FDOT District One: Atlas of Growth
A Region on the Threshold
History of growth
Today’s decisions will impact tomorrow’s prosperity.
Growth and economic activity in the U.S. are concentrated in 11 mega-regions. The state of Florida is its own mega-region.
Florida is one of 11 mega-regions in the US, which is significant because these regions account for more than 70% of the nation’s population and jobs.
District One is within the Florida mega-region, and along with District Five, is growing at a faster rate than any other FDOT District. Growth is expected to continue.
The dashboard to the right explores projected growth among the FDOT districts and the MPOs within District One. Individual districts and MPOs can be selected using the drop-down menus in the upper right hand corner.
The District’s growth has organized along I-4 and I-75 corridors leveraging the high speed and intercity connections provided by these facilities.
More than 80% of the District’s population and traded industry jobs are located within ten miles of interstates and expressways.
The development patterns in District One create three distinct regions with their own unique characteristics:
- Coastal Tourism Region
- Polk Central Distribution Region
- Inland Rural and Agricultural Region
The Coastal and Polk regions continue to grow, while the Inland Region's growth has leveled.
The dashboard to the right explores the development history across the district. The selectors in the upper right allows you to focus on different MPO areas and view development footprints from 1970 to 2020.
Polk County
Polk County has experienced unprecedented growth, and is expected to grow at the second highest rate in the District, reaching over one million people by 2035.
Polk’s role as a key distribution hub for Florida will continue. Sun Rail has planned extensions into Polk County, and Virgin Trains is planning an extension to Tampa Bay with a possible stop in Polk County.
Sarasota and Manatee Counties
Sarasota and Manatee Counties combined are expected to reach one million people by 2035.
Port Manatee’s cargo throughput reached 10.4 million tons in 2021 and will continute to increase.
Total passenger traffic at Sarasota Bradenton International during Q1 and Q2 experienced 73% increase from 1.8 million passengers in 2019 to 3.2 million passengers in 2021.
Charlotte County
Charlotte County and the coastal communities have experienced unprecedented growth. While Charlotte County’s population is lower than other coastal counties in Southwest Florida, its rate of growth is higher than the District as a whole.
Lee County
Since 1970, the population growth rate in Lee County – along with its bordering counties of Collier and Charlotte – has been higher than the District as a whole. Lee County's consistent growth will continue.
Fort Myers/Cape Coral/Naples metro area reached one million people in 2012.
Total passengers through Southwest Florida Regional Airport reached a high point of 10.3 million in 2021.
Collier County
Collier County’s population growth rate has outpaced all other counties in the district. Collier County’s growth is anchored by economic drivers including hospitality, tourism, and business services.
Fort Myers/Cape Coral/Naples metro area reached one million people in 2012.
Heartland Region
While Polk and the coastal counties within District One have experienced steady increases to their growth rate, the growth in the Heartland Counties has plateaued.
Development Patterns
Development Patterns Over Time
Pre-1970 development
The development footprint before 1970 exhibits compact development patterns with smaller block sizes, a gridded street network, and a balanced jobs to housing ratio. This provides residents with job proximity, which encourages more walking and distributes vehicular traffic across the network. The local and state networks are interlinked, both pulling their weight, working as a connected transportation system to efficiently move people.
Post-1970 development
Development patterns since 1970 responded to market demand for larger lots, privacy, security, and reduced residential traffic. These suburban patterns offer fewer employment opportunities, and the street network has few connections to state roadways with fewer alternative routes to employment centers. These factors burden state roadways to move people and goods.
The table below summarizes some key values across the development foot prints. The dashboard to the right allows for interactive exploration. The selector in the upper right allows you to focus on selected MPO areas.
Compare Development Patterns
On the map to the right the left side displays 2021 aerial photography and the right displays 1984 aerial photography. The slider in the middle allows you to directly see the change in development patterns by panning it to either the left or right to view the respective photography.
Access to Opportunity
Access to Jobs
Economic productivity within the District is influenced by the ability of workers to access job opportunities within a reasonable time. Access to traded industry jobs is particularly important because these jobs bring revenue into the area from outside the area.
Roughly 60% of the District’s jobs are within the pre-1970 development footprint.
Job accessibility declines and average commute time increases for workers residing in the post- 1970 development footprints. This is attributed to the lack of proximate employment and fewer route choices for commuters to access jobs.
The dashboard to the left explores each MPO areas access to employment, both in total jobs and in traded clusters industries. The selector in the upper right changes the focus to the selected MPOs.
Transportation System
Increased Travel Time
While the post-1970 development footprints have 56% of the District’s population, only 38% of total jobs are located in these areas. This imbalance has caused trip lengths and commute times to increase in these areas, as suburban workers commute to jobs in the urban core.
The dashboard to the right explores various trip characteristics, including average commute time and distance, commute mode share, and changes in mode share over time. These characteristics can be filtered by time or area using the selectors in the upper right corner.
Travel Conditions
This has placed a high dependence on commuter corridors, most of which are state roadways. Travel conditions are reaching saturated levels on these corridors, but widening these roads further competes with placemaking, economic, and multimodal accessibility objectives.
The map to the right displays the various roadways within District One and the estimated year for improvements and repairs.
Environmental Systems
Encroachment on Environmental Systems
The pre-1970 development footprint within District One minimally impacted Florida’s pristine environmental landscape. Since then, natural systems and critical habitat for a variety of plant and animal species are increasingly threatened by sprawling development patterns.
The map to the left explores where the development foot prints encroach on greenways, water and wetlands, and panther habitats. On the interactive tab the slider allows for dynamic exploration of the encroached areas, moving to the right highlights these areas and moving to the left removes the highlights. Map layers can be added and removed using the tools in the upper right. For simple view of encroached areas the static tab provides a non interactive view of the same map.
