Urged by activists on Belle Isle and elsewhere, Miami Beach commissioners have voted to phase out the use of gasoline powered leaf blowers.
Miami Beach is one of hundreds of cities and towns across the country to ban gas leaf blowers, which create both noise and air pollution.
Other cities include Washington, D.C.; Burlington, Vt.; Houston; Palm Beach, Key Biscayne, Aspen, Colo. and Highland Park, Ill. South Miami Restrictions include forbidding gas-powered units, imposing decibel limits and limiting what days they can be used.
California has taken steps to ban their use statewide. Similar legislation is being debated in several other states, including Illinois and New York.
The ordinance Miami Beach commissioners passed in late January provides for a nine month educational period to give landscapers and others time to switch from gas to electric devices, with warnings beginning in November of this year and full enforcement by August 1, 2023.
“Operating the best-selling commercial lawn mower for one hour emits as much smog-forming pollution as driving the best-selling 2017 passenger car, a Toyota Camry, about 300 miles — approximately the distance from Los Angeles to Las Vegas,” the California Air Resources Board said in a recent fact sheet. “For the best-selling commercial leaf blower, one hour of operation emits smog-forming pollution comparable to driving a 2017 Toyota Camry about 1,100 miles, or approximately the distance from Los Angeles to Denver.”
In Miami Beach, the city’s website notes that “transitioning away from gas-powered leaf blowers is beneficial for communities from multiple perspectives including reducing air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions, improving water quality, mitigating noise pollution, and promoting operational effectiveness.”
The leaf blower issue isn’t new to Miami Beach, which in 2017 passed a resolution directing the administration to shift to electric leaf blowers. That transition is expected to be complete this spring.
The Belle Isle Residents Association meets tonight on Zoom at 6:30 p.m., and as previously shared, the head of Miami Beach Public Works, Joe Gomez, will be taking questions, and new officers will be elected.
From BIRA:
The Belle Isle Residents Association will hold its Annual Meeting Thursday, February 10th at 6:30pm. The meeting will be virtual on Zoom and is open to all residents.
We are delighted to have City of Miami Beach Director of Public Works Joe Gomez as our guest speaker.
We will elect our board members, share BIRA’s goals for 2022 and take your questions about neighborhood issues.
Once you register, you will receive a confirmation email with instructions and a link to join the meeting where you will have an opportunity to ask the Director of Public Works a question. We will also take questions live during the meeting.
City Public Works contractors on Alton Road and 17th Street, dealing with sewer issues.
If you want to know why we keep seeing traffic barricades, tanker trucks and warnings about sewage in the bay near our neighborhood, Joe Gomez is the person to ask.
The Belle Isle Residents Association holds its annual meeting Thursday night at 6:30 p.m., and Gomez, the head of Miami Beach Public Works, will be addressing neighborhood issues and taking questions.
During the last several months, we’ve had sewer failures on almost a regular basis, resulting in road closures and environmental warnings.
The meeting is virtual, and will include the election of new officers for the residents association.
Nearly four years after demolition, Belle Isle Key’s replacement remains a work in progress.
Here’s what Bella Isla looked like on Jan. 26.
If you live on or near Belle Isle, you’re likely wondering when tenants will begin moving into the the glass and steel apartment complex at 31 Venetian Way.
The old 120-unit complex, called Belle Isle Key, closed in 2017 and was demolished in early 2018. The master permit for the new project, called Bella Isla, was issued in April 2018.
Nearly four years later, information from the developer, the EuroAmerican Group, is hard to come by. Calls to EuroAmerican’s offices this week yielded only vague information. Apartments may be available for rent “in late spring,” a receptionist said. No pricing is available. Can you get on a waiting list? You can fill out the contact form on the website, callers are told. When we know something, we’ll call you….
The first apartment units on Belle Isle were not really apartments at all, but barracks built in 1931 to house troops. Those housing units at 31 Venetian Way later became low income housing and were renovated into 120 apartments known as Belle Isle Key in the 1970s.
For more than a dozen years, the owners of the old complex, the EuroAmerican Group, sought to replace the bayfront apartments with modern steel and glass units.
Before the wrecking ball came, Belle Isle Key Apartments, 31 Island Ave.
In 2009 and 2010, EuroAmerican went to the city with designs that called for 181 apartments in two five-story buildings, including a 315-space parking garage topped by two tennis courts. The city Design Review Board approved a plan that trimmed one floor from the easternmost building, and eliminated eight apartments.
They came back in May 2015 with a new proposal, with 172 units in three buildings. A variation of it eventually was approved by the city. Residents of the existing complex fought fought a demolition permit but failed, and the buildings were demolished by Spring 2018. A higher seawall was built and contractors began filling in the land to raise the height of the ground floor.
In July 2018, demolition was done and seawall construction was well underway.
The result — ground floor raised by about eight feet and five floors instead of three — is a set of buildings considerably taller than the previous complex. Just ask a neighbor in a north facing apartment on the south side of Venetian Way.
You’d think in four years the apartments would be built, rented, finito. But construction at Bella Isla has moved painfully slow. Blame it on the pandemic, supply chain, issues with underground utilities or God knows what else. When the units will be completed,, marketed and rented remains an unknown.
