Miami 21 "zoning" of Virginia Key allows urban uses

Miami 21 isn’t just about dictating development in the urban grid. Virginia Key, the urban island with the heart of a wilderness, has also been zoned.

Some areas are designated preservation zones (T-1), others have civic zone designations (CI) which may be developed with urban public uses or commercial uses, with urban infrastructure, including parking garages and roadways. Other areas are zoned "urban core," some of the highest urban center designations (T6-8).

A Miami Dade County planning report states that Virginia Key’s “valuable and protected” areas – mangroves, wetlands, dunes, and hammocks and cultural resources, including the historically-designated Miami Marine Stadium – could be threatened if future land uses permitted under Miami 21, the City of Miami’s new land use and zoning code that will take effect May 20, don’t take into account the long-term management requirements of these areas.


County planners analyzed Miami 21’s impact on Virginia Key as part of the biological evaluation prepared by the Dade Environmental Resources Management department for the purpose of identifying areas that could be acquired by the Environmentally Endangered Lands Program. The report stated:

Regardless of whether some Virginia Key properties are ultimately acquired by the EEL program, it is important that any future land uses on Virginia Key be carefully planned and permitted such that they do not impact the sensitive and valuable habitats there. The management of restored and protected land on Virginia Key should be not inhibited by adjacent future land uses. The historic places and structures on the key should be maintained and fully incorporated into all future land use plans.

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Miami 21 took effect May 20, 2010 although City of Miami Mayor Tomas Regalado has called it a “work in progress” and will give residents, including Miami Neighborhoods United (MNU), commissioners and others, the opportunity to express concerns and possibly amend the code in the future. A special City Commission session on Miami 21 will be held at 9 a.m., Wednesday, June 2, 2010.

Resources: www.miami21.org

Environmentally Endangered Lands Report: Critical Habitats of Virginia Key

A new biological evaluation of Virginia Key just released by Miami-Dade County’s Environmentally Endangered Lands (EEL) Program documents the barrier island contains some of Miami-Dade County’s last remaining critical habitats.

Plant communities on the island include seagrass beds, sand and mud flats, mangrove and herbaceous wetlands, beach dunes and coastal maritime hammock.  Of the approximately 1,300 acres, submerged lands constitute 900 acres, coastal wetlands 235 acres, dunes 12 acres, maritime hammock 28 acres with an additional 7 acres of reforested maritime hammock reclaimed from previously disturbