Red Road (Miami)

Red Road

West 57th Avenue
Red Road in 1921 in Coral Gables
Maintained by	FDOT
Length	20.6 mi[1] (33.2 km) Two non-contiguous segments interrupted by Miami International Airport
Location	Miami-Dade, Broward
South end	South 136th Street / Howard Drive in Coral Gables
North end	SR 823 in Miramar
Construction
Inauguration	1921 (1921)

Red Road, also known as West 57th Avenue, is a 20.6-mile (33.2 km) main north-south street running west of downtown Miami in Miami-Dade County, Florida and into Broward County. Red Road is signed as State Road 959 from U.S. 1 to the south end of the Miami International Airport, and State Road 823 from U.S. 27 to the Broward County line.

Route description

Southern section

The southern terminus is at South 136th Street (Howard Drive) in Gables by the Sea, with the incorporated village of Pinecrest to the northwest corner and the city of Coral Gables to the east and south. Red Road goes north through a residential area until it dead ends at Campamento Avenue in Coral Gables. It resumes just south of Old Cutler Road at the Gulliver Academy campus' west end. Red Road and Old Cutler Road are cosigned as they head north for a short distance until Old Cutler Road veers east.

Red Road continues north, skirting the east side of Pinecrest as West 57th Avenue, roughly dividing it from Coral Gables until it crosses Kendall Drive (South 88th Street/SR 94) where it divides the city of South Miami to the west from a plot of unincorporated Miami-Dade County to the east.^[2]

North of Sunset Drive (South 72nd Street/SR 986) it divides the city of South Miami from Coral Gables.

State Road 959 begins at the intersection with Red Road and US 1 (South Dixie Highway), with SR 959 heading north, going through the southwestern end of the University of Miami campus, and then through residential areas, as it acts as the dividing line between Coral Gables to its east and South Miami and patches of unincorporated Miami-Dade County to the west between US 1 and SR 976 (Bird Road).^[3] North of Bird Road, Red Road continues through the residential sections of Coral Gables, and enters the residential areas of West Miami, crossing US 41 (Tamiami Trail). SR 959 then enters Miami, intersecting SR 968 (Flagler Street). North of NW 5th Street, Red Road becomes more commercial as it approaches the airport area, with a major shopping center and hotel at the intersection with NW 7th Street. SR 959 then crosses a canal and has an interchange with the Dolphin Expressway (SR 836), with the road terminating just north of the interchange at an dead end intersection with North 12th Street/Perimeter Road, just south of the Miami International Airport runway. This is also the end of the southern segment of Red Road.^[4]

Northern section

The road continues on the north side of Miami International Airport at North 36th Street and runs through the city of Miami Springs as Curtiss Parkway, their main north-south road, until it ends at Hunting Lodge Drive where Curtiss Parkway curves northeast.

At the northside of the Miami Canal at Okeechobee Road (US 27), Red Road resumes and runs through the city of Hialeah as their West 4th Avenue and signed as SR 823. It exits Hialeah when it crosses West 84th Street (Hialeah grid) or North 135th Street (Miami-Dade County grid) and again becomes Northwest 57th Avenue.

It continues north dividing the incorporated town of Miami Lakes to the west from Opa-locka Airport and the city of Miami Gardens to the east until it crosses the Palmetto Expressway (SR 826) where it continues to run north through unincorporated Miami-Dade County.

North of North 202nd Street (Honey Hill Drive) it divides Broward County and the city of Miramar to the west with unincorporated Miami-Dade County to the east, until it fully enters Broward County and Miramar just south of the Homestead Extension of Florida's Turnpike (State Road 821).^[5]

It continues north into Broward County and Miramar for a short distance, curving northwest starting at the intersection with Miramar Parkway, and merges onto Flamingo Road.

History

When George Merrick made plans for the layout of Coral Gables in the 1920s he intended Red Road to be the western boundary of his planned city. The east–west Coral Way (SR 972), the northeast-southwest South Dixie Highway (soon to be designated US 1), and the north–south Ponce de Leon Boulevard were intended to be main throughways, and the Tamiami Trail (soon to be part of US 94, which would in turn be folded into US 41 in 1949) was planned to be the northern boundary.

Red Road gets its name from the color of the mark Merrick made when he drew the road on his planning map; similarly, an east–west street was drawn in with a blue pencil and was named Blue Road.

The section of Red Road between Killian Drive and the Miami International Airport received its FDOT of SR 959 designation in 1980. Its original configuration was 2.7-mile (4.3 km) longer as it stretched southward to the intersection of Red Road and Southwest 111th Street (Killian Drive), where it met the eastern end of SR 990 just outside the parking lot of the original Parrot Jungle, a major tourist attraction. Between 1995 and 2001, FDOT truncated several State Roads in Miami-Dade County, and both SR 959 and SR 990 were cut back to terminate at US 1.

Major intersections

County	Location	mi[6][7][8][9]	km	Destinations	Notes
Miami-Dade	Coral Gables			SW 136th Street/Howard Drive
				Campamento Avenue	Dead end northbound
		Gap in route
				Gulliver Academy Entrance	Dead end southbound
				Old Cutler Road	South end of concurrency
				Old Cutler Road	North end of concurrency
				SW 112th Street/Killian Parkway
				Kendall Drive
	South Miami–Coral Gables line	0.000	0.000	Sunset Drive/SW 72nd street
		0.217	0.349	US 1 (South Dixie Highway)	Southern terminus of SR 959
	Coral Gables	2.038	3.280	SR 976 (SW 40th Street)
	West Miami	4.072	6.553	US 41 / SR 90 (SW 8th Street)
	Miami	4.570	7.355	SR 968 (W Flagler Street)
	​	5.446– 5.556	8.764– 8.942	SR 836 (Dolphin Expressway)
	​	5.598	9.009	Perimeter Road	Northern terminus of SR 959
	Gap in route
	​			SR 948 (NW 36th Street)
	​			Hunting Lodge Drive
	Gap in route
	Hialeah	0.000	0.000	US 27 / SR 25 (Okeechobee Road)	Southern terminus of SR 823
		0.758	1.220	SR 934 (Hialeah Expressway / 21st Street)
	Palm Springs	2.540	4.088	SR 932 (49th Street)
	Miami Lakes	4.483– 4.645	7.215– 7.475	SR 924 (Gratigny Parkway)
		4.754	7.651	SR 916 (West 84th Street / Northwest 135th Street)
		6.566– 6.611	10.567– 10.639	SR 826 (Palmetto Expressway) / Northwest 167th Street
		7.569	12.181	SR 860 (Miami Gardens Drive / Northwest 183rd Street)
		8.780	14.130	Northwest 202nd Avenue (Honey Hill Drive)	Former SR 854
Broward	Miramar	9.604– 9.894	15.456– 15.923	Turnpike Extension / SR 821	Exit 43 on Homestead Extension
		10.260	16.512	CR 858 (Miramar Parkway)	To SR 858
		11.697	18.824	SR 823 north (Flamingo Road)	Northern terminus of Red Road
1.000 mi = 1.609 km; 1.000 km = 0.621 mi       Concurrency terminus

References