There are many aspects to the complex that have not been completed or received final inspections, said Miami Beach Building Director Ana Salgueiro. Among them: gazebos, trellises, stair railings, the roof top terrace, the sprinkler system, plumbing systems, elevators — it’s a long list.
So what’s a best guess on completion and occupancy?
“Based on all of the permits in applied status, I would say it is quite a bit away,” Salgueiro said. “The contractor would have a better idea as they should have the timeline and plans. I have not been approached regarding a TCO (temporary certificate of occupancy) and usually on these projects I am approached when they are about 4 to 6 months from applying for TCO to make sure that they get to that goal on time.”
On the Bella Isla website, you can see floor plans for the apartments. There are one, two and three bedroom floor plans, ranging from 717 square feet to 1,606 square feet (again, no rental rates).
On the Bella Isla website, you can see the site plan as well as floor plans, but no prices.
One question circulating among Belle Isle neighbors is whether EuroAmerican has decided to change the use of the units from apartment to condominium. In city files, “there does not appear to be any revisions which show a change of use,” said Miami Beach spokeswoman Melissa Berthier. To may that change, EuroAmerican would need to apply to revise its plans.
The Standard Spa and hotel is moving forward with its effort to add on-site parking and renovate one of the wings of its property, but this time with a twist — it’s asking the city of Miami Beach to create a hotel overlay district for its property.
That’s because the Miami Beach zoning code for Belle Isle doesn’t allow a hotel use; the Standard is grandfathered in because it was built (originally as the Monterrey Motel and later the DiLido Spa) before the current code was enacted.
The Standard will meet with Belle Isle residents on Sept. 13 at 6 p.m. at the hotel, 40 Island Ave.
It plans to go before the Miami Beach Planning Board on Sept. 27.
The Standard’s latest proposal is believed to involve knocking down the existing single-story east wing of rooms. It would be replaced with a two-story wing — with parking on the first floor. In preliminary discussions, no additional rooms were to be added to the property.
As proposed, the overlay district would only apply to the Standard property, not other sites on Belle Isle.
If you didn’t vote early and plan to cast your primary ballot on election day Tuesday, the usual Belle Isle polling place has moved.
The city announced Monday it was temporarily closing the Botanical Gardens so it could be searched for mosquitoes in light of the Zika virus. That’s been the site of Miami Beach voting precinct 30, which serves Belle Isle, for a number of years.
Instead, you’ll need to go to Miami Beach City Hall, 1700 Convention Center Dr. Polls are open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.
There’s a town hall meeting for Miami Beach residents on the Zika threat tonight at 6 p.m. that will include the state surgeon general and Miami Beach City Manager Jimmy Morales.
The meeting, scheduled from 6 to 8 p.m. at the Waverly Condominium, 1330 West Avenue, is hosted by state Rep. David Richardson. There will be a presentation on protecting yourself and preventing the spread of Zika, as well as a question and answer session.
As you know, Miami Beach between Eight and 28th Streets has been designated by the Centers for Disease Control as a Zika zone.
The July Critical Mass bike ride is taking a Miami Beach-heavy route Friday night, crossing our neighborhood from Dade Boulevard west across Venetian Way to the mainland.
The ride is scheduled to start in downtown Miami at 7:15 p.m., crossing over the 79th Street Causeway through North Bay Village and then into Miami Beach on 71th Street before heading south along Indian Creek and then Collins Avenue to Dade Boulevard.
You’ll want to be patient, and planning ahead is the best strategy. Be careful out there.
With the newest road construction obstacle course underway off Sunset Harbor in preparation for the West Avenue Bridge, another major traffic inconvenience is about to begin.
This one will no doubt be more disruptive. As we’ve reported before, Miami-Dade County has to do major work on the eastern Venetian Way drawbridge span, the one between Rivo Alto and Belle Isle.
Some work is expected to start next month, but the biggest issue — the closure of the bridge to all foot, bike and auto traffic — may not happen until November. At one point, the county had said the bridge would be closed to all traffic for a 45-day period.
That’s a huge headache, no matter how you look at it. Miami Beach Commissioner Michael Grieco has told the Venetian Island Homeowner Association he’s investigating engaging a water taxi to ferry people across the gap, but it’s unclear how consistent the demand would be.
How bad will it be? What will be the precise timing?
Miami-Dade has scheduled a community meeting at 7 p.m. Tuesday, Aug. 2, at the community room at 1000 Venetian Way on Biscayne Island. It will be hosted by the Venetian Way Neighborhood Association, in collaboration with the Belle Isle Residents Association and the Venetian Isles Homeowner Association.
You’ve no doubt noticed that work began last week on the raising of the Venetian Way/Dade Boulevard/17th Street seawalls near Maurice Gibb Park and Sunset Harbour.
And now comes word from the city that Miami-Dade County, as it prepares to rebuild the drawbridge between Belle Isle and Rivo Alto, will be opening the bridge tonight from midnight to 3 a.m. Wednesday, and Wednesday night from midnight to 3 a.m. Thursday.
The work near Sunset Harbour involves raising seawalls along the Collins Canal, and is a early step in a process that will ultimately include raising the road and the construction of a new bridge along West Avenue over the canal.
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