New plan gives regional organization direction to address barrier island traffic

The Sarasota/Manatee Metropolitan Planning Organization is advancing the Barrier Island Implementation Plan to identify actionable solutions to the traffic congestion in and around the region’s barrier islands. 

Representatives from the MPO held a public input session on June 11 to gather input from locals about what they view are the highest priorities in solving the barrier island traffic issues. At the session, eight roadway solutions were presented and available to be voted on. 

Of those, the two closest to Longboat Key are the Cortez Road and Gulf Drive intersection and St. Armands Circle. 

For the Cortez Road intersection, the implementable solution presented is to evaluate an extension of the right turn lane that often backs up traffic through Bradenton Beach and onto Longboat. 

Proposed solutions at St. Armands Circle included a new route to bypass the circle and raised pedestrian crossings to improve safety and slow traffic. 

Varshini Renikunta, a multi-modal planner with the MPO, was one of the representatives at the June 11 session and said the study is taking a high-level look at the traffic congestion problems on the barrier islands from Anna Maria Island down to Manasota Beach. 

“There have been multiple studies that were conducted in the barrier islands. So this study, what it did was it went back to all those studies, it brushed up the recommendations and came up with this list that are more implementable solutions,” Renikunta said.

Photo by Carter Weinhofer

One of those background studies is the Barrier Islands Traffic Study, which the Florida Department of Transportation launched in 2017 for $675,000. The study wrapped up in 2020 and included over 70 potential solutions within the 900-page study. 

The BITS was a zoomed-out look at traffic congestion on the barrier islands and encompassed solutions spanning from pedestrian fixes to alternate transportation and parking. 

In the BITS were recommendations like increasing water transport — which became the Gulf Islands Ferry — and looking into replacements for the Cortez Bridge and Longboat Pass Bridge. 

Some of those recommendations progressed, like the water ferry and the Cortez Bridge, which is scheduled to be replaced starting in 2026. 

“There is progress of recommendations from (the Barrier Islands Traffic Study),” Renikunta said. “But this is looking at what we can do next.”

Renikunta said the new implementation plan is not a direct extension of the BITS, but rather a more zoomed-in investigation into the most implementable solutions. This includes short, mid and long-range solutions. Renikunta estimated the implementation plan study cost around $300,000 for the year-long endeavor. 

The implementation plan looked at data over 10 years using information obtained from Google Maps and similar services. The data gives organizations like the MPO insights into travel times, predictability and congestion severity. 

The data also gives insights into peak season versus non-peak season, congestion frequency and the difference between weekends versus weekdays. 

All of this data allowed the MPO to create a 3-D model of barrier island traffic congestion, which is now available on the Barrier Island Implementation Plan website. 

Courtesy image

The MPO planners used this data to identify the largest hotspots, then built the eight recommendations around those hotspots. 

While none of the eight suggested solutions are on Longboat Key, Renikunta said addressing the hotspots around the barrier islands — like the Cortez Road intersection — would help the larger issue. 

“There are still some spots of congestion in Longboat, but we felt these are more doable, more implementable and would solve the higher problem,” Renikunta said. 

Also included in the Barrier Island Implementation Plan are policy options that Renikunta said could help the MPO build implementations. 

Those policy actions include vehicle restrictions, parking policies, traffic studies, free transit, expanding multi-modal options and various resiliency measures. The idea, Renikunta said, is to give areas a toolkit of policy recommendations that could also help address traffic congestion issues on the barrier islands. 

Traffic congestion remains the most important issue to Longboat Key residents, according to the town’s annual citizens survey. 

In the 2025 survey, 98% of respondents felt it was “very important” or “somewhat important” to address traffic congestion. Additionally, 56.7% of the open-ended responses from the survey were about traffic congestion, road conditions or pedestrian safety. 

Commissioner-At-Large Steve Branham is the town commission’s representative on the MPO. He recently took over the position after winning the seat left vacant by Mike Haycock. Haycock also served as the town’s MPO representative. 

Still learning the ropes of his new position, Branham said he was not too familiar with the implementation plan, but knows the Cortez Road intersection and traffic along Bradenton Beach is a top priority for Longboat Key North, the group of homeowners associations on the island's north end. 

He said he is engaged with the Longboat Key North Group, as is District 5 Commissioner Sarah Karon, to work on alleviating the traffic pressures up on that end. 

The MPO frequently holds public meetings, and the schedule, along with the organization’s contact information, is at MyMPO.org.