Babcock Ranch now faces a legal challenge from the state of Florida about traffic concerns

On Jan. 28 the State of Florida filed the challenge against Charlotte County’s decision to move forward with the project. Lee County Commissioners had already filed suit, and thankfully the State agreed with the concerns over traffic impacts of Mr. Kitson's-Babcock Ranch in Charlotte County.

There needs to be an assurance in the development order that Kitson & Partners of West Palm Beach will pay for regional traffic impacts, according to the state’s challenge — the same reason Lee County opposed the Babcock plan.
“As the project develops in phases, our concern is the transportation needs won’t be fully addressed and the law requires that they be fully addressed,” said Jon Peck, a spokesman with the state’s Department of Community Affairs.

Kitson & Partners has proposed an incremental approach, working section by section to address traffic on the primary route to Babcock — State Road 31, a two-lane highway traveled by 12,200 cars per day, according to the latest county counts. But that approach, outlined in the development plan in Charlotte, does not follow a complex formula the state uses to calculate traffic impacts and the cost to relieve them. That led to the legal challenges.

“Shows we’re not too far out of sync,” Lee Commissioner Bob Janes said of Lee County’s and the state’s take on the project.

For those not familiar with what this is about:

Babcock Ranch is proposed as a new town of 45,000 people on 17,000 acres in northeast Lee and southeast Charlotte counties. It has been promoted as a self-sustaining town, with its own fire and police service, water and sewer plants, a mix of homes and businesses, and walking and biking trails to give people a reason to leave their cars at home.
But when they do leave their home and get on State Road 31, a state highway connecting Palm Beach Boulevard and Arcadia, the concern Lee and state officials have is how Kitson will address the traffic.