A recent proposal now out for public comment has brought into sharp focus what should already be obvious to anyone living, working, or serving along Florida’s Highway 98: this is not just a traffic problem. It is a 10-plus year story of failed leadership at the local, state, and federal levels—a cautionary tale about what happens when words and studies are substituted for meaningful action.
The stretch west of Hurlburt Field has become a daily choke point, strangling the flow of traffic and quality of life. When I moved here in 1997, Navarre was a quiet community of just over 10,000 people. Today, it is home to more than 40,000. Further west, communities have swelled at an even greater pace, more than quadrupling in size. All of this growth has poured five times the volume of vehicles onto a highway never designed to carry it.
Highway 98 is not just crowded—it is fragile. With no true alternative short of an hour-long detour up to I-10, a single accident cascades into chaos. Thousands upon thousands of people are stranded, late to work, late to school, or simply stuck. The entire coastal economy slows to a crawl at the mercy of one roadblock. This is not an inconvenience; it is a systemic vulnerability…