Community working to make getting onto US 41 from Burnt Store Isles safer

Punta Gorda’s Burnt Store Isles neighborhood is getting more crowded and so are the roads.

“It’s a combination of the build-out, season and also the traffic from the shopping center,” said President of the Burnt Store Isles Association Bill Courtney.

Drivers can only exit from Monaco Drive to get onto US 41 northbound, forcing vehicles of all sizes to cut through residential Tripoli Boulevard.

“Traffic is becoming increasingly of an issue,” Courtney said.

It creates congestion around the neighborhood which some worry could become dangerous during a mandatory evacuation.

“If it’s an imminent threat, I don’t know how people are going to get out of there,” said Burnt Store Isles Association Security Director CJ Metcalfe.

FDOT won’t allow northbound access to US 41 from nearby Madrid Boulevard because it’s too close to the busy Burnt Store Road intersection. Drivers argue they need some other way out.

“What I’d like to see is a way to increase access to 41 N from Burnt Store Isles, other than from just at Monaco,” Courtney said.

City Council will consider lowering the speed limit by 5 mph on Tripoli and adding signs to ban commercial trucks.

“We’ve got to do something from here, either through signage or through enforcement,” Metcalfe said.

Taking proactive measures to keep our community safe.

A Punta Gorda representative for the county’s Metropolitan Planning Organization will bring up the issue at its board meeting on March 23.