Citywide speed limit of 20 mph proposed

As part of a developing traffic calming plan, Sarasota neighborhood street speed limits will be set at a slower pace by 2055.

By Andrew Warfield
| 5:00 a.m. October 9, 2025

Morning commuters take Osprey Avenue in Laurel Park into downtown Sarasota.

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Armed with the Sarasota City Commission approval to develop a citywide traffic calming plan as part of the fiscal year 2025 adopted budget, the city’s transportation planning staff has brought forth a plan to lower speed limits throughout the city.

A key component to the traffic calming plan is to set speed limits on local streets to 20 miles per hour. In some instances, that will mean raising speed limits from 15 mph to 20 in order to comply with Florida law, which restricts local jurisdictions from setting limits below that threshold. That needs to happen as soon as possible.

For county or state-maintained roads, staff recommends restricting speed limits to no faster than 35 mph, excluding interstate connectors and U.S. 301 between 17th Street and the northern city limit.

For all of the affected streets, the goal is to achieve a citywide speed limit with a horizon year of 2055, which met with unanimous commission approval during its Oct. 7 meeting.

But why 30 years, Vice Mayor Debbie Trice wondered aloud. If included in the traffic calming plan, Senior Transportation Planner Corinne Arriaga explained, streets that don’t experience an excess volume of speeding — according to a five-year speed study — by a volume of more than 15% can be addressed simply by installing new signage. The remainder will require engineering mitigation — bump-outs, traffic circles, speed tables, chicanes, rumble strips and other speed calming strategies — that must be designed, approved and funded.

Those, along with future capital improvement projects can take upward of two decades from paper to completion, conforming to the 2055 horizon year for citywide compliance.

To reach this early stage of plan development, Arriaga and Chief Transportation Planner Alvimarie Corales led a monthslong public engagement effort beginning in spring 2025 with a town hall meeting and online survey. Data analysis was completed over the summer and presented to the commission on Monday.

“We have a community think tank composed of members from the (Coalition of City Neighborhoods) traffic calming group,” Arriaga said. “We also have a leadership task force composed of city leadership, our (police) chief and also our fire department, our health department, Sarasota County Area Transit and other members as well.”

According to the timeline presented by staff, this winter will bring project prioritization, neighborhood outreach, a public hearing and a draft report preparation. By spring 2026, the final report is scheduled to be presented to the City Commission with a request for formal adoption.

The heat map shows high crash locations where speeds may be a factor.

More than 500 residents responded to the survey with more than 75% in favor of implementing traffic calming plans in their neighborhoods. Of them, 57% reported feeling unsafe, pretty unsafe or very unsafe on their streets. Only 5% reported feeling very safe.

Of perceived residential speed, the survey found speeds were:

Way too fast: 37%
Too fast: 36%
Just about right: 23%
Too slow: 2%
Way too slow: 2%

The survey also showed 78% of respondents support installing traffic calming measures.

The 2055 horizon year gives the city a “long-term endpoint,” Arriaga said, adding that lowering speed limits involves more than erecting new signs. Mitigating roads currently carrying a higher volume of faster speeds will require design and construction.

“We can implement a lot of the projects in the traffic calming plan as part of the capital improvement program,” Corales said. “As resurfacing happens, we can also implement a couple of these projects. We can also implement some of these as projects move along in the capital improvement program as well.”

Why not speed cameras?

During the traffic calming plan discussion, it was asked whether speed cameras could be included as part of the effort to slow speeds. Deputy City Manager Patrick Robinson said the state of Florida restricts the use of speed cameras — as the city currently employs them — to school zones.

He suggested that may be expanded over time.

“My professional opinion on this is that this was sort of a test case,” Robinson said of the school zone speed cameras, adding that if not misused by local jurisdictions, the program could possibly be extended to other areas.

“It is a force multiplier for the police department that you don't have to staff it with people," Robinson said of speed enforcement.

Otherwise, to consistently monitor speeding live assets must be placed on site for 12 hours a day with a rotating shift, unless a call for service is made “which will pull them away from those enforcement activities,” he said.

author

Andrew Warfield

Andrew Warfield is the Sarasota Observer city reporter. He is a four-decade veteran of print media. A Florida native, he has spent most of his career in the Carolinas as a writer and editor, nearly a decade as co-founder and editor of a community newspaper in Mecklenburg County, North Carolina.