Central Florida expressways will let you drive on the shoulder

A first-of-its-kind approach to managing congestion in Florida will debut this summer on a pair of Central Florida expressways with the goal of helping motorists escape traffic jams more easily.

The Central Florida Expressway Authority announced last week that flex lanes are coming to State Road 417 and State Road 429. Flex lanes allow drivers to pass accidents on the shoulder when overhead signs signal the lanes are open, according to CFX.

CFX is the state agency that oversees the transportation network connecting Brevard, Lake, Orange, Osceola and Seminole counties.

A red X signals the lane is closed, a green arrow means it’s open and a yellow X indicates it’s about to open or close. CFX will add 55 overhead flex lane sign gantries along SR 417 between International Drive and State Road 528. SR 429 has 31 overhead sign gantries from Tilden Road to State Road 414.

Flex lanes are the agency’s latest attempt to ease congestion generated by the large number of tourists traveling to and from theme parks along with the growing number of Central Florida residents. SR 417 and 429 are also being widened, and the flex lanes are being added as that happens.

The two toll roads, which together see over 491,000 vehicles per day, were chosen for flex lanes based on the tremendous amount of growth in the area that’s only expected to continue, spokesman Brian Hutchings said.

But Hutchings said CFX expects to expand use of the lanes across its network in coming years, and believes expressway agencies elsewhere in the state may follow suit. SR 417 and SR 429 will initially test the technology during accidents, but in a few years it will be implemented for daily rush-hour traffic, allowing vehicles onto the shoulder during peak times.

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“We’re not unique right, there are numerous roads, expressways that are challenged with the same issues that we are with increasing growth resulting in high traffic volumes,” he said. “And as we hopefully find success in this, that more agencies will see the value in it, and implement their own system.”

Several states have already implemented a similar idea, including Ohio, Wisconsin, Colorado, Hawaii and Washington. Research varies on whether flex lanes actually save time, but studies do show they reduce crashes, according to the Federal Highway Administration. FHA lists public outreach as critical for success because the technology is so new — it’s never been used before now in the Southeast.

Hutchings said public outreach is a uniquely difficult task for Central Florida because of the high number of tourists.

“Tourists that are new to the area may have never seen anything like this, so there are some challenges to educate people on how to use them,” he said.

To combat that challenge, CFX hopes to educate through social media campaigns, targeted ads, email blasts, visiting area homeowners associations and partnerships with the Visit Orlando tourism agency.

Learning how the system works shouldn’t be too difficult, Hutchings said.

“It’s pretty intuitive, right?” he said. “We’ve grown up that green means go, yellow means caution, slow down, and red means stop or get out of this lane.”

The agency partnered with the Florida Department of Transportation to fund monitoring of flex lanes 24/7, Bryan Homayouni, director of Intelligent Transportation Systems, said during a presentation to the CFX board last week.

“Once all the testing, training and construction activities are complete the test messages will be replaced with the appropriate lane status image and operations will commence,” Homayouni said. “The first segment of roadway anticipated to be ready for implementation will be the southernmost project on State Road 417 running from International Drive to John Young Parkway.”

Hutchings said cost of the flex lanes is included in the over $800 million in total budgeted for widening SR 417 and SR 429.

Construction on widening will wrap up starting this summer — which is when flex lanes gradually will start coming online — and continue through summer 2025. Police, FDOT and emergency services have completed training to use the system, Homayouni said.

He said through that measured and tiered approach, everyone will have time to get comfortable with the system as a safety application in upcoming years well before it’s used to manage daily traffic congestion.