Finals plans approved for bayside accesses
Two bayside accesses on Fort Myers Beach have been approved for final design, engineering, permitting and construction elements.
Improvements at the bay end of Delmar Avenue and Gulf Beach Road are expected to be completed before Oct. 1, 2015.
Last week, the Fort Myers Beach Town Council adopted the final plans last week and told Town officials to complete the project by the end of the current fiscal year. Conceptual plans including initial design were approved in April 2014.
The Gulf Beach Road Access Ramp plan, which includes a 448 square foot floating ramp, fixed dock and access ramp, received no negative feedback to the full conceptual plan, while the Delmar Avenue Passive Park design required a hybrid plan between proposed Option #1 and #2. The latter agreement calls for an ADA access walkway over existing rip-rap, sand for kayak launching, mangrove trimming to improve the bay view visual corridor, a bike rack, a ‘no parking’ sign and a ‘paddle craft only’ sign or ‘no motorized vessels’ sign overlooking the bay.
“It would be a public park,” stated Mayor Anita Cereceda. “I don’t think every street will clamor for it. But, in our comp(rehensive) plan, as we define ourselves as a park, there really is a mandate to create public view to the water whenever possible. I would say that this is furthering that view in the comp plan.”
Funding for these projects comes from allotted monies by the Lee County Tourist Development Council. For fiscal year 2015, $219,000 in TDC funds are available for construction.
Prior to approval, Town Environmental Science Coordinator Keith Laakkonen provided a power point presentation, specifically for the proposed Delmar park due to “heightened public concern” and to present options. Several Delmar Street residents weighed in during public comment. The majority who spoke were in favor of the upgrade at the bay end of their street as long as the design did not include an observation or boat deck or parking spots. Opposition points also included concerns such as traffic, party spot and boaters tying up and leaving their boats unattended.
Residents had already created a small path over the rip-rap for paddle craft launching. Safety concerns due to a drop-off and balance instability on rocks played a role in adding features.
“Access over across the rocks is a little bit difficult,” said Laakkonen.
Town manager Don Stilwell wanted to keep the plan simple as to not attract many nonresidents to the site. He thought keeping it a neighborhood park without parking would be best.
“If we don’t keep it very simple, it is going to attract people to the neighborhood and then people will be very concerned about parking on (street residents’) property,” he said. “We are setting a precedent if we open this up.”
The Gulf Beach Road plan involves a highly eroded area from impact by previous boaters. At this site, parking spots will be provided.
“There is a much larger area to work with and a lot less issues associated with it,” said Laakkonen. “We would be working with the existing footprint we were given there.”
Back in April 2014, Council approved recommendations made by the Community Resources Advisory Board and granted a planning process for Town staff to move forward on. The proposal included improvements at four water accesses and involved beach accesses at Gulf Road and Canal Street as well as the aforementioned bayside accesses.
The overall improvements project was called a beautification program and was to be closely related with the Town’s continuing activities to improve ADA accessibilites to the accesses.
Now that final plans are approved, there are hopes that the project work is successful, so that other park-style updates can be done at more accesses on the Beach. TDC funds should be available for such future endeavors.
Town morning meetings move to 10 a.m.
The Fort Myers Beach Town Council has unanimously agreed to move its 9 a.m. meeting timeframe to 10 a.m. to give two members of the policy board more time to work at their family businesses.
The 10 a.m. Town meetings go into effect beginning Feb. 2.