After having traveled to Miami, Orlando, Key West, throughout Tampa Bay, to Northwest Florida several times, and all around the rest of Florida in 2006, Jacksonville was last on the list of places to document. The opportunity to drive to Jacksonville, Florida arose sooner than Justin and I thought as my brother in law was in the area for a week long visit. Coupling that with the Fourth of July holiday, and a spur of the moment road trip was born.
Jacksonville hosted the Superbowl in 2004, and that meant sprucing up the city in preparation for the worldwide spotlight. Whatever they did to the city, it appears to have worked. Downtown bustles with a riverside mall, the Main Street Bridge featured in the superbowl logo was repainted and allows for pedestrian traffic, new skyscrapers are going up, and the overall atmosphere of the city is much better. It paints a prettier picture than the Jacksonville I remember from the 1980s.
As for AARoads, we have Interstate 95 documented well, and Interstate 10 eastbound from a drive I did in 2004. Carter has also passed along several photos he’s shot of Interstate 295 and Florida 9A that we’ve not gotten to posting online yet. Otherwise we have no photos of any of the non-Interstate freeways including U.S. 1 Alternate, the Arlington Expressway, the Hart Bridge Expressway, and Butler Boulevard.
On the way to Jacksonville, we opted for Florida 121 north from Gainesville into Charlton County, Georgia. That gave us the chance to see one of the segments of Georgia 94, a highway number that switches to Florida 2 at the points where it crosses into the Sunshine State. The section we took was east of St. George into Nassau County. As it works out, Georgia 94 turns into Nassau County 2, and not Florida 2, and the state line crossing was poorly marked on the way into Florida, and only one County 2 pentagon was posted, that being on Nassau 108 south.
From there we took U.S. 1 & 23 south from Callahan. It’s interesting to note that the street signs at intersections for the tandem show it as “SR 15”, which is U.S. 1’s hidden counterpart in Florida. Much to our surprise, aside a subdivision called Hunter’s Green, there was virtually no suburban sprawl along the U.S. highway between Callahan and Interstate 295.
Once on Interstate 295, we headed east to Florida 9A. This was the first time for me to take Florida 9A, and we opted for southbound to crest over the Dame’s Point Bridge at roughly the same time the Discovery was set to launch from Cape Canaveral. The NASA space shuttle was supposed to launch on Saturday July 1, then Sunday July 2. Well bad weather forced the launch back twice, and officials decided for an Independence Day time at around 3:30 in the afternoon. We just happened to be getting on Jacksonville’s beltway in time, and our timing was perfect. Listening to the launch on XM CNN, we hear liftoff and a few seconds later, “there it is!” a contrail streak in the sky just as we crested over the Florida 9A bridge over the St. Johns River. Not only did we see the contrail, but also noted the fireball from the rocket booster separation!
Approaching the Dame’s Point Bridge along Florida 9A southbound.
The adreneline was pumping for witnessing the launch. I have to admit that it was utterly fantastic to have witnessed that, and being where we were, it was a perfect setting! Now back to the roads, Florida 9A is done as a freeway for all but the interchange with Florida 202 (J. Turner Butler Boulevard, aka the JTB). There’s a diamond there right now, with traffic lights governing the movements between the future I-295 and JTB east/west. There’s pier supports for future flyovers in place, and ramp grading as well. It doesn’t appear that there’s much more to do, but the site http://www.northfloridaroads.com indicates a Summer 2009 timetable completion date. So there’s plenty more to do before Florida 9A becomes Interstate 295.
Spaceshuttle Discovery zooms toward space as visible from the Dames Point Bridge 130 miles to the north.
The new interchange between Interstates 95, 295, and Florida 9A on the south side is completed and it’s straight out of southern California with its design. High speed flyovers in CA style supports carry motorists between the two freeways. To the north, road work is underway involving the Interstate 10 eastern terminus for a similar high-powered interchange.
