Partly Cloudy, 77°
Weather sponsored by:

New director of traffic and engineering to tackle county’s exponential growth

Smith: Developers are responsible for building, maintaining new roads

By Wesley LeBlanc
Posted 5/27/21

GREEN COVE SPRINGS – Richard Smith was selected as the new director of engineering and traffic control operations and he’s excited to tackle the challenge of the county’s exponential growth, …

This item is available in full to subscribers.

Please log in to continue

Log in

Don't have an ID?


Print subscribers

If you're a print subscriber, but do not yet have an online account, click here to create one.

Non-subscribers

Click here to see your options for subscribing.

Single day pass

You also have the option of purchasing 24 hours of access, for $1.00. Click here to purchase a single day pass.

New director of traffic and engineering to tackle county’s exponential growth

Smith: Developers are responsible for building, maintaining new roads


Posted

GREEN COVE SPRINGS – Richard Smith was selected as the new director of engineering and traffic control operations and he’s excited to tackle the challenge of the county’s exponential growth, especially as it relates to the roads 220,000-plus residents use each day.

Smith grew up in Bradford County, graduated from Bradford High, and he obtained an engineering degree from the University of Florida in 1985. He didn’t leave Florida once until he was 22 years old and even then, it was to watch his Gators play ball against an out-of-state team. His engineering journey eventually led him to Atlanta, where he worked as a private engineer for 35 years. He witnessed first-hand the massive growth Atlanta experienced in his three-plus decades there and he’s excited to help guide Clay County through its own intense growth.

“Atlanta’s population was 1.6 million when I first arrived and when I left seven months ago, it was six million,” Smith said. “I’m not saying we’ve got that ahead of us here, but it definitely feels similar, especially when looking at the rise of the county’s numbers. I think we’re doing a better job here than [Atlanta] was doing...and I mean that truthfully.”

There are a couple of reasons Smith believes Clay County is better positioned for its upcoming growth, which is fueled primarily by the construction of the First Coast Expressway that’s set to bring jobs, residents, schools and commerce to the area. He said one of the best things the county is doing is simple to explain, but harder to understand: the development pays their way.

The boiled-down version is this: developers are responsible for building the roads of that development – not the county – and the new residents should cover the costs of roadway maintenance. Another way of wording this is that taxpayers in Keystone Heights won’t have to pay for a road for a Fleming Island neighborhood.

The maintenance costs will be covered for a long period of time. The people living in one of the new developments will pay additional costs each year so when it’s time to fix a road or repave it, the money is already there.

“You don’t drive in their neighborhood or walk their sidewalks...so you won’t be paying for it,” Smith said. “It’s a fair way of doing this kind of thing, I think.”

The neighborhoods are built with traffic concerns in mind, too. Anyone that’s driven down County Road 209 knows how frustrating and dangerous it can be. That goes for residents who also live on the road. The driveways that lead to homes there are directly connected to 209 and that poses a major traffic problem in the inherent danger it presents for residents, their children and pets, and it’s just generally unsafe to have cars driving 50 miles per hour 50 feet away from one’s home.

The new neighborhoods are being developed with this in mind. Subdivision entrances are what’s going to be found off of main roads. People will turn into them and then drive safely to their house at a presumably much slower speed.

“That’s one of the best things I think the county has done,” Smith said in regards to this type of development. “Not everyone wants the First Coast connector, but it’s coming and the thing the county and the county leaders did that’s so forward-thinking is this.”

The First Coast Expressway is going to bring hundreds of jobs to Clay County. It’s going to be the driving force between many new housing developments and multiple schools. It’s an exciting time to live in Clay County, but the growth can be unwelcomed for some, especially in relation to traffic.

Smith is aware of the county’s traffic problems. He knows how congested Blanding Boulevard can be and he knows U.S. Highway 17’s rapid growth and the congestion it’s beginning to receive. He said Clay County is great for traveling north to south. Getting from Green Cove Springs to Orange Park is a breeze after all, but anyone who lives here knows getting from Green Cove Springs to Middleburg is more difficult.

There are ways to travel east to west and vice versa in Clay County but it feels more like a detour than an official route. Smith is excited to change that.

He said opening up veins that allow drivers to traveling east and west one of the county’s main arteries – U.S. 17, Blanding Boulevard and the Expressway – essentially is tied to fixing Clay County’s biggest traffic problems. It will alleviate the congestion on U.S. 17 and Blanding Boulevard and make it easier for drivers. It will feel deliberate, too, and not like a detour.

He also said widening projects like the one happening at this moment on Blanding is crucial. One of the other bigger facets of the challenges for Smith is road paving and resurfacing. There are several roads in Clay County that are dirt. Some are privately owned and until everyone on that road gives permission to turn it into a non-dirt road, it won’t be paved.

The challenge of paving a dirty road is getting the residents to agree. Everyone on the road must agree and they usually need to give up a bit of their land and right-of-way because the new road needs shoulders, sewer and water drainage and more modern commodities associated with roads.

“It costs about $1 million a mile to turn a dirt road into a paved one,” Smith said. “Oftentimes, these roads aren’t used by anyone but the people that live on it. If 50 people want the road paved, but one person doesn’t, we can’t pave the road. We have a list of dirt roads we’re working on based on priority, but it’s certainly a balancing act.”

Smith said he’s committed to successfully juggling and balancing the wide-scale traffic construction associated with projects like the First Coast Expressway and its traffic-related impact and the smaller roads that need some love in places like Middleburg and Keystone Heights too. It’s not about one or the other, he said. It boils down to right-of-way availability, which is in the hands of the residents, and funding availability, which is in the hands of the county.

Smith’s plate is certainly full. He was asked by Dale Smith, who previously held the job, to come to the county as the deputy director because Smith planned to retire in about five years. Two months later, Richard Smith now holds the title.

“I’ve enjoyed working here for the six months I’ve been here so far,” Smith said. “It’s nice to be back home where I grew up (Smith now resides in Orange Park). We’ve got some great leadership here with [county manager Howard Wanamaker] and the commissioners and with their term limits, it means there’s always new people and fresh ideas coming in and that’s exciting.

“I’m excited to guide Clay County through its future growth.”