Zombie issue? Plan to cut Twin Pairs lanes divides Vero Beach residents, flops in meeting
I’m not sure I’ve ever been in a large government meeting where everyone agreed on so much, but disagreed so passionately, yet civilly.
Despite all the ugliness from extremists at Indian River County School Board meetings, polar opposites on the Twin Pairs issue showed two things Thursday night at the Vero Beach Community Center:
How much residents love downtown Vero Beach and agree on strategies to make it even better.
More than 30 people can speak on one of the most long-standing, divisive issues the city has ever seen without hurling personal attacks.
How State Road 60 is configured as it goes through downtown Vero Beach has been debated for about 50 years.
Road improvements accommodated Vero Beach growth
Helpful to know Twin Pairs history: Why does Vero Beach have this traffic pattern through downtown? Should it change?
Still time to speak up: Vero Beach sets meetings to cut 3 lanes, add parking on downtown SR 60; your views sought
'Zombie project': Study of Twin Pairs moving into second phase after initial council approval
In 1970, Indian River County had a population of 36,000 with a two-way 20th Street, State Road 60, lined with stores.
By 1992, the state Department of Transportation made 20th Street westbound only, while 19th Place to the south became one-way eastbound, with a railroad crossing added.
In November 1977, Art Neuberger, a Twin Pairs supporter and Vero Beach councilman, was prescient in a conversation with the Florida Today newspaper:
“ ‘Twin Pairs,’ the 17th Street Bridge and Indian River Boulevard as a team will alleviate traffic congestion downtown and in the shopping center area,” said Neuberger, who later became a county commissioner.
Residents in the 1970s had big debates over whether to build a second bridge, now the Alma Lee Loy Bridge on 17th Street, and widening State Road 60 to three lanes each way west of St. Helen Church on 20th Avenue.
Can you imagine, now that Indian River County’s population approaches 170,000, if all of this had not been done?
Thursday night was the first of four meetings slated to address a proposal, spearheaded by city council members John Carroll, Rey Neville and Linda Moore, to narrow the combined lanes from seven to four, widen sidewalks and add landscaping and 51 parallel parking spots. The speed limit would be reduced from 40 to 35 mph.
Their votes to spend $165,000 on consultant studies was a major surprise, given that Moore, during the 2022 campaign, told this editorial board she agreed with a 2021 council vote to trim the road to six lanes, add pedestrian crosswalks with signals and lower the speed limit.
Either way, the state Department of Transportation plans to restripe the lanes during a widening project at no cost to the city in 2026 or 2027. But if Vero Beach wants more than just repaving, taxpayers would have to pay $1.9 million to $3.9 million for other improvements, consultants said Thursday. DOT supposedly needs an answer by January as to what the city's wishes are.
Parallel parking unites detractors
Despite a presentation that included pretty pictures of what a reconfigured road could look like, there seemed to be almost universal disdain among opponents for parallel parking.
Detractors worried traffic would move into only one lane when drivers stopped to back into a spot. And where would emergency vehicles go if there were an accident? Now delivery vehicles use one of the lanes, not reserved for parking.
“You’re going to get the old people in Vero Beach to parallel park?” asked Debbie Apolinario, who moved to Vero Beach from the Fort Lauderdale area, where driving and parking were a nightmare. “Let’s fix what’s broken instead of getting rid of a lane.”
What’s broken was an area of consensus the other night: Downtown must be cleaned up, including deteriorating crosswalks, blackened sidewalks and ugly storefronts; it needs more directional signs for parking, historical sites, etc.; flowers, planters, trees and maybe wider (and nicer) sidewalks (or brick pavers, like on 14th Avenue) would help.
Downtown Vero Beach friendly to children?
By my count, 18 of 32 speakers were against any lane reductions; 6 wanted a compromise or offered no opinion, while only 8 were in favor.
I’m not surprised. “Don’t fix something that’s not broken” is easy to argue when you haven’t seen data-based animated visualizations to see the traffic flow, projected to slow traffic by 22 to 30 seconds. And the city never put up orange barrels, as I suggested months ago, to simulate lane closures in season.
The most emotional part of the evening came from Michael and Audrey Mosel, parents of children ages 2 and 5, who said they have owned the Seahorse Lane Boutique, on 14th Avenue in-between the Twin Pairs, for several years.
They live about a mile southwest near Charles Park and take their youngsters downtown regularly, sometimes by bike, to get an ice cream or go to school. Crossing the Twin Pairs with children is a challenge, said Michael Mosel, noting he liked the lane-reduction plan.
“There is no margin for error when you’re standing on the corner (with little kids),” he said.
Three Corners will have an impact
I can just imagine.
My wife and late mother-in-law grew up near and in downtown, too. But Vero Beach was very different in the 1970s and 1940s.
Chet Hogan, who sold me the lot I live on and who developed more than 30 other subdivisions in the county, explained how in the 1960s, he and his friends used to ride their bicycles down State Road 60, worried about getting hit by a car.
It was a much different time, the opponent to lane reduction said.
“Y’all are damn crazy if you think you’re going to get this place to be smaller,” Hogan said, citing projections of continued local growth. “We must do something to make us grow better.”
Val Zudans, a former Vero Beach mayor whose wife, Tracey, sits on council, said keeping lanes to accommodate traffic is important to what he said will be the city’s biggest opportunity in the next 50 to 100 years: the 38-acre Three Corners project, which would include a hotel, restaurants, shops, open waterfront and a youth sailing center.
“We’re going to have lots of people coming in,” he said, from places none of us want to live ― Boynton Beach, West Palm Beach and Fort Lauderdale.
Don't blow chances for downtown master plan
Interestingly, places like that have calmed traffic to create pedestrian-friendly downtowns where business thrives, Carroll said.
Comparing Vero Beach to cities like that never helps. Other narrowing proponents used comparisons like Lake Wales; Cashiers, North Carolina; and Thomasville, Georgia.
I enjoy cities that have done things right — keeping streets clean goes a long way. I rarely find a situation like Vero Beach: a downtown divided by main state road, a critical link between the ocean and the gulf and our beach to Interstate 95.
Other supposedly “pedestrian-friendly” cities I’ve been in have twin pairs, such as Portland, Oregon. They don't all bisect downtown.
The tapering plan revealed Thursday is not the solution. I hope Carroll, Neville, Moore and Mayor John Cotugno see that, and pivot in a direction — soon ― that makes the city better, not more divided.
There is a reason road narrowing has not happened despite various other consultant studies taxpayers have funded the past 20 years: Most people don’t want it.
A downtown master plan, if done right, remains important. Council members should preserve any political capital they have left for those discussions.
Other Twin Pairs meetings are slated for:
10 a.m. Oct. 25 at the Metropolitan Planning Organization, Indian River County Administration Building B, 1800 27th St., Vero Beach.
5:30 p.m. Nov. 16 at the community center.
9:30 a.m. Dec. 12 in council chambers at City Hall, 1053 20th Place, when a final decision is expected to take place.
This column reflects the opinion of Laurence Reisman. Contact him via email at larry.reisman@tcpalm.com, phone at 772-978-2223, Facebook.com/larryreisman or Twitter @LaurenceReisman.
If you are a subscriber, thank you. If not, become a subscriber to get the latest local news on the latest local news on the Treasure Coast.
This article originally appeared on Treasure Coast Newspapers: Vero Beach residents worked up by plan to calm traffic through downtown
