079-1999 LTC
CITY OF MIAMI BEACH
CITY HALL 1700 CONVENTION CENTER DRIVE MIAMI BEACH, FLORIDA 33139
http:\\ci.miami-beach.f1.us
L.T.C. No. 79-1999
LETTER TO COMMISSION
April 5, 1999
TO: Mayor Neisen O. Kasdin and
Members of the City C mmission
FROM: Sergio Rodriguez
City Manager
SUBJECT: Traffic Mitigation Plan Approvals
At the March 3, 1999 meeting of the City Commission, members from the public raised questions
concerning the City's approval of several traffic mitigation plans during discussion of the Ocean
Parcel settlement. The Administration has been submitting to the Commission mitigation plans
addressing traffic impacts for their approval. These traffic mitigation plans maintain the City's
adopted (LOS) level-of service standard of "D" for traffic circulation, and are consistent with the
goals and recommendations set forth in the Miami Beach Municipal Mobility Plan.
The Miami Beach Comprehensive Plan and the City Code requires that all project development
application packages be reviewed for concurrency compliance to ensure that public facilities and
services needed to support the development are available. Most of the project development
application packages submitted to the Planning Department contain a traffic impact study for the
subject project, based on it s proposed land-use and trip-generation intensity.
Traffic mitigation plans and agreements are sometimes required for a number of these projects in
order to ensure and provide additional operational capacity. This additional capacity corrects an
existing or future traffic circulation level-of-service deficiency within an identified corridor,
segment, intersection or surrounding roadway network. The vast majority of traffic mitigation plans
will be funded and implemented by individual projects or developments that would directly benefit
from the improvements by utilizing the newly created excess operational capacity.
Some traffic mitigation plans are simple in their scope of work, while others are quite complex and
may require a multi-phasing sequence for their total implementation. However, recommended
traffic mitigation plans must be submitted and approved by the City Commission before any project
identified for mitigation participation is issued their building permit. This established policy and
procedure has been strictly enforced by the Administration, even when a project has been approved
by any of the City's various development review boards.
The Administration was first instructed to report all traffic mitigation plans to the Commission in
1998. There has been a total of seven (7) separate traffic mitigation plans approved, among which
recommended traffic and safety improvements for the Alton Road (6th to 18th Street) and Ocean
Drive (5th to 15th Street) corridors were identified and included.
These two mitigation plans are good examples of where the recommended improvements not only
addressed projected traffic impacts from continued development, but also corrected and improved
the existing roadway level-of-service (LOS) deficiencies. These LOS deficiencies are more
attributable to the seasonal growth patterns and the growing popularity ofthe City as a year-round,
world-class vacation and recreational destination, than to the City's continued growth and
development activity.
The traffic mitigation plans approved by the City Commission have been developed to further
enhance the quality of life, preserve the livability of the City, establish the overall "sense of
community" for it s residents and meet the City's concurrency requirements. All of which are
consistent with the goals, objectives and recommendations set forth in the recently adopted Miami
Beach Municipal Mobility Plan.
SRJ~JJ/jj
enc.
cc: Janet Gavarrete, Assistant City Manager
Christina Cuervo, Assistant City Manager
Julio Grave de Peralta, Director of Public Works
Dean Grandin, Director of Planning
Raul Aguila, 1 st Assistant City Attorney
Mercedes Sosa, Assistant Public Works Director
Joseph Johnson, Senior Planner