Medians Between Lanes

[realjd]

East of Orlando, they recently opened a new road through the middle of nowhere to provide a southern exit to what had previously been a fairly isolated part of town. Part of the road is really weird. It has two lanes in each direction, with medians separating the lanes and just a double yellow separating directions. You can see it here:
http://maps.google.com/?ie=UTF8&ll=28.458869,-81.166041&spn=0.00092,0.001717&t=k&z=20

Both lanes in each direction are open to traffic. My first thought was that they wanted separated bus lanes but traffic is so ridiculously low and it's so far out of the way that I don't know why they would have bothered.

Do any of you know why they would have done it this way?

[1995hoo]

According to the YouTube video linked below, the part in the middle will be bus lanes in the future.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ySp_77j2O3Q&feature=autofb

Until I looked at the satellite view you linked, the first thing I thought of was parking lanes. Some roads in my area have median-separated lanes providing access to driveways and parallel parking separate from the thru traffic. But that's clearly not the case on the road you reference.

See also this PDF below from Orange County's website, which lists the middle portion as a bus lane:

http://tinyurl.com/3muteea

[realjd]

Cool, thanks for the info! It's going to take a LOT of growth out there before they have an actual need for bus lanes. I guess it's good they're planning ahead.

[NE2]

Innovation Way is supposed to be a major corridor for high-tech business, and would presumably have bus service to UCF on the north and Lake Nona (medical campus) on the southwest. But yes, this is a little weird.

[realjd]

I know they're supposed to connect the Innovation Way that ends right before the 528 (i.e. Avalon Park Blvd) with the Innovation Way that has an exit on the 417, but they're going to upgrade it with those goofy bus lanes also? Or are those just going in on the new portion connecting the two segments?

If you have a good source for project info, that may be better then me pestering you guys with questions.

[NE2]

Innovation Way is and will remain as a normal four-lane. The bus lanes are only on Monument Parkway, which was fast-tracked when the OOCEA delayed on building the eventual interchange at 528 and Innovation. The new interchange is still planned, at which time the existing interchange will most likely be closed.

http://www.openstreetmap.org/?lat=28.4412&lon=-81.2001&zoom=14&layers=M

My guess is that after a few crashes from left-turning drivers who don't realize there's a bus roadway, buses will have to stop at every intersection.

[Ace10]

Hey, I've driven on that road before! I do agree, it is a little odd having the parallel lanes separated, but I do agree it could be useful to have thru traffic separated from other traffic needing to access driveways or traffic. But yes, that area is very undeveloped (except for a power plant and landfill nearby) so maybe they planned too far ahead? I dunno.

And just for the record, I drove in the middle lanes for the buses, but there was no signage directing drivers to which lane to use at the time.