We opted for the Main Street Bridge into downtown, and then surface streets to the Arlington Expressway. The Main Street Bridge is painted in a brilliant deep blue color. There’s a wide pedestrian sidewalk and views of downtown and the riverside mall. The north end of the bridge splits into ramps onto the surface streets below.
Traveling northbound across the Main Street Bridge into downtown Jacksonville.
The Arlington Expressway is a 1960s-vintage freeway leading east from the All-Tel Stadium area to U.S. 90 Regency Square Mall. The east-west highway crosses the St. Johns River along the cantilevered Mathews Bridge high above. An old style viaduct exists along the freeway to the west and to the east of the river is a freeway lined with frontage roads in a format similar to U.S. 29 in Greensboro, NC. A county project is underway a the junction with Southside Boulevard to construct a high-speed interchange.
The Mathews Bridge spans the St. Johns River along the Arlington Expressway.
The Arlington Expressway eastbound on the approach to Arlington Road. The 1960s freeway reminds me of Tidewater Boulevard (Virginia 168) in Norfolk.
Southside Boulevard, despite what many maps display, is not a full freeway. In fact the road isn’t even an expressway, despite interchanges with Arlington Expressway, a SPUI with U.S. 90 (Beach Boulevard), and an exit for the Regency Square Mall.
We took U.S. 90 east to Jacksonville Beach to see it’s eastern terminus. I saw the western terminus in Van Horn back in January, and so seeing the eastern terminus of one of my favorite routes really capped it off for me. The junction with Florida A1A was somewhat crowded with 4th of July beach goers, but otherwise was a nice end for the five-state route.
U.S. 90 stops just short of the Atlantic Ocean at Florida A1A in Jacksonville Beach.
From Jacksonville Beach, we took JTB west to Southside Boulevard to make the jaunt north to U.S. 90 (Beach Boulevard) west. U.S. 90 splits with the Hart Bridge Expressway just west of the Southside SPUI for South Jacksonville. The Hart Bridge Expressway (unnumbered initially), merges with U.S. 1A before crossing the St. John River over the arched Hart Bridge. The Hart Bridge looks a lot like Interstate 695’s Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore for what it’s worth. At the north end is the split with U.S. 1A. A freeway spurs into downtown along the river and adjacent to All-Tel Stadium. This freeway provides direct access onto Florida 228 ahead of its intersection with U.S. 1-17-90. U.S. 1A meanwhile travels north along Martin Luther King Jr. Parkway toward the Springfield section of the city along another 1960s-vintage freeway.
The Hart Street Bridge carries U.S. 1 Alternate over the St. Johns River near All-Tel Stadium.
U.S. 1 Alternate travels the Martin Luther King Jr. Parkway, a 1960s-vintage freeway to the north and east of downtown.
The end of our roadding in Jacksonville took us south along Interstate 95 to Interstate 295 west and Orange Park. The bridges across the St. Johns River each carry four lanes of travel. Due to suburban crushes of traffic during the peak hours, the right-hand two lanes of Interstate 295 default into the exits with U.S. 17 and Florida 21. I’ve never seen this before, at least actually enforced, but solid white lanes prevent lane chances along the west end of the bridge and on the approaches to both aforementioned exits. The back-ups are so bad that traffic movements have to be segregated to accomodate through traffic interests along Interstate 295 north. The U.S. 17 off-ramp expands to four lanes before meeting the highway and the Florida 21 off-ramp departs almost a full mile ahead of its end. That’s some suburban sprawl in action for you.
Interstate 95 southbound at the new stack interchange with Interstate 295 & Florida 9A
The afternoon light shimmers against the St. Johns River as Interstate 295 nears the suburban community of Orange Park.
The rest of the trip involved heading down Florida 21 to the Clay County town of Middelburg to hang out with Dan for the evening. All in all it was a great way to spend Independence Day, and Justin and I have to give Jacksonville kudos for being a great city.
