What Happened Yesterday Morning on 9-Mile Road?

A signalization malfunction led to unnecessary gridlock during the morning commute on 9-Mile Road this week.  The state's contractor has addressed and corrected the malfunction.

Wednesday, Thursday and Friday of this week there was something amiss on 9-Mile Road which was causing a backup all the way down 9-Mile Road to the west as far as Leisure Lakes RV park.

Friday morning it came to a head as folks could not even exit their subdivisions to make a right hand turn onto 9-Mile Road to head toward the interstate.



The choke point was the light at Heritage Oaks and Saltgrass.  It was improperly holding East and West-bound traffic due to a malfunctioning sensor on the smart grid software that was holding the green light north and south between Heritage Oaks and Saltgrass--even when cars were not at that light..  I notified staff and asked for immediate attention to the matter.

This condition was infuriating to drivers but the situation has been addressed as of Friday--and the lights are once again functioning properly.  From an email string resolving this malfunction from yesterday afternoon:

"For an unknown reason Gridsmart detection is activating at the side street, Saltgrass Drive, and no vehicle is present.  Operationally, Nine Mile Road and Heritage Oaks will have a red light and no one will be leaving Saltgrass Drive.  The light for Saltgrass will be green for 10 seconds.  This is an issue that does not normally occur...I have monitored for the past couple hours and it appears to be working.  I sent Gridsmart and Ingram the Diagnostic logs"

Thanks go out to the County's engineering staff and FDOT's signalization contractor for getting the situation resolved.

ABOUT THE STATE DOT's  9-MILE ROAD WIDENING PROJECT....

The section of FDOT's 9-Mile Road from I-10 to Beulah Road project was slated for completion by the end of this month--however the state has recently informed us all that unfortunately once again a completion timeframe has slipped and that now this segment from Navy Federal Way to Beulah Road will be done by "Late Summer" 2020.  I know this has been a nightmare, but I want all citizens to know we have been pushing this project, to get it done.  The county, NFCU, the state--all of us.  Pushing.  Unfortunately it is just dragging on and on and the completion date has slipped again.

But it is coming, and once complete it will GREATLY assist in the traffic flow east and west through Beulah.  And looking forward-once we complete the PD&E study for the Beulah Interchange, we will begin pressing hard for that project to get construction funding in the state's FDOT 5-year work program.  That project, once completed, will reduce East-West traffic on 9-mile road in Beulah by as much as 40%----as the Western portion of Beulah will have a closer option for accessing I-10 and thereby bypassing the NFCU campus and whatever is ultimately developed on the county's OLF 8 site.

What Happened to the Beulah Traffic Signals over this past Weekend--What is Happening Right Now?

This weekend in Beulah--the traffic signals on 9-Mile Road in front of Navy Federal Credit Union's two eastern-most entrances were way out of sync.

Something was definitely wrong--as the traffic began to stack up on 9-Mile Road going East and West---even though there were no cars going into or out of NFCU.  I was out running errands on Saturday and Sunday and knew, immediately, that something was wrong.

"Why is traffic stopped at 10:30AM on a Saturday??"

Drivers were getting frustrated---several went around cars waiting at the light and drove through the red lights.

So I immediately fired off emails to see if we could get this fixed ASAP.

And staff deserves credit for immediately engaging and working toward the solution right away.  Here are the emails:

"David [Forte],

This weekend the lights on 9-mile road at NFCU way and security place were WAY out of whack.  This created a nightmare for those of us going back and forth with our lives in and out of Beulah.  There would be long delays at both lights----long and unnecessary----even though there was zero traffic coming into and going out of NFCU.  It was ridiculous.  Can someone please look into this and see what went sideways with the timing this weekend—and can we please look at getting this fixed?  Thanks!

R/

Jeff Bergosh

Escambia Board of County Commissioners,

District 1

221 Palafox Place Suite 400

Pensacola, FL 32502

850-595-4910 office

850-377-2209 Voicemail

District1@myescambia.com

www.jeffbergoshblog.blogspot.com

@jeffbergosh"

To which I received the following responses:

"Will report this immediately.

Thanks."

"Kelli/Eric,

Please see the below email from Commissioner Bergosh re: the two traffic signals on 9 Mile Road and Navy Federal (Navy Federal Way and Heritage Oaks), and direct/respond accordingly. 

Please, also, advise as to the resolution(s).

Thanks."

This afternoon I received an email describing what caused the signal timing issue, and also the resolution:

"All:

On Friday Ingram Signalizations’ directional bore crew begain installation of the new signal conduit to service the intersection of Heriatage Oaks and 9-Mile Road. Currently the entire intersection is operating using temporary loops. As work progressed from the installation of the water and sewer, through the roadway pavement several splices and temporary connections were made. During the directional boring the crew inadvertantly hit the homerun (the main connection for the loops beneath the roadway. The crews did not recognize that they had damaged the loops and the signal went into the default mode and operated on the timing. There is not much impact or change during the day, however it became very noticable during the evening hours and thus the compalints were received.

Ingram was on-site this morning troubleshooting the issue. They discovered the damage and tried to make repairs however, they were onable to locate one end. They pulled new cabling and have completed re-wiring of the intersection and it is back in actuation mode. Ingram also reviewed the Navy Federal Intersection and all loops and cameras were functioning properly."

I'm told the technicians are still working the issue as of right now....as the first fix hasn't solved the problem...

"Mr. Bergosh:

My staff just reported that the signal seems to be lagging again. We have contacted Ingram Signalization and they will go back out and see what is happening.

Sincerely,

Michael Lenga

Project Administrator

Radiation Safety Officer

Stantec

8130 Pittman Ave."