Belle Isle looks to clamp down on wild Jet Skis on Conway lakes
Skipping across the Conway Chain of Lakes like 850-pound stones, Jet Skis and Sea-Doos rule the urban waterways most weekends, and Belle Isle’s had enough.
City leaders in the community of about 8,000 people would like to clamp down on personal watercraft, the gas-powered water scooters best known by brand names.
A proposed ordinance, which Belle Isle City Council is set to discuss Tuesday, would impose no-wake or slow-speed zones within 300 feet of shorelines.
“Before someone dies, we need to change what is going on out there,” said Zander Clem, a lawyer who lives on the north shore of Little Lake Conway.
Belle Isle’s beef isn’t with the machines or most riders — just reckless ones, said Belle Isle City Manger Bob Francis.
“It’s a little out of control out there,” he said.
But some riders say problems on the Conway lakes are exaggerated.
“We’re just ridin’ waves, ” said a man on a Jet Ski who declined to give his name. “No one’s died. You know what I’m saying.”
According to monthly reports provided by the Sheriff ’s Office to the Lake Conway Water and Navigation Control District Advisory Board, the marine unit issued 78 citations and 128 warnings to riders of personal watercraft from April 1 to June 30. July figures were not available. Many of the violations were issued to riders who didn’t know basic rules.
Francis said he has heard reports of a rider facing backward, traveling at speeds of 65 mph, and Jet Skiers confronting and encircling other boaters.
Francis hopes the modest pro
posal helps the city wrest control of the popular recreational lakes from the horde of riders who take over the waterways on summer weekends. He said the city’s chief concern is safety, because boats, pontoon boats and wake-boarding vessels also use the lake to fish, picnic or water ski on sunny afternoons.
He said whatever new rules the city imposes must also be approved by the Florida Fish & Wildlife Conservation Commission, an extra hurdle.
On a hot summer Sunday, as many as 100 or more personal watercraft flood onto the Conway Chain of Lakes, Francis said.
Shore-front residents complain that noise and waves from the machines and wake-boarding vessels is constant on weekends.
“There’s almost no letup,” said Ward Davis, who has lived on the lake since 1987.
Orange County provides off-duty deputies on weekends and holidays to control traffic at the Randolph Street Boat Ramp which provides public access to the lakes. The line to drop a vessel in the water can stretch to Hoffner Avenue and a deputy prevents the queue from tangling traffic, said Parks and Recreation division director Matt Suedmeyer.
Dennis Lewis, 27, who spends part of most summer weekends on the Conway lakes, said the rush from riding brings him to the water.
“The adrenaline, man, the speed,” he said at the boat ramp. “That’s what it is.”
Much of the blame falls on fellow riders.
“They don’t know the rules of the water, they don’t respect slow-speed zones and that’s a lot of the problem,” he said.
Capt. Bruce McMullen, commander of the Orange County Sheriff’s marine unit, which often has a deputy or two on the Conway lakes, said the potential for conflict — and serious injury — exists whenever speed is mixed with ignorance, especially on the water. “There’s a lot more of them out there than there used to be,” he said of water scooters.
“A lot of them are operating these vessels and maybe they shouldn’t be.”
“A lot of them are operating these vessels and maybe they shouldn’t be.”
Capt. Bruce McMullen, commander of the Orange County Sheriff’s marine unit