Action on traffic

You have to give credit to Lenny Landau, Longboat Key’s chief unpaid, volunteer data analyst. He’s a doer, a GSD guy (Get S--- Done guy), not just a talker.

He wouldn’t make a good politician, that’s for sure.

Landau is tired of all the yammering about traffic — and nothing changing. So he’s trying. He’s doing something. 

Which is more than you can say about some of the officialdom that you would expect to be addressing this region’s most-talked-about issue. See box below.

Many Longboaters know Landau. A jet-engine engineer for General Electric and Longboat resident for nearly two decades, Landau thinks quantitatively and by common sense.

Voluntarily and as a member of the Longboat Key Revitalization Task Force, Landau has analyzed quantitatively everything from submerged water pipes in the bay to beach erosion to water usage to electric grids. Given all of the angst about traffic, this past summer Landau turned his attention to traffic. 

He wanted data, but he quickly realized the problems were obvious — too many people trying to go places at the same time and not enough road capacity.

But also knowing that state and regional transportation officials and road building take eons to GSD, Landau applied common-sense engineering thinking to this question: What can we do now, requiring little expense?

Here’s one thing Landau concluded after his initial research: “We don’t need any other studies,” Landau told attendees at a recent meeting of the Federation of Longboat Key Condominiums. “We know what has to be done.”

And he told them, appropriately: “Stop wishing. Start doing.”

Indeed. 

One of Landau’s other conclusions:  Longboat residents (and everyone everywhere, for that matter) can implement common-sense changes in their behavior that would help reduce traffic congestion.

Beyond that, the region’s residents, snowbirds and visitors are at the mercy of local, regional and state public officials’ and elected leaders’ efforts to address capacity and flow. Clearly, none of them has stepped forward to be the general, generals or commander-in-chief to address what is reaching an annual three- to five-month crisis.

Yes, it is becoming a crisis. No,  scores of people are not dying in their cars as they sit in barely crawling traffic. But when traffic is all everyone talks and complains about, and when citizens’ groups have formed to stop development because of traffic, the message is obvious: Citizens want leaders to take corrective action.

Proposed ordinance would limit Colony

This is not good news for Chuck Whittall and his Unicorp National Development Corp. — the would-be redeveloper of the Colony Beach & Tennis Resort:

The Longboat Key Planning and Zoning Board this week sent to the Town Commission newly drafted revisions to the town’s zoning code for planned unit developments. Here is a key passage in the proposal:

(1) Height. … The town commission may, at the applicant’s request, approve increases in building height above the greater of this maximum height if the required building setback is increased by two feet, for every one foot of additional height requested, or open space is increased by 2% for every one foot of additional height requested, up to a maximum height of 80 feet above base flood elevation. 

For Whittall, this can be a problem — based on what he has said he intends to develop. 

We’re told he has discussed with town officials a desire to construct: 180 five-star hotel units; and 180 luxury condominiums. And he wants to do that on 18 acres, nine of which must be devoted to open space.

Altogether, that’s about 20 units per acre. 

The existing Colony contained 13 units per acre.

Now juxtapose those figures against the recently completed Aria luxury condominium just up the road. That development contains 16 units on four floors (four per floor) on five acres. The units range in size from, say, 3,500 to 4,000 square feet. That’s what the luxury buyer seeks today for his $3 million and more.

Now imagine 180 luxury condos amid 180 five-star hotel rooms and resort amenities such as multiple tennis courts, swimming pools, restaurants and parking.

And imagine: If each floor runs between the 12 and 15 feet high that is custromary today, an 80-foot maximum height would accommodate a six-story building. That’s the number of stories of the Colony’s mid-rise building, albeit with lower ceilings.

Now imagine 180 3,000-square-foot condominiums in six-story buildings. And say there are 10 units per floor. That would be three six-story buildings of 180,000 square feet, each the size of the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C.

And that’s not counting what would be needed to accommodate the 180-room hotel.

The point is if the Town Commission adopts the revised ordinance for planned unit developments with the 80-foot restriction, Whittall’s development would be more crowded than if he is able to build higher. 

What’s more, if Whittall wants, say, to build higher than 80 feet, the new ordinance would require him to increase his setbacks and thus reduce his development footprint.

As one planning board member told us, for more than two decades the town has resisted the 13- and 14-story high-rises that were built on the beach prior to 1984.

Altogether, this pending town ordinance, to be considered by the Town Commission Dec. 12, adds yet another wrinkle of uncertainty to Unicorp’s proposed purchase of the Colony property.

Meantime, Manfred Welfonder continues to await his turn.