See the changes planned for one of Winter Park's most dangerous roads
Commissioners looked at final concepts for the plan to fix S.R. 426, though the city’s share of the cost is still unclear
April 1, 2025
By Charles Maxwell
Final plans are ready for the long talked about improvements to the unusually narrow and curvy 1.7-mile stretch of State Road 426 between Park Avenue and Lakemont Avenue, but it’s still unclear how much the city will pay for its share of the project.
State data shows the busy stretch of S.R. 426 averages six car crashes per month and more than 4,000 speed violations daily. The road is controlled by the state of Florida, but serves as a major east-west passage through Winter Park, winding around and over the city’s chain of lakes.
Residents who live on the lakes and off the side streets have called for years for improved safety features.
Final plans show repaved roads, raised medians, and new high-visibility crosswalks to help prevent collisions, bring down travel speeds and protect pedestrians. Construction of the project is expected to start in early 2026.
City of Winter Park engineer Hongmyung Lim told the City Commission during a work session last week what he’s heard from residents throughout the Florida Department of Transportation’s design work on the project.
“A lot of the stakeholders and residents wanted general support for pedestrian features and safety, and slowing down traffic on 426,” Lim said.
Primary concerns included turning left safely onto S.R. 426 from the side streets and safely turning into driveways and side streets from the main road. Requests also included several additional traffic signals.
The plans include raised intersections with high visibility crosswalks at Chase Avenue, Sylvan Drive, and Cortland Ave, along with three different raised crosswalks with pedestrian hybrid beacons and advanced signage to help pedestrians safely cross dangerous roadways.
Vice president of American Structurepoint and project manager for the project’s design phase, Nick Harrison, addressed the commission and elaborated on each of the proposed improvements. Harrison believes that the changes, such as raised crosswalks, will encourage drivers to slow down and punish the vehicles that choose not to. “If you’re traveling 45-50 mph, it’s going to create a problem for you,” said Harrison.
The city of Winter Park made an initial financial commitment of $1.8 million to support the project on September 27, 2023, but is expected to reduce its investment as some of the scope of work has been reduced.
Due to maintenance challenges and complications, Lim said that some original features, such as brick intersections, landscaped medians, and bus stop pavement markings, have been removed from the plans.
“The city would be responsible for maintaining those bricks whenever they popped out, and also if we were to have landscaping inside the medians our team would have to go out there to make sure it’s maintained and trimmed… we ensured that any of these changes did not impact the intent of the traffic operations of the project,” said Lim. “We’ve been coordinating with FDOT and will determine a final financial commitment soon.”
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Charles Maxwell is a graduate of Winter Park High School and Florida Atlantic University with a degree in multimedia studies. His work has appeared in the South Florida Sun Sentinel and The Boca Raton Tribune, and he is a contributing writer for Keeping it Heel on the FanSided network.
Raised speed tables & crosswalks are hateful! Why don’t you simply enforce the existing speed limits (Use cameras)?
Why would these raised speed tables and crosswalks be hateful? If one follows the speed limits they should not be a problem. Likely they will be designed so if one does follow the speed limit one glides over them. Then still enforce the speed limits with cameras as well if possible. Now that ought to keep people from speeding.
though i can appreciate the attention to the proposed “traffic-calming” features along 426, i remain very disappointed that the city has continued to promote various projects over & above the “Pennsylvania” bricks fiasco that was the result of its extremely ill-founded decision years ago.
it is well-known that the primary impact of this project has been felt by the local residents and those who must travel this route to service winter park, not to mention the thousands of dollars spent on vehicle repairs.
i had heard at some point that this was to be a near-term project which has not happened. i would hope this disaster of a road would gain the attention it deserves.
and as long as i’m complaining, i would mention that the new speed bumps that have been installed in various locations including old winter park road are jarring at any speed and would appear to have been an easy fix to a kinder speed bump design such as those Orlando has installed or those along lake howell road.
As a resident of Winter Park for over 40 years and a homeowner on South Pennsylvania Ave. I wish to AMEN these comments. I can only conclude the City’s traffic coming idea when the expected Traffic from the coming Baldwin Park development and a federal grant resulted in this mistake and nightmare maintenance problem for the city street department and car owners!
I have a simple, cheap traffic calming solution. Mill the pavement down to the gritty under layer, a la Lakemont Ave. recently during re-paving. Everyone crawls along and people avoid the road. Voila!
I’m sure the people who diverted onto Phelps went nice and slow there, right?!?
These changes will definitely slow people down, which is very much needed. The question is…..will people divert onto quiet side streets to avoid them? If this happens, I will be starting a LOUD campaign to put pressure on Winter Park to add speed bumps on our streets too and start ticketing by our homes. You don’t fix problems for some residents by creating problems for another group of residents. I’m glad they are fixing 426, I just want the problem actually fixed….not just diverted.
If anyone thinks these ” traffic calming ” improvements will change anything, you are sadly mistaken. It won’t slow traffic down enough to make any appreciable difference and it darn sure won’t decrease the amount of traffic coming east to west and vice versa. A further unintended consequence, will be the increase in traffic on Palmer which is already a mess.
BRIDGES!!! While having cars slow down on that road is great, the raised crosswalks still pose a hazard as many distracted drivers aren’t paying attention and rip through the streets dangerously. I don’t trust people slowing down enough to see pedestrians going through. I propose bridges be put in place for pedestrians to cross 426 from Rollins to Downtown WP. That sounds a lot safer than to hope cars will stop at a pedestrian crossing.
I think they should have raised mediums and traffic circles. Force people to only turn right and go to a traffic circle to turn around. People need to be patient and not be in a hurry all the time. You don’t need to race everywhere.