Santa Rosa considering adding tolls at Navarre Beach Bridge
The Santa Rosa County Commission will look at taking $1.5 million previously set aside to pay for a PD&E study at the Navarre Beach Causeway Bridge and putting it toward installing tolling devices at the span to collect funds to be to put toward maintenance and eventual construction of a new bridge.
Commissioner Ray Eddington has been pressing fellow board members to start looking seriously at replacing the aging bridge. At Thursday's regular commission meeting he said establishing a toll "is the only way I can see to do it and get money coming in."
Fellow commissioners agreed to discuss the idea of establishing tolls at its next meeting. A proposal will be put on the agenda for the county's Feb. 24 meeting.
Commission Chairman Kerry Smith said tolling "is gonna have to fly" with a majority of the governing board.
"It's the only way we're going to pay for anything, even just the cost of repairs for the bridge," he said.
County Budget Director Sabrina White informed the board that $1.5 million had been set aside in the FY 2024 budget to use for a Planning, Development and Environmental study, which the Florida Department of Transportation requires be conducted for projects it funds or participates in helping to fund.
But according to Assistant County Administrator Jared Lowe, it looks less and less likely FDOT is going to participate with the county to cover the cost of a new bridge.
"It's not theirs and they really have no interest in chipping in," he said.
The state turned the bridge over to Santa Rosa County in the early 2000's, and allocated dollars at that time to assist with maintenance, but Eddington estimated that the cost of county upkeep alone has reached $5 million.
County staff had raised the idea of establishing a toll on the Navarre Beach Causeway Bridge during last year's budget meetings.
Based on information obtained by looking at toll by plate systems utilized in neighboring counties, staff concluded that establishing a toll of between 50 cents and $1.50 per crossing at the bridge could raise approximately $2 million annually to be put toward bridge maintenance and construction.
When commissioners rejected the idea of tolls last year, they did so prior to a referendum being held that asked county residents to implement a half-cent sales tax for use on transportation initiatives. That referendum failed at the ballot.
Eddington said following Thursday's meeting he thought the 50 cent to $1.50 charge to travel the bridge was a good starting point for discussion.
He said he doesn't want to overburden residents of Navarre Beach or Santa Rosa County residents.
"We've got to look out for people who live here, maybe make it a little higher for people coming in from out of town," he said. "We've got to sit down and look at the numbers and see what we can do that doesn't hurt anybody."
White suggested the tolling method county staff will present for commissioner consideration is what is known as a "gantry system." The system utilizes an overhead structure that collects tolls through transponders or via automatic license plate recognition.
Lowe said cost estimates for implementing the tolling system will be gathered prior to the Feb. 24 meeting.
In an email, White said commissioners will be presented with an estimated cost of hiring an engineer to design a gantry toll by plate system and develop a chart of potential tiered rates. The tiered rates would be calculated to charge differing rates for beach residents, county residents and out-of-county individuals.
More: Navarre Beach Bridge converting to one-way traffic after Blue Angels show Saturday
The Navarre Beach Causeway Bridge was built as a toll bridge, but tolls were eliminated in 2006 through the efforts of then-County Commissioner Gordon Gooden and then-State Rep. Ray Sansom.
Samson said when he introduced legislation seeking to end the toll, the bridge had been paid off and the money being collected was primarily going toward paying the people collecting the tolls.
"I was excited to see that toll removed," Sansom said. "But that was a long time ago and so many things have changed."
The two-lane Navarre Beach Causeway Bridge was built in 1960 and is listed by the Florida Department of Transportation as "functionally obsolete," which is a term given to roads that "do not meet the state's current roadway design standards."
In 2021 the county directed staff to begin drafting a request for proposals for companies who could perform a feasibility study to look at options for replacing the bridge.
The report generated through the study, released in 2023, identified three options to be considered for bridge replacement. All options took into consideration FDOT's plans to widen U.S. 98 to six lanes through Navarre and an overpass at the current Navarre Beach Bridge intersection.
Alternative one pinpointed in the feasibility study would take out the existing bridge and replace it within the same footprint with a single structure that rises to 65 feet above the Santa Rosa Sound to meet Coast Guard standards.
The second alternative would extend the bridge from State Road 87 and U.S. 98 across the sound and land it on county property adjacent to the Navarre Island Wastewater Treatment Plant.
The third would also incorporate State Road 87 and U.S. 98 into planning and would "cross Santa Rosa Sound in an S-curve pattern" to connect with the existing southernmost landing of the bridge.
The county was approached last year by a Delaware company called Delivering Bridges LLC, which offered to tear down and rebuild the bridge for between $150 and $200 million.
Under the plan Delivering Bridges would, upon completion, manage the new bridge's maintenance and toll functions through either an ownership option or lease agreement
The company envisioned toll charges of between $2.35 and $3.35.
A second alternative presented by Delivering Bridges would have seen the bridge constructed at a location other than where the existing one stands now at a cost of $250 to $300 million. Tolls on the more expensive alternative were estimated to have run between $4.25 and $5.20.
This article originally appeared on Pensacola News Journal: Navarre Beach Bridge tolls considered by Santa Rosa Commissioners
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