Under the FDOT the westbound toll collection was eliminated on the Dolphin due to traffic backing up onto I-95. The plaza was rebuilt to charge 25 cents instead of 10 cents in each direction.
As population and traffic growth increased, officials wanted local control to best fund expansion and maintenance of the five expressways without increasing property or sales taxes while eliminating dependency upon proportionate sharing of gas tax revenues with 66 other Florida counties.
In 1994, a legislative act created the MDX as an “agency of the state” with full authority over the Dolphin, Shula, Snapper Creek, Gratigny and Airport expressways while two others — Palmetto (SR 826) and I-95 — would remain administered by the State Department of Transportation. The newly created MDX was approved to maintain five of Dade’s expressways and plan expansion from their toll revenues.
“As an ‘agency of the state,’ the MDX is answerable to every requirement and policy as a ‘state agency’ such as the Department of Transportation,” Rodriguez emphasized in an effort to clarify the entity’s status.
“Accountability is at three basic levels, beginning with the governor of Florida and all state departments concerned with transportation, the Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO) of Dade County, and a 13-member board of directors that issues an annual report of revenues and expenditures,” Rodriguez stated.
Of the 13 members, 12 are non-paid, volunteer business and civic leaders and the 13th is the Florida Department of Transportation District Six Secretary who serves as an ex-officio MDX board member. Of the 12 volunteers, Florida’s governor appoints five and Miami-Dade Commissioners appoint the remaining seven. The board meets monthly, he said.
Since becoming operational in 1996, MDX has invested nearly $700 million in completed projects through June 2010, invested approximately $400 million in ongoing projects and has committed to invest some $500 million in the upcoming five years.
The MDX additionally has contributed $400 million in joint construction projects with other state and local governmental agencies, resurfaced the entire MDX system and upgraded its bridges.
Answering audience queries, Rodriguez said the annual toll revenue for 2010 is projected at $124 million (inclusive of the Gratigny, Snapper Creek and Shula collections through Open Road Tolling, compared with $112 million total in 2009.
The current $494 million five-year program includes a partnership with FDOT in the development of a Shula connection to a future widening of the Palmetto Expressway to better interface the two roadways, as well as the massive Palmetto-Dolphin interchange project.
In answer to questions of “bonding the future,” Rodriguez pointed out that the MDX actually reduced long-term costs of an existing bonded debt by refinancing at lower interest, effecting savings of $70 million.
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