Collier approves $7.59M design contract for Immokalee Road flyover

Collier County awarded a nearly $7.6 million contract to a Fort Myers civil engineering firm that will design a Livingston Road flyover above Immokalee Road to reduce traffic congestion. 

The roughly 30-month design phase is part of a $111 million project that is expected to take five or six years to complete. Construction will not begin until after work is finished on a diverging-diamond interchange at Interstate 75 and Immokalee Road. 

The Board of County Commissioners on July 28 voted unanimously to award a $7,594,351.10 design contract to Fort Myers-based DRMP Inc., the top-ranked firm among three responsible bidders. The firm initially bid $8.436 million, but county Procurement Services Division negotiations reduced the cost, which includes possible relocation of county-owned water systems. 

“Immokalee Road has long been faced with congestion challenges,” Marlene Messam, the county Transportation Management Services project manager, told commissioners before the vote. “The point of the project is to alleviate congestion that we’re seeing now. … We will efficiently design the project so that we are solving the problems.” 

Messam said the Immokalee Road Corridor Congestion Study, completed in August 2021, recommended constructing a four-lane flyover carrying Livingston Road over Immokalee Road. In January, the county issued a request for professional services for the design work, and last month commissioners authorized staff to negotiate with DRMP. 

Commissioner Chris Hall, whose district includes the project, questioned how much eastbound and westbound traffic Immokalee Road could handle beneath the flyover with a single traffic signal. 

Messam said the existing light will be replaced with a signalization system similar to the one at Golden Gate Parkway and Airport Road that will improve traffic flow. 

That system will enable the county to reallocate “green time,” Transportation Management Services Director Trinity Scott explained. 

“Instead of having the length of time that you would typically give to the north-south movement, you will now give that green time to the east-west movement,” Scott said. “And what you would give to that north-south movement will be much less because you will have less traffic going to the north-south.” 

She compared the project to the Golden Gate Parkway overpass at Airport Road. 

“We used to have miles of backup for both roadways, but once that overpass went in, now Golden Gate Parkway flows very freely and Airport Road benefits from that because it gets significantly more north-south green time from that and you can still go at grade on Golden Gate Parkway. You still get that green time and you’re not sitting there,” she said, adding that the improvement pushes more traffic through on both roads. 

The congestion study’s initial traffic modeling showed that building an overpass over Immokalee Road would reduce wait times by about six minutes, Scott said. 

Vice Chair Bill McDaniel Jr. noted the flyover is part of a broader traffic improvement system in North Naples that includes the expansion of I-75, improvements along Immokalee Road and the extension of Veterans Memorial Boulevard. 

Scott said the project is listed in the county’s five-year Annual Update & Inventory Report. Design is expected to take about 30 months, followed by construction, which would begin during the third or fourth year of the county’s five-year AUIR work program. 

“We’re probably looking at about five and a half, maybe six years, for construction completion,” she said, noting construction would follow completion of the diverging-diamond interchange at Immokalee Road and I-75, which is expected to begin in early 2027. Diverging-diamond interchanges temporarily shift traffic to the left side of the road, eliminating left turns across opposing lanes and reducing the number of traffic-signal phases. 

Commissioner Burt Saunders questioned whether other congested intersections west of the flyover also would be improved. 

“You’re going to get more flow going west in the morning,” Saunders said. “Are there plans to improve traffic along the way there? We get more traffic, but it gets blocked up at other locations.” 

Scott said no additional improvements are planned west of the flyover, but several are scheduled east of it, including at Juliet Boulevard, the entrance to Walmart and TownePlace Suites by Marriott Naples, and across from Juliet Boulevard at Northbrooke Drive, which serves Huntington Lakes, Cypress Woods Golf & Country Club, Mason Classical Academy High School and the planned STARability campus. 

Long term, she said, the county is working with the Florida Department of Transportation to incorporate additional intersection improvements into the planned diverging-diamond interchange. It also is evaluating improvements to Logan Boulevard east of the flyover, another roadway identified in the congestion study.