Volusia County, FL - At its Tuesday meeting, the Volusia County Council approved a $5.1 million agreement with the Florida Departments of Economic Opportunity and Transportation to widen a mile-long stretch of Williamson Blvd. in Daytona Beach to four lanes.
The stretch of roadway along Williamson Blvd. from LPGA Blvd. to Strickland Range Rd. is currently two lanes, but now that the agreement has been approved by the Council, the roadway is expected to be expanded to four lanes within five years. The project will partially use money from a Florida Job Growth Grant Fund.
Council Chair Ed Kelley said the project is critical and needed for the diversion of traffic in the area. "It was already needed," explained Kelley. "It's not just for future development. As (with) most of our traffic issues or our transportation issues we have, (these improvements) are needed yesterday - and not just for future development."
"(The expansion) will help us when we have incidents out on I-95 to move traffic around and other types of situations," said Council member Pat Patterson.
The project will use $1,961,564 from the State grant for the construction phase, according to County records. $1,342,393 will be funded from the County’s local option gas tax, and $1,796,043 would come from proportionate share fees committed by private development.
Council member Heather Post said the money put into the project on Williamson Blvd. will help the County "catch up" on infrastructure. "Currently, we are looking at catching up to all the monies that we have not been putting in since the recession, in addition to maintaining, in addition to looking at all of the tremendous growth that we have coming in," said Post.
While the approved expansion is planned from LPGA Blvd. to Strickland Range Rd., the County is also currently competing for legislative appropriation in order to continue that expansion up to Hand Rd. That continuation would cost about $8 million. Kelley said if the expansion is continued up to Hand Ave., that could be a benefit for evacuation routes since major highways like State Rd. 44 are "clogged."
"I think we're going to see more of this, I hope, and then if we can get the State, the County, the City, and the private sector all working together, then we can have dollars to make a difference," said Kelley.
During its meeting, the Council also approved a contract to partially replace the roof of the historic County Courthouse in downtown DeLand. The $341,778 contract would be with Tydir Construction Company in Daytona and would replace the south roof of the courthouse, located at 125 W. New York Ave.
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