Scott directs FDOT to better prepare Florida for hurricane evacuations

Bumper-to-bumper traffic and dried-up gas stations caused by Hurricane Irma led Gov. Rick Scott on Friday to direct the state transportation department to implement certain interstate traffic and fuel practices in future emergencies.

Major improvements detailed in recently released reports from the Florida Department of Transportation include expanding lanes at the Interstate 75-Florida Turnpike interchange in Wildwood — construction will start at the beginning of this year’s hurricane season — and seeking out fuel storage opportunities at ports.

Sooner than those projects, Scott expects that by June, FDOT will be able to start installing more cameras to monitor traffic along interstates, fortify the Florida 511 traffic website to handle more online use and allow for more shoulder use in the event of emergency. Plans are set to add cameras to highways in the northern portion of the state by next spring. Other parts of I-75, including in Manatee County, also lack camera coverage.

By July, the department should figure out which gas stations are most critical on evacuation routes, increase fuel storage capabilities for first responders and get help from nearby states to move oversize vehicles during emergencies, per Scott’s direction.

“As Florida continues to recover from Hurricane Irma, the largest storm to impact our state in modern history, it is critically important that we continue to do all we can to make sure our state is fully prepared in the face of any potential disaster,” Scott said.

A month after the storm hit, Scott directed the department to look for ways to improve how evacuation could have been improved, especially since nearly 7 million Floridians were ordered to evacuate. Hurricane Harvey, which hit Houston about two weeks before Irma, also damaged major ports and affected fuel supply to Florida.

Sen. Bill Nelson’s spokesman Ryan Brown had a scathing rebuttal to the announcement. The Democratic senator sent a letter to U.S. Department of Energy Secretary Rick Perry to establish a gas supply reserve with two locations on each of Florida’s coasts, like what was done in the northeastern part of the country in 2014 after Hurricane Sandy. He filed a bill that October.

“Unlike Nelson’s bill, this report today by the governor doesn’t offer any real solutions, it simply asks the state to look at doing something Nelson proposed five months ago,” Brown said.

This story was originally published February 2, 2018 at 2:51 PM with the headline "Scott directs FDOT to better prepare Florida for hurricane evacuations."