SOUTH DIXIE HIGHWAY CONTRAFLOW BUS AND CAR-POOL LANE DEMONSTRATION PROJECT

This paper describes a series of improvements planned and implemented by the Florida Department of Transportation and Metropolitan Dade County, Florida, to increase the peak-hour people moving capacity of an 8.8-km (5.5-miles) section of US-1 (South Dixie Highway) that links the suburbs of South Dade County with the Miami central business district. One of the improvements, the contraflow bus lane, improved travel times for transit riders by 10 to 16 min and induced over 1700 more riders per day to use transit. The car-pool lane, another part of the project, improved travel times for the nearly 900 car poolers per day by 6 to 8 min. These results and other effects of the project such as automobile occupancy, traffic volume changes, enforcement, and safety are discussed. A profile of the transit user is presented, and car-pool and general lane riders compared. /Author/