Honore to receive another roundabout

Palmer Ranch residents may soon get a break from speeding vehicles on Honore Avenue.

Palmer Ranch Holdings Ltd. has hired engineering firm Stantec to install a new roundabout at Honore and Central Sarasota Parkway to control speeding on both roads.

Frank Domingo, senior project manager at Stantec speaking on behalf of Palmer Ranch, said the Palmer Ranch Master Association had received complaints about speeding near the intersection. 

Sarasota County spokesman Jason Bartolone said the county has also received complaints.

Sarasota County’s 2014 annual traffic count found that 85% of traffic on Honore near that intersection exceeds the speed limit by about 10 mph.

According to Domingo, a couple hundred feet before the roundabout, the speed limit will drop to 30mph, and inside the circle,  there will be a suggested speed limit of 15 mph.

But some residents would rather not see a roundabout.

In June, Rich Alpher, who lives about a mile from the intersection, wrote to Sarasota County Commissioner Alan Maio calling the proposed roundabout “ridiculous and dangerous (at this) high speed.”

Domingo said a roundabout will be safer and more efficient than a traffic signal, which could have been placed at the intersection, eventually. 

With some roundabouts, he said, accidents are more common, but they are typically less severe and occur at lower speeds.

“There is a learning curve with a roundabout,” Domingo said, “but you should always feel a little bit of discomfort going into an intersection.”

Domingo said Stantec and Justin Powell, vice president at Palmer Ranch Holdings, began discussing the roundabout a year ago, and the design process commenced at the beginning of 2015.

Stantec applied to Sarasota County and the Southwest Florida Water Management District for permits to build the roundabout and has received approval from the latter.

 If approved, the project will go out to bid this winter, and construction will start after Easter. Construction will take approximately nine months and cost between $700,000 to $800,000.

Due to a 1999 agreement between Sarasota County and Palmer Ranch, projects within the Ranch’s boundaries that enhance capacity — allowing it to better handle traffic, for example — usually qualify for impact fee credits. 

Impact fees are collected from developments in Palmer Ranch and used to pay directly for infrastructure. As a result, the community can bid projects privately, rather than relying on the county’s process for procuring contractors.

Stantec also designed six other roundabouts on Honore between Bee Ridge and Fruitville Road, as well two others in the county, one at Venice Avenue and Jacaranda Boulevard and one on Hillview Street near Sarasota Memorial Hospital.