Florida State Road 811

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State Road 811 is the shared Florida Department of Transportation designation of two separate north-south roads in southern Florida. Both are former alignments of Dixie Highway (which became U.S. Route 1) after the route was shifted to the east, closer to the Atlantic Ocean. One segment of SR 811 is in Broward County; the other is in Palm Beach County, Florida

[edit] SR 811: southern segment

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SR 811's definition in 1945

The 14 mile southern segment of SR 811 is locally known by a variety of names: Northeast 4th Avenue (in Fort Lauderdale), Wilton Drive (in Fort Lauderdale and Wilton Manors), North Dixie Highway (in Wilton Manors, Oakland Park, and Pompano Beach), Old Dixie Highway (in Oakland Park and Deerfield Beach), and West Dixie Highway (in Pompano Beach). The southern terminus of the southern segment is an intersection with Sunrise Boulevard (SR 838) in downtown Fort Lauderdale; the northern terminus is an intersection with Hillsboro Boulevard (SR 810) in Deerfield Beach.

Parallelling both US 1 and Interstate 95 and being between the two national highways, SR 811 is a major north-south commercial access road for northeastern Broward County cities. While much of the property that lines SR 811 is residential in nature, most of the route is adjacent to Florida East Coast Railroad tracks. Two hospitals (North Ridge Medical Center and the Pompano Beach Medical Center) are on the southern segment of SR 811, south of Pompano Beach Airpark, home base of the Goodyear Blimps.

While the SR 811 designation ends at Hillsboro Boulevard, Old Dixie Highway continues into Palm Beach County, staying only a few blocks west of US 1 until it intersects with it in Delray Beach.

In the 1990s, the stretch of SR 811 between Commercial Boulevard (SR 870/Northeast 50th Street) and Atlantic Boulevard (SR 814) was signed State Road 840, even though the even-numbered designation was applied to a north-south street.

[edit] SR 811: northern segment

The divided northern segment of SR 811 extends 11.1 miles from an intersection with Northlake Boulevard (SR 850) in Palm Beach Gardens to its northern terminus, an intersection with U.S. Route 1 (SR 5) near Tequesta and Jupiter Inlet Colony and a mile north of Jupiter. While FDOT signs indicating the SR 811 designation are posted alongside the road, street signs (mostly overhead) identify it as Alternate A1A and Old Dixie Highway the entire length of the route.

While the completion of I-95 in the late 1970s has diminished the importance of Alternate A1A as a commercial byway, the replacement of forest by the development of suburban residential districts have made SR 811 an important commuter road in addition to a bypass of US 1.

[edit] SR 811A, now County Road 811A

Neither a bypass nor a spur, the former State Road 811A, now Broward County Road 811A, is a seven-mile-long stretch of North Andrews Avenue in Fort Lauderdale. The southern terminus is an intersection with Sunrise Boulevard (SR 838) and the northern terminus is an intersection with Atlantic Boulevard (SR 814). It provides an alternative north-south commuter route whenever I-95 is clogged with a traffic jam.

With Broward Boulevard (SR 842), Andrews Avenue provides a baseline from which all Fort Lauderdale addresses are determined. Just west of the northern terminus of CR 811A is the Pompano Park Raceway, the only harness racing track in southern Florida. Within nine six blocks of the southern terminus are Fort Lauderdale and Broward County governments, all of which within a block of the Fort Lauderdale Museum of Discovery and Art and a campus of Broward Community College.

State Road 811A does not intersect with its "parent"; however, in the 1960s, State Road 811 extended along Andrews Avenue southward from SR 838 to US 1. Had SR 811A been in existence at that time, the two roads would have branched out from Sunrise Boulevard and North Andrews Avenue, but no road map - commercial or governmental - has ever indicated the concurrent existence of SR 811A and the SR 811 extension.