished view is that we have blundered along with Miami's building and development community long enough, and you won't read that view in the Miami Herald or Miami Today.
We agree with blog readers who have piped up in comments, asking county commissioners to solve existing east-west transit and the problem of Metrorail, first, invest and fund real solutions before a single decision to bail-out land speculators.
http://www.miamidade.gov/mpo/m9-study-kendalllink.htm
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE March 30, 2007
Media Contact: Elizabeth Rockwell – erock@miamidade.gov305.375.4507
TRANSPORTATION PLANNING BEGINS WITH YOUR OPINION(S)
Kendall Transit Corridor Alternatives Analysis (Kendall-Link Study)
Miami, FL – The Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO), the agency responsible for transportation planning in Miami-Dade County, is inviting residents to attend an open house meeting to obtain information on, and provide input to, potential rapid transit options being considered for the Kendall Corridor. These meetings are the third series of workshops for this project and are intended to focus on the detailed evaluation results. The Kendall-Link Study's purpose is to develop short, medium, and long range rapid transit recommendations in the greater Kendall area which stretches from SR-836 to the north, SW 152nd Street to the south, US-1 to the east, and Krome Avenue to the west. Alternatives under consideration include bus service improvements, Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) along Kendall Drive and SW 137th Avenue, Diesel Multiple Units (DMU) along the CSX rail corridor, and Metrorail extensions along Kendall Drive and H.E.F.T., and other supportive roadway improvements.
What: Open House Meetings for the Kendall-Link Study
Who: Miami-Dade Metropolitan Planning Organization
When/Where:
TUESDAY, APRIL 24, 2007
6 PM to 8 PM Kendall Village Center 8625 SW 124 Avenue, Miami, FL 33183
WEDNESDAY, APRIL 25, 2007
6 PM to 8 PM Country Walk Homeowners Association Clubhouse 14601 Country Walk Drive, Miami, FL 33186
Why: To encourage citizens to provide input to the potential rapid transit options being considered for the Kendall Corridor.
To learn more about the Kendall-Link Open House meetings, please call (305) 375-4507 or visit our website at www.kendall-link.com.
It is the policy of Miami Dade County to comply with all of the requirements of the Americans with Disabilities Act. The above facilities are accessible. For sign language interpreters, assistive listening devices, or materials in accessible format, please call 305-375-4507 at least five days in advance.
# # #
Metropolitan Planning Organization
111 NW 1 Street – Suite 910, Miami, FL 33128 - (305) 375-1881 FAX (305) 375-4950
WWW.MIAMIDADE.GOV/MPO
305-375-2836 or Fax 305-375-3968
9 comments:
Actually, the Watershed Study calls for moving the UDB in 2025, not 2050.
Please try and remember that the Commissioners are bought and paid for by the developers. Nothing that the public says or does effects them. They must be removed and hopefully honest people found to take their positions.
Thanks for the date correction. As far as the second point is concerned: people have to make the connection, and the only ways to do that is to become educated about campaign election reality.
I've submitted a plan last year. It goes something like this: express, elevated Metrorail that run along I-95, Palmetto, and 836. They would use low-cost, NIMBY-free highway medians. Super terminals at Govt. Center Metrorail Station, Golden Glades, Palmetto Metrorail Station, FIU/MIA west, and Dadeland South Metrorail Station. Some of these locations can be expanded and are capable of handling garages.
MDT already handles non-car owners and their short-trip needs. This plan would serve long-trip automotive commuters. The most convenient rail trip in Dade is the south leg of Metrorail. This plan would be like that but with less stops!
Even as a carpool lane commuter you'd be stupid not to use that train "flying" overhead.
It would be green: not only because it's electric but because it would NOT encourage the outward growth into our wilderness.
This plan would also stop one-district pork transit plans like the Homestead or North Corridor Metrorail lines. This plan would also completely replace the current East-West/MIC non-plan.
Once this is in place, street-level transit routes and systems would flourish as more and more folks leave their cars parked.
The consultant doing the "Kendall corridor" study (which goes far from Kendall)is also the transportation consultant for the applications to move the UDB. How's that for conflict of interest? How did Kimberly Horne get this contract anyway? That's why the proposed routes just happen to serve all the UDB application sites.
This is another evident situation of the corruption that exists in our government. It is so frustrating when you have a situtation like the CSX - which makes no sense whatsoever especially as it relates to the traffic situation in Kendall. This so called alternative will only make a bad situation worse. I wonder who will be pocketing the money on this deal? I hear from many people that Commissioner Joe Martinez is not a righteous man at all. Apparently he has accepted money and favors from others before. What a shame that these elected officials who are to be looking out for the best interests of the City and it's people have no morals or integrity at all. What we should do is collect money and hire someone to do an internal investigation on the financial affairs of these people who make these moderate salaries yet live the high life - while we suffer the consequences of these deals that are only benefiting their pockets and personal bank accounts.
This rail expansion proposal will be voted on at the Miami-Dade Metropolitan Planning Organization meeting October 4, 2007, 2 PM in the County Commission Chambers. It will be your only chance to join other concerned citizens in demanding that no further development of this destructive boundary buster be allowed. Control your community's destiny while you can.
It is time to start collecting the names of the commisioners that back this proposal and the staff and outside consultants that are aiding and abetting the process, in order to present to some outside body that can investigate their actions. It is abundantly clear that the project increases traffic congestion, decreases quality of life and misallocates our meager resources. The project is a thinly disguized attempt at circumventing the UDB restrictions; it is located in the east and Kendall needs traffic support in the west; it is redundant since it parallels 874 and is in some places about 10 blocks east of the existing metrorail lines. But it is championed as the "solution" for a certain Kendall segement. The models used for this "solution" seem to ignore that we have a rating of F for Kendall Drive and many of our other primary arteries. This project does not help but rather interferes with MDPS buses, MDX plans, the 200,000 Kendall vehicles going east and west every day, takes no car off the road, and, the cost recovery [ie ridership cost is not addressed at all]. But who cares what the project will cost, or if it ever gets paid back, when some people get to make immense profits off of rezoning land and breaking through those "pesky" Growth Management Laws, and common sense? We get once again an arrogant Home Rule County bullying and intimidating its residents. We need to call for State and Federal investigations and or to kick out of office those that would so brazenly hurt the county and its citizens.
To paraphrase: Never underestimate the greed and arrogance of our "leaders", who thanks to single member districts, answer only to their fiefdoms. You concerned citizens should be paying attention to the Charter Review process because single member districts allow these community corruptors to maintain their rule.
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