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INTERACTIVE MAP: One Santa Barbara project moves forward as another is ready for bid
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NAPLES — George Chaves only sees his regulars irregularly now.
The owner of El Morro Cuban Cuisine said the Santa Barbara Boulevard expansion has confounded and chagrined some of his best customers, driving business down 20 percent to 30 percent in the year since construction began.
“They told us when they came in that they were trying to come in before, but they had no way to,” Chaves said as his daughter, Zuli Nirabal, 20, translated from Spanish into English.
The project to expand Santa Barbara to six lanes from four began in February 2007, and stands roughly a year from completion, Collier County Transportation Engineering Director Jay Ahmad said.
The project, he said, is 74 percent complete and roughly 10 percent ahead of schedule.
Meanwhile, the project is within its $62 million budget, the highest-contracted price for a single transportation project to date in Collier County.
The recently completed expansion of Immokalee Road, though it totaled $86.6 million, was broken into three sections completed by three separate contractors.
The Santa Barbara expansion has come at another price though. As with any other road project, the endless headaches have affected homeowners and a handful of businesses along the road.
“This entrance has been blocked for about a month now and it was supposed to be for a day,” said Julie Ramos, the director of Bottles, Blocks & Books Preschool, pointing to the one-way entrance to the center’s narrow parking lot.
Parents are forced to drive in and out the same small exit as they pick up and drop off their children.
“You have parents trying to get in and out at the same time,” said Stacy Murdoch, as she stopped in to pick up her 4-year-old son, Brian. “I’m just waiting for the day I hit someone or someone’s not paying attention and hits me.”
They had little patience for the problems caused by construction, which they said changes each day, blocking one entrance or another without an apparent pattern.
The 3.2-mile project from Davis Boulevard to Copper Leaf Lane also calls for changes to the intersection with Pine Ridge Road, to the north where Santa Barbara turns into Logan Boulevard.
“It’s a little portion of the puzzle, but eastbound on Pine Ridge we’re adding a new turn lane to the south,” said Steve Ritter, the county’s manager of road construction. “Northbound on Logan, we’re adding a turn lane for the cars to stack up.”
That work will cause traffic on Pine Ridge Road from Vineyards Boulevard eastbound to Logan to be diverted from three lanes to two lanes intermittently for the next six months.
During the same period, one of two turn lanes onto southbound Logan Boulevard from Pine Ridge Road will be closed. This will be limited mostly to “non-peak” hours, Ritter said, from 9 a.m., to 3 p.m., Mondays through Fridays and 8 a.m., to 6 p.m., Saturdays, times when most traffic is heading in the opposite direction.
The changes will be necessary when the road construction is complete, Ritter said, and Santa Barbara is carrying additional capacity at the northern intersection.
For Betty Flores, moving her shop to the corner of Santa Barbara and Davis boulevards with her husband, Sergio, seemed risky after 15 years in another location.
“I did not want to move here because of the construction,” said Flores, who owns and operates the jewelry and bead store Bead It with her husband. “It was like a desert — it was nothing but construction. But it’s wonderful now.”
She said she can see progress in the road and sidewalk since they moved in June, and looks forward to the growth the road project will bring.
As the expansion project enters its final stages, Collier County is getting ready to award a contract Tuesday for the Santa Barbara Boulevard Extension Project, to connect Davis Boulevard and Rattlesnake Hammock Road to the south.
New shopping centers are planned for the to-be-constructed corners of that intersection.
“Sometimes you have to look toward the future,” Sergio Flores said. “I have reasons to believe this is going to be a nice potential.”
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New shopping centers are planned for the to-be-constructed corners of that intersection.
GREAT, more vacant retail space. what ever happened to dolphin plaza that was suppost to be built 2 years ago behind 7-11. there is plenty of vacant retail space all arount wal-mart 1 mile up the road. i am getting tired of looking at the department store half built......
#1 Posted by ncb1978 on September 22, 2008 at 9:38 p.m. (Suggest removal)
While I hear what everyone is saying about the corner of Davis & SB, how many retail businesses do you think there are, that can fill up all the empty space? There are probably over 50 empty storefronts around the Wal-Mart up the street alone. What else can go in just 2 miles down the road, when the other malls are built? There isn't enough smaller shops that are needed in the area. Hopefully, some non-retail establishments will sign on.
#2 Posted by Cynical1 on September 23, 2008 at 11:22 a.m. (Suggest removal)
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