Nearly six miles of a promised running and biking path through west Miami-Dade remain mostly unopened, even after a county groundbreaking in 2021. For neighbors, runners and nearby developers, the Ludlam Trail has become less a linear park and more a long, fenced-off reminder of how slowly big public projects can move.
The county approved the Ludlam Trail plan in 2015 and later bought the former Florida East Coast rail corridor. Advocates say Miami-Dade has already spent roughly $42 million, yet there is still no signed design contract. A nearly two-year procurement to select a designer produced no executed agreement, county project managers told residents, and the official timeline has shifted again and again since the 2021 groundbreaking. Those gaps, plus the parks department’s limited public response, drew renewed scrutiny in a recent report from the Miami Herald.
Environmental and regulatory hurdles
Some sections of the corridor have been fenced off since soil contamination was identified, and detailed county PD&E and contamination screening documents list multiple brownfield sites that must be cleaned up or capped before construction can happen. Those studies show environmental cleanup, permitting and coordination with state and federal agencies are built directly into the project timeline, work that adds both cost and complexity.
The county’s contamination screening evaluation outlines the contamination issues, the options for remediation and how those choices affect schedule and budget, according to Miami-Dade County.
Bridges and the FDOT role
The Florida Department of Transportation has agreed to handle several key overpass bridges for the trail. FDOT’s SunTrail program lists a Ludlam bridges entry, and procurement notices lay out design work for three pedestrian overpasses. The SunTrail “At-A-Glance” shows project entries for FPID 450835 and a construction line item, and a separate design solicitation details span lengths, environmental permits and a production schedule for bridge design, according to FDOT and FDOT.
Under a county agreement, one Coral Way bridge will be built in partnership with MV Real Estate, which has already finished adjacent senior housing with ramps designed to tie directly into the future bridge, local context that has been highlighted by the Miami Herald.
Where the money is — and is not
Miami-Dade’s capital documents show relatively modest line items for the Ludlam Trail this year, roughly $11.7 million for construction and land acquisition and $750,000 for planning and design in the parks budget, while larger earlier expenditures sit in prior years’ lines. Budget tables also record millions spent on land acquisition after a 2018 commission resolution that approved a roughly $24.6 million purchase of the rail property.
Together, those entries point to a funding gap between what appears in the five-year plan and the cost estimates staff have put on full build-out, and they underscore the need for clearer schedule and contract milestones, according to Miami-Dade County and Miami-Dade County.
Advocates want answers
Trail supporters and local officials have been pushing more forcefully for clarity. They have revived Friends of the Ludlam Trail and pressed county staff at recent meetings for specific dates and dollar figures. Elected leaders and longtime advocates have cited procurement delays, permitting hurdles and the complications of developer “nodes” that swap private construction for trail segments.
Local coverage of public meetings and ribbon cuttings has repeatedly contrasted gleaming new private development with the still-closed corridor just a few feet away, as reported by NBC6.
FDOT’s bridge solicitation lists a production date and contract window that, if carried out as written, would move design work forward. County approvals, however, remain the key step before major construction can begin. Advocates say signed contracts, clearer budget commitments and a public construction schedule are the concrete moves needed to turn fenced right-of-way into an open trail. The FDOT design solicitation lays out the kind of milestones those advocates and officials say they want to see. See the bridge design solicitation for technical schedule details at FDOT.
