ST. JOHNS COUNTY, Fla — This year, beachgoers and beach communities will see something they’ve been waiting for a while: Crosswalks on Highway A1A.
This, after people have been hit and even killed while trying to cross the busy highway that runs along the coast.
"There’s a lot of traffic here," Harry Delibero winters in the Vilano Beach community. His home is not on the beach, so he, like many, has to find a safe opening between oncoming cars to cross Highway A1A.
"I cross here usually," he pointed to Nease Beachfront Park. On the eastside of the road, there is a public access boardwalk to the beach.
This location is one of five places the Florida Department of Transportation has designated for crosswalks on A1A in St. Johns County. They will be the kind that pedestrians can punch a button on one side of the road, and lights will blink for drivers to see.
Three pedestrians have now been hit by cars in less than two years on A1A in St. Johns County. Two of those three died.
Many businesses and neighborhoods are not on the beachside of A1A in St. Johns County. So that means a lot of folks, in order to to get to the beach, have to walk from one side of the road to the other... and then back again.
A DOT spokesman says the locations for the crosswalks along A1A will span the length of St. Johns County. They will be A1A at Fort Matanzas, Green Road, Treasure Beach Road, Nease Beachfront Park, and Euclid Avenue.
Some of the work will begin mid February and will be complete in the fall.