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The Miami Herald Commuting Column

Posted on: Monday, 25 July 2005, 21:00 CDT

Jul. 25--Miami-Dade Transit is preparing to kick off a new express bus service on Aug. 1 that could be a boon to commuters in Northwest Miami-Dade and Southwest Broward.

But Transit officials aren't getting any help from General Growth Properties, the Chicago-based owners of Pembroke Lakes Mall.

The Northwest Dade Express -- Route 175 -- will originate on Pines Boulevard, on the outskirts of the mall, head south on Interstate 75 and make limited stops along Miami Gardens Drive and Ludlam Road before dropping riders at the Palmetto Metrorail station.

Transit is starting the route on the boulevard because mall managers are refusing to give the agency permission to drop its passengers at the front door.

What's the problem? It can't be an aversion to mass transit.

Broward County Transit has been running at least two bus routes right up to the front door on the Sears side of the mall since it opened in October 1992.

"We'd requested permission -- not written -- to bring our buses on their property a while ago," said Bob Pearsall, Miami-Dade Transit's veteran scheduling and service-planning guru. "We wanted to drop our customers where BCT stops."

Are shoppers arriving on BCT buses that much more desirable than those arriving on Miami-Dade Metrobuses?

Are the store clerks, janitors and fast-food line cooks arriving from Hollywood, Lauderhill and Tamarac that much more valuable to its tenants than the working-class folks who hail from Hialeah Gardens, Medley and Carol City?

Aside from Westland Mall in Hialeah, Pembroke Lakes is the closest shopping center for hundreds of thousands of Northwest Miami-Dade residents.

Pembroke Lakes marketing manager Ann Schultz said the problem is a dearth of available parking during an ongoing redevelopment period.

The new Macy's and an adjacent parking deck are tentatively slated for completion in mid-2006.

The construction has swallowed up a significant portion of the mall's parking spaces and the mall is already running the risk of not providing enough spaces under the terms of its existing construction and zoning permits with the city of Pembroke Pines, Schultz said.

There's only one problem with that explanation, said Miami-Dade Transit's Pearsall: "We never asked for parking spaces. We just wanted to drop our passengers at the front door, just like Broward."

Pearsall acknowledges a certain percentage of people who catch express buses at the end of the line will inevitably park in nearby free spaces, including the mall's.

The new route, which was promised with the 2002 sales-tax campaign, will run every 20 minutes on weekday mornings between 5:30 and 8:30 a.m., arriving at the Palmetto Metrorail station from 6:20 a.m. to 9:30 a.m.

In the evenings, the express will leave the Metrorail station from 4 p.m. to 7:05 p.m., arriving in Pines between 4:57 p.m. and 8:02 p.m.

For the short-term, Transit will encourage express bus patrons to use the park-n-ride lot a quarter-mile west of the mall at Pines Boulevard and Flamingo Road.

This is far from optimal. Road construction in the area will make it difficult for eastbound buses to drop passengers close to the park-n-ride.

So much for the spirit of regionalism, eh?

IGNORE OLD HOV SIGNS: In response to several calls and emails from confused Interstate 95 commuters:

Continue to ignore those signs that seem to indicate that new High Occupancy Vehicle operating hours have gone into effect on I-95 in Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties.

The Florida Department of Transportation insists the old HOV hours -- 7-9 a.m. and 4-6 p.m. -- will remain the law of the land for the foreseeable future.

The new signs -- promoting HOV hours from 6-10 a.m. and 3-7 p.m. -- were erected in June and were supposed to go into effect on July 1.

FDOT, which had been planning the change for nearly two years, caved to 11th hour political pressure from state Sen. Ron Klein, D-Boca Raton, and indefinitely postponed the expanded hours.

The new signs were erected in late June, in anticipation of the July 1 kickoff date, for the expanded HOV lane hours and rules.

FDOT IN A SCRAMBLE: FDOT, which spent upwards of $1 million planning the HOV expansion program, is scrambling to erect hastily ordered sign overlays restating the old-but-still-legal HOV hours on top of the new-but-suddenly-obsolete signs.

The overlays, started going up during the overnight hours last weekend on I-95 in Palm Beach County. The crews will work their way south over the next couple of weeks.

No dates have been set for the anticipated anti-HOV lane spleen-ventings in Broward and Palm Beach counties.

Have a commuting question or column idea for Larry Lebowitz? Contact him at streetwise@herald.com or call him at 305-376-3410 .

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Source: The Miami Herald

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