FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact:    Scott Gilbertson, Lee County Transportation Department
                (941) 479-8580

FORT MYERS, Fla. (December 12, 2000) – The Board of Lee County Commissioners unanimously approved a contract today to design the final three-mile stretch of Veterans Memorial Parkway Extension to Burnt Store Road – with construction scheduled to begin in May.

The contract is for $159,180 to Johnson Engineering to design the segment. The project will be completed years in advance of original projections due to a $6-million, no-interest loan from the state-funded State Infrastructure Bank Program. In addition, it will be a four-lane, instead of a two-lane, connection.

The construction will take Veterans Memorial Parkway from where it now ends at Surfside Boulevard west and north to Burnt Store Road. Construction is scheduled to be completed by August 2002. The loan would be repaid from 2003 to 2008 using surplus toll revenues from the Cape Coral and Midpoint Memorial Bridges.

"Once Veterans Memorial Parkway is linked with Burnt Store Road, motorists will have a continuous transportation corridor approximately 30 miles long, running from Punta Gorda to Lehigh Acres," says Scott Gilbertson, the county’s transportation director. "The extension is a critical component of the central travel artery for Lee County, and the SIB loan allows the project to be completed years in advance of when it would otherwise be possible."

The project has been pursued as a joint effort between Lee County and the City of Cape Coral, with a 1988 interlocal agreement designating the County as responsible for the design and permitting phase and the City as responsible for the right-of-way acquisition. Under existing agreements, the Cape is entitled to 40 percent of the future surplus toll revenues, so the use of those revenues to ultimately pay for the construction phase through repayment of the loan continues the partnership effort between the two jurisdictions. An amendment to the 1988 interlocal agreement to show the construction phase being paid with future surplus toll revenues is in the works.

Lee County already has completed preliminary construction activities consisting of clearing and filling.

Lee County has been working to complete construction of the corridor since the completion of the Midpoint Memorial Bridge in October 1997 made the connection possible. The corridor extends from Lehigh Acres via Colonial Boulevard to the bridge, and then to Chiquita Boulevard via Veterans Memorial Parkway. At Chiquita, the Parkway ties into the existing four-lane Miracle Parkway, which leads to Surfside Boulevard, and now will connect to Burnt Store Road. The entire Midpoint Memorial Bridge and Corridor project has cost about $170 million.