This is indeed quite crazy ...the few times I've done that drive I've gone out east and then up through Immokalee and LaBelle then up through Kissimmee and it didn't seem anything like 4 hours... am I missing something here ?
i live in Bonita and we get to Orlando in about 3hrs 15 mins depending on stops. We take i-75 to Palm beach blvd and go up US-17 basically into Lakeland. From there we can get up to Clermont or take i-4 into the Universal/South Orlando area. You can just stay on i-75 the whole way too, just a lot more miles on the odometer, but still around 3:15-3:20 to get there. I guess if you live wayy out there in South east Naples, you can expect 4 hours as it takes me about 30 mins to get to lakewood country club in South Naples from Bonita.
We have left in the morning and the afternoon in our trips to Orlando.
Well yeah, compared to one of the largest cities in the country, traffic here is nothing.
But when you take into account the size of the town, some of the major intersections here are crazy, and it's not just during the season anymore.
As they keep building more and more east of i75, it's only going to get worse and there are no plans for improvement....only bad ideas about lengthening left turn lanes and having them cross traffic earlier.
As point of reference, I've been doing the drive from N. Naples to MCO and back, 2-5 times per month for almost 18 years.
I almost always run a stopwatch.
The quickest route going up in the daytime, by a large margin, is I75 to 17 to Bartow, then cut over to the Polk Expressway on Spirit Lake/Thornhill Rd. Take the P.E. to I4.
If you take the interstates, it's 52 miles longer, and even with no traffic in the middle of the night, you simply can't make up the time.
Going through LaBelle up 29 and 27 isn't too bad, until you get to Lake Wales. The problem with 27 is that the lights are spread out, and you have to stop more often than on 17. The "no traffic" time in the middle of the night is about 15-20 minutes longer than the 17 route I typically take. Once you get to Lake Wales, there are a lot more lights and traffic, and once you get to Haines City, it's a parking lot, especially in season. Last time I took took 27 to avoid an accident on 557 in Lake Alfred, it took me 55 minutes to go the 10 miles from 17 to I4 on 27.
I used to take 31 to Arcadia, then 17 up through Winter Haven to 557, but due to a huge increase in traffic on 31, it's become nearly impossible to pass the incessant line of morons going 45 in a 60, and it's become a death trap during the day. WH gridlocks in season, so I avoid those 2 places on the way up most of the time.
I do go through WH and take 31 coming home late at night, because it is 18 miles less driving than the other way, and at night, the traffic is usually very light. There's also a 24 hour DD right on 17 in Winter Haven.
In the middle of the night coming home, it typically takes me 2:40 or so, depending on weather (rain and fog), lights and traffic on 417/I4. I can usually count on another 5-15 minutes if I get in my car before 10:00PM on a weeknight, or if it's a Fri or Sat (which I try to avoid).
My all time record is 2:34, when I hit a total of 3 lights from the parking lot to my driveway, but that was before they added a couple of the nuisance lights on 17, and all the lights on Immokalee Rd and 951 which were all flashing yellow after 11:00 pm.
Last night, I left MCO at around 9:40pm, which is a few hours earlier than usual. There was an accident on 417, which added around 5 minutes, it rained the entire way home, I stopped for DD coffee and then a pee break on 31. It took me 2:53 from the parking lot to my driveway.
Midday, which is when I normally drive up, it takes roughly 20-30 minutes longer (3:10-3:20ish) with no traffic issues.
In the last 3 years or so, between the buffoonery on I75, I4 and 417, it's been taking closer to 3:30-3:40 to get to work, and it has taken up to 5:00, more than a few times. Occasionally, I get lucky, like I did Sunday, and it's closer to 3:00 even, but that's very rare now.
More often than not these days, I have to take an alternate route to bypass the traffic on I4 in the daytime, adding 15-20 minutes, and even that's getting crowded these days.
Last edited by Tripower455; 02-27-2019 at 10:53 AM..
You would've loved it here when we actually didn't have much traffic.
The "8 month", off season traffic is orders of magnitude worse now than the worst part of season was, even just 10-15 years ago, and it's spread out over a much larger area now. The latter is the main problem. They keep building the houses, but never add any capacity, particularly in eastern Collier. This forces the traffic onto road networks never designed to handle that kind of volume.
In my tenure here, the biggest change for the worse came during the building boom in the early-mid '00s. It was really noticeable when we took our kids to the Village School, which is less than 10 miles away. What was typically a sub 30 minute drive in rush hour, started taking nearly an hour. I'd make it home in 15 minutes after dropping them off. After the RE bubble burst, we were back to the pre bubble drive times. I am sure it's worse these days, but I make it my business to not be awake, much less on the roads, at those hours, unless I absolutely have no choice.
Sadly, it's gotten, and will only get worse as Collier/SWFL sinks under the weight of unrelenting development, especially since they haven't/aren't adding anywhere near the requisite road capacity to handle the huge increase in traffic.
Last edited by Tripower455; 02-27-2019 at 10:57 AM..
Traffic is everywhere. Anywhere its desirable or inexpensive to live you will have traffic.
I heard these same arguments in Chicago where I hail from. Never enough roads, too many people, too many developments, on and on and on. And I lived in the suburbs.On top of that the roads have to be resurfaced every 5-10 years so there's always construction.
Then throw in snowstorms or ice on the roads, even an inch of snow and you can forget getting home for dinner on time.
I know if you work for a living here it can be frustrating as no one wants to sit in traffic going or coming from work.
Plus if you have great distances to drive it can be a nightmare.
Overall though its not that bad here. Can it be better? Sure. At least you don't have red light cameras, traffic signals almost every block, and speed traps almost everywhere with overzealous cops trying to feed into their municipal coffers.
Here you can drive 30 over and nary a cop in sight. (Not that I'm for that of course, just amazes me).
Don't forget, more developments mean more roads (usually) and more roads means more development (always).
Here, more development doesn't mean more roads. It means more cars on the same, already inadequate roads.
We've needed more major arteries that connect to other major arteries, especially those outside the county for over a decade. Although it's not just here, N/S roads leading out of the county are sorely needed along the Immokalee Rd. corridor east of 75. There also needs to be some access between GGE and 41, east of 951. We used to be able to take Everglades to the south end and connect to the Miller extension to 41, but that got shut down when the state took over the southern part of GGE and turned it into the Picayune Strand. We also used to be able to access the Alley from Everglades and DeSoto, but that disappeared when they 4 laned it.
They simply don't build the needed roads, which is why the intersections along 951, Pine Ridge, Immokalee, VBR etc. are backed up so often. Add in all of the nuisance lights they put up to make access to the high density subdivisions along these roads easier and it's a recipe for a nightmare.
All it takes is one collision on one of the 3 major N/S arteries and there's gridlock for miles.
An accident on 75 north of Immokalee Rd. shuts down much of N. Naples, because there are only 2 (heavy traffic) alternate routes into Lee Cnty., and none east of 75.
If we ever had to evacuate the county, it'd be quicker to walk.
Don't talk about evacuate - I'm still getting over the Irma evacuation. 18 hours from Naples to the North Georgia mountains.
I've already told you the quickest way. It only feels like I drive for a living!
I've considered an airplane for my commute several times over the last 18 years. Bottom line is that there is a lot more hassle/moving parts than simply driving, not to mention that it's exponentially more expensive.
Flying is far safer than driving though, especially on that route.