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Pedestrian Bridge Dedication on December 1


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    Pedestrian-BridgeMore than a decade in the making, the pedestrian bridge across busy U.S. 1 at Mariposa Court will officially be dedicated at 10 a.m. on Friday December 1 in a ceremony presided over by Miami-Dade County Mayor Carlos Gimenez. 

    UM President Julio Frenk, Vice President for Student Affairs Patricia Whitely, and student leaders Adrian Nunez and Alessandria San Roman also are expected to attend the ceremony at the University Metrorail Station, as are Coral Gables Mayor Valdes Fauli and the Coral Gables City Commission. The University community and the public are welcome to attend the dedication, which was originally scheduled for September 13 but postponed by Hurricane Irma.

    UM students began lobbying for the overpass 12 years ago, when freshman Ashley Kelly was struck and killed by a car while crossing the busy intersection. The day after her 2005 death, the Student Government Senate passed the Ashley Kelly Resolution calling for construction of a bridge at the intersection. In July 2013, Miami-Dade commissioners green-lighted the plan and, at the April 2015 groundbreaking ceremony, Gimenez called the $6 million project “a giant step” in protecting the more than 1,300 pedestrians who cross the intersection every day.

    To reach this point, the bridge had to overcome many obstacles, most notably trying to figure out where the bridge would land on the south side of U.S. 1. When one plan fell through, City of Coral Gables commissioners unanimously agreed to transfer control of Mariposa Court to Miami-Dade County, paving the way for the bridge’s construction.

    “That’s a testament to how important we believe this project is,” former Coral Gables Mayor Jim Cason said at the time.

    A major supporter of public transportation, UM subsidizes its employees who use county buses, Metrorail, and Tri-Rail through its Public Transportation Benefit Program. Many of those employees cross the intersection of US 1 and Mariposa to get to work, and the area is seeing even more pedestrians since the The Lennar Foundation Medical Center opened across the street.

     

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