Fort Lauderdale, Florida 1985

It was the summer of Live Aid, and we all hung around the pool of our small hotel which had a two-storey, rooms around the pool layout. During the concert broadcast, most doors were open and all tv sets were on MTV. Sometimes we went to the beach or walked along Fort Lauderdale Beach Boulevard where people were cruising and showing off their cars in the right lane shortly before sunset. I remember the road being busy at all times, the Boulevard was surely not an area where you´d spend a relaxing beach holiday. It was a setup designed towards urban beach-goers on a short trip.

The road along the beach had five lanes, two in each direction and the center lane obligatory for turning. Additionally there was a parking strip on the beach side. Cruising traffic, through traffic and commercial traffic all driving along this stretch of road, with only a narrow sidewalk for pedestrians and hard to recognize crosswalks. In essence not a very friendly surrounding for aesthetes, but good enough for short vacation tourists and quick-cash oriented businesses along the way.

Fast forward to present-day: the same stretch of road has only two lanes for cars, no more parking bays and extra wide sidewalks. The setup is designed for local traffic to drive slowly along the beach road, stopping immediately as soon as pedestrians want to cross the road. Pretty smart. The quality of moving around and beach enjoyment is much higher, and this concept has surely not hurt the businesses. But I can imagine what a struggle it must´ve been between business owners, city planners, the tourist board and local politicians to come to an agreement leading to this new concept. It shows that it´s always worth fighting for sustainable and common sense solutions, even when the odds are overwhelming.

Picture I took in July, 1985

Google street view of the same spot almost 35 years later

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