History
It was originally built by H. L. Mills Construction Company as a two-lane tollway connecting the two coasts of Florida, as a part of State Road 84 (which is currently the hidden designation of the highway). After it was determined that I-75 was using this route for the Tampa-Miami extension instead of the Tamiami Trail in 1973, it was widened to four lanes between 1986 and 1992, with many bridges designed to let water and wildlife pass underneath. This helped to reduce the environmental impact of the highway somewhat, especially upon the severely endangered Florida panther, as well as reducing the danger of the highway, which was notorious for high-speed accidents.
A state effort to privatize Alligator Alley failed in May 2009 when no bids were received for the highway that met the required terms.
In January 2000, the west end toll plaza of Alligator Alley was dedicated to the memory of Edward J. Beck, a toll taker who was murdered while on the job, January 30, 1974.
Read more about this topic: Alligator Alley
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“No matter how vital experience might be while you lived it, no sooner was it ended and dead than it became as lifeless as the piles of dry dust in a school history book.”
—Ellen Glasgow (1874–1945)
“There has never been in history another such culture as the Western civilization M a culture which has practiced the belief that the physical and social environment of man is subject to rational manipulation and that history is subject to the will and action of man; whereas central to the traditional cultures of the rivals of Western civilization, those of Africa and Asia, is a belief that it is environment that dominates man.”
—Ishmael Reed (b. 1938)
“I am not a literary man.... I am a man of science, and I am interested in that branch of Anthropology which deals with the history of human speech.”
—J.A.H. (James Augustus Henry)