PORT ST. LUCIE – In its first public hearing to revise and modify the city’s relatively new mobility plan, the City Council faced an overflow crowd in its Chambers Aug. 25, many of whom had come to protest a consultant’s proposed bypass road that would have crossed the St. Lucie River near Lyngate Park and bisected their neighborhood in the process.
Although the Council ultimately elected to remove that particular roadway from the 2040/2050 Long Term Plan toward the end of a marathon presentation by New Urban Concepts consultant Jonathan Paul, Vice-Mayor Jolien Caraballo acknowledged that other contested roadways in the plan might not get the same result in the future.
“The Chambers are full because this was transparent, and the public is here to provide us their feedback,” she said. “To me, that is success because that is the goal. Just to be fair, I can’t make decisions just because people like something or they don’t. We have a fiduciary responsibility and a responsibility for safety, and people have to get around. We do have to find an east-west connection, but it’s not there.”…