Bridges that split Hialeah, Miami Lakes part of deal
An I-75 overpass closed for decades will finally open under a deal involving two shuttered bridges that link Hialeah and Miami Lakes but caused a political rift that ended up in court, negotiators announced Friday.
The mayors of the neighboring cities outlined the deal struck last week. Miami Lakes will endorse opening the 170th Street bridge over Interstate 75, allowing vehicles to use the overpass for the first time since it was built in
the 1980s.
In return, Hialeah will back keeping the 154th Street overpass closed to traffic for at least another 10 years, allowing pedestrians and cyclists to cross but not drivers.
“It becomes a community amenity,” Miami Lakes Mayor Manny Cid said in an interview Friday morning.
The agreement is designed to settle Miami Lakes’ lawsuit against Miami-Dade to halt the county’s efforts to open the 170th Street bridge, litigation that has kept the state-owned overpass closed.
Esteban “Steve” Bovo, the former county commissioner elected Hialeah mayor in November, confirmed the deal in a video message, with the graffitipainted walls of the 170th Street bridge behind him.
“Today is a historic day for the residents of the city of Hialeah. The bridge at 170th will now be open,“Bovo said. “Our goal here is to improve the quality of life of all the people in this area.”
Bovo also posted a photo of him shaking hands with Cid on the 170th Street bridge, joined by the other political players in the dispute: MiamiDade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava, Miami-Dade Commission Chairman Jose “Pepe” Diaz, who represents Hialeah and pushed to open both bridges, and René Garcia, who replaced Bovo on the County Commission two years ago. The photo followed a morning broadcast by WAMR 107.5 from the bridge, where the officials announced the deal during the Spanish-language show.
“People were beeping at us from I-75 non-stop,” Cid said. “It was wild.”
Bovo used to represent both cities on the County Commission. At the time, the Miami Lakes strategy was to strike a deal allowing the 170th Street bridge to open while securing a long-term agreement to keep the 154th Street bridge closed.
The bridge fight captured some of the rawest tensions in suburban politics. Hialeah, on the western side of the major highway, demanded access to the overpasses to relieve traffic from newly built subdivisions on what used to be farmland at the edge of I-75. On the eastern side, the largely built-out Miami Lakes objected to opening bridges that would increase traffic through a village with the motto “Growing Beautifully.”
At one point in 2019, Miami Lakes built a park on municipal grounds on the eastern side of the 154th Street bridge to make it harder for MiamiDade to let cars through. That year, Bovo’s predecessor, then-Mayor Carlos Hernández, blamed a “small group” in Miami Lakes objecting to opening up the area to the more working-class demographic of Hialeah.
“They’re racists,” he said at a community meeting attended by hundreds pressing for the bridges to open. “That’s the reality.”
When the bridges were first built, farmland was on both sides and the overpasses allowed tractors and livestock to cross over the new highway traversing stretches of what back then was rural Dade County. But as development expanded on the Hialeah side, and the city’s boundaries expanded closer to I-75, pressure grew to activate the overpasses.
The potential for opening the bridges loomed over Hialeah wanting to absorb land under the county’s jurisdiction west of I-75. That led to a 2006 agreement between Hialeah and Miami Lakes to clear the way for the expansion, provided the 154th Street overpass remained closed. The 154th Street bridge was a Miami Lakes priority since it empties into an area within village limits, Cid said, while a canal separates Miami Lakes neighborhoods from 170th by I-75 at the edge of town.
While once rural, the western side of I-75 now is an area of intense growth in Hialeah, with new commercial parks and residential subdivisions. Residents complained of being paralyzed by traffic, and pressure grew to open the overpasses and create new routes east. Miami Lakes objected, warning of commuter traffic overwhelming small municipal roads.
Eddie Santiesteban, an advertising executive living in one of the new developments by I-75, helped lead the push to open the bridges. On Friday, he said he welcomed an agreement that would allow residents to cross the 170th Street overpass as soon as possible.
“The agreement means we have one win,” said Santiesteban, a candidate for Hialeah City Council in last year’s elections. “What we really need is connectivity.”
At the county level,
Diaz has been pressing for a resolution instructing Levine Cava to open the 154th Street Bridge, as well as the one on 170th. When both Bovo and Cid asked for more time at the March 1 commission meeting, Diaz agreed to delay a vote on the legislation. With a deal in hand, Diaz said he’s prepared for the commission to approve the agreement after councils in both cities vote to ratify the deal as well. “This is something I’ve been working on for many years,” he said. “I just hope everybody sticks to their agreements.”
There was a hint of potential resistance Friday. Josh Dieguez, a member of the Miami Lakes council, posted on Twitter that he hasn’t seen a final deal. “I look forward to reviewing it and evaluating whether it is in the best interest of Miami Lakes,” he wrote.
Under the agreement announced Friday, the 154th Street bridge could still open. But the two sides agreed to revisit the issue in 10 years, keeping the overpass closed through the decade. Cid said there would also be a lane for emergency vehicles with gates triggered by sensors on those vehicles as needed.
Garcia, the District 13 commissioner, said the agreement makes sense by creating a reasonable way to alleviate some traffic on the Hialeah side while addressing concerns from the Miami Lakes side.
“It’s important,” he said, “to connect communities, rather than to isolate them.”