VERO BEACH Extensive deterioration to concrete beams on the east side of the Alma Lee Loy Bridge has left a portion of the span “unstable,” yet the Florida Department of Transportation maintains the bridge is safe.
FDOT records obtained by TCPalm provide an incomplete picture of the 17th Street Bridge. Moreover, heavy redactions and high costs for obtaining records from the state agency have raised concerns from First Amendment experts.
Documents show the three most eastern spans are “scour critical,” an industry term for a bridge that has so much erosion or removal of its foundational materials that it reaches a critical point.
The plan will never be as popular as the day he presented it.
“We are a deal-killer of a society,” Andres Duany said while presenting plans to renovate the power plant at Indian River Boulevard and 17th Street into a hotel-conference center and create a vibrant, public waterfront with restaurants, a skate park and a sailing center.
Thirteen months out, city volunteers and officials have spent months nitpicking various versions of his plans and dealing with end runs by the Youth Sailing Foundation of Indian River County, which wants to do its own thing.
The city seems to be navigating the issue more like a circular sailing course than taking a direct route necessary to get from Point A to Point B in what might be the city’s most important long-term issue.