WELCOME BACK: Can we get out of our traffic jam?

Don’t take it as a personal insult,  snowbirds. But the return of seasonal residents comes the return of gripes about traffic in Sarasota.

After residents, particularly those on Sarasota’s barrier islands, complained about seemingly historic traffic issues last year, are things going to be any better in 2016?

While you were gone, local and state officials continued to search for possible mitigation options. The city of Sarasota has held a series of transportation-centric workshops, including a joint workshop with the Planning Board to discuss its mobility study Tuesday.

As part of a strategy to combat traffic issues, the city is prioritizing multimodal transportation options. By encouraging the use of modes of transit other than cars, officials believe they can help ease the strain on the road network.

To facilitate that change, the city has switched to a multimodal fee system for developers, which allows it to spend funds from new projects on bike, transit or pedestrian improvements. Under the old system, that money was reserved for road-widening.

The city’s Urban Design Studio, responsible for developing new zoning regulations for Sarasota, is encouraging a greater emphasis on public transit. As part of its work, the team presented a map that envisions a large interconnected transit system in Sarasota, including bus, rail and trolley lines, not to mention a waterbus to the barrier islands.

Transit use is currently light in the city. Still, city officials believe that would change if the option were more attractive to residents. Without inspiring that change, they contend, it’ll be difficult to lighten the load on the city’s road network as the region continues to grow.

Urban Design Studio Director Karin Murphy acknowledges the expense of a more robust transit network but says it’s comparable to money already spent on roadway improvements.

“This is what we want to talk about as a community,” Murphy said. “How do we want to grow, and where do we want to spend these dollars?”

In the short term, the Florida Department of Transportation is working on making a permanent change to U.S. 41, designed to improve the flow of traffic onto and off of the John Ringling Causeway. After an encouraging trial period this spring, the state agency wants to cement the dedicated northbound right-turn lane at U.S. 41 and Fruitville.

FDOT hopes to begin work on the project, which would include a median along U.S. 41, in summer 2016. The state agency has verified the severity of the traffic issue coming off of the Ringling bridge and hopes the changes will help.

“FDOT looked into the concerns and during season, their travel time measurements found there were times when the trip from St. Armands to U.S. 41 and Fruitville Road took two hours,” City Engineer Alex DavisShaw wrote in a memo regarding the project.

The state hopes to conduct a long-term examination of the area, as well. In October, FDOT proposed a $675,000 study of traffic issues on Sarasota and Manatee barrier islands.

Although officials have sought to address the ongoing traffic problem, the Sarasota/Manatee Metropolitan Planning Association expressed concerns about the price and deferred any action until a December meeting.