Work on new stoplight at busy Lee County intersection to last months

FORT MYERS, Fla.- The installation of a traffic light at the busy McGregor Boulevard and A & W Bulb Road intersection began Monday morning.

Residents in the area have been pushing for a light for a while, saying the intersection is dangerous, but some residents are concerned about the timing of the project.

“This is gonna cause more problems than no light, until the light is there,” said Lisa Casale who lives nearby in Heritage Cove. “We need the light, I just don’t understand why they’re doing it in season, in January, when there’s more congestion than anything else.”

Aside from adding a stop light, crews also have to reconfigure the median, which means ripping up portions of the roadway and repaving them.

“There’s gonna be closures and excavation and rerouting,” said Earl Hill,  “and some people don’t handle it well.”

“There’s gonna be more congestion, more back up, probably more accidents. We need the light, I’m happy about the light, but the time of day just doesn’t work,” said Casale.

The Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) says it has a limited number of workers and time, and can’t afford to only operate half the year, during non-seasonal months.

FDOT says there will be no lane closures during morning rush hour, between 6 am. and 9 a.m., or during afternoon rush hour, between 4 p.m. and 7 p.m.

An FDOT spokesperson adds the department already chose to postpone starting the project a little more than a week. It was supposed to start right before Christmas, but they didn’t want to disrupt traffic during some of the busiest travel days of the year. Work on the $700,000 project is expected to be complete by early summer.