{"id":309979,"date":"2026-06-17T01:38:08","date_gmt":"2026-06-17T01:38:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/309979\/"},"modified":"2026-06-17T01:38:08","modified_gmt":"2026-06-17T01:38:08","slug":"orange-county-accelerates-state-road-50-improvements","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/309979\/","title":{"rendered":"Orange County Accelerates State Road 50 Improvements"},"content":{"rendered":"

ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. \u2014 A project to improve safety along State Road 50 will get underway two years sooner than expected. Orange County commissioners voted Tuesday to speed up the construction timeline for road widening and safety improvements on a stretch of East Colonial Drive. The county decided to partner with FDOT to make it happen.<\/p>\n

For years, Channel 9 has reported on the calls for safety improvements <\/a>after back-to-back crashes. <\/p>\n

Some residents said they have been advocating for improvements for over a decade, particularly at the intersection of South Tanner Road and State Road 50. According to MetroPlan Orlando data, there were 51 crashes at that intersection over a five-year period.<\/p>\n

All along State Road 50, Crosses and Drive Safely signs are small reminders of lives cut short. <\/p>\n

The Florida Department of Transportation is currently working three improvement projects on the highway. <\/p>\n

One looks to add an extra lane in each direction, from Avalon Park Boulevard to Chuluota.<\/a> It\u2019s a stretch of the highway that saw 14 deadly crashes from 2020 to 2024, according to MetroPlan Orlando.<\/p>\n

Commissioner Kelly Martinez Semrad represents the area. She called the road a \u201clethal stretch\u201d of highway and explained the FDOT project includes safety improvements like signalized intersections, new lighting and sidewalks. But construction wasn\u2019t set to start until 2029 because of funding challenges.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we didn\u2019t move forward with this deal, we don\u2019t know when this project would have been executed,\u201d said Martinez Semrad. <\/p>\n

On Tuesday, the county voted to give FDOT $20 million to speed up the timeline, with construction now set to begin in 2027. <\/p>\n

\u201cEvery day that goes by is a day of risk that we see similar accidents occurring over and over,\u201d said Martinez Semrad, \u201cWe are grateful that we found a solution.\u201d <\/p>\n

The County will be reimbursed for that $20 million payment in quarterly intervals from FDOT, beginning in 2028. <\/p>\n

Click here<\/a> to download our free news, weather and smart TV apps. And click here<\/a> to stream Channel 9 Eyewitness News live.<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

TOP STORIES FROM WFTV CHANNEL 9<\/p>\n

\u00a92026 Cox Media Group<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. \u2014 A project to improve safety along State Road 50 will get underway two years…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":309980,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[7304,129313,2777,129314,10234,66426,58737,1061,2345,129312,1052,129315,634,129310,115,1300,139,141,140,129311,4542,30873,129308,129309,1798,1045],"class_list":["post-309979","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-orlando","tag-7304","tag-avalon_park_boulevard","tag-channel_nine","tag-chuliota","tag-commissioner","tag-east_colonial_drive","tag-east_orange_county","tag-eyewitness","tag-fdot","tag-florida_department_of","tag-fot","tag-kelly_martinez_samrad","tag-local","tag-metro_plan_orlando","tag-news","tag-orange_county","tag-orlando","tag-orlando-headlines","tag-orlando-news","tag-pamela_siebel","tag-sabrina","tag-sabrina_maggiore","tag-state_road_50","tag-tanner_road","tag-transportation","tag-video"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/309979","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=309979"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/309979\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/309980"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=309979"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=309979"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=309979"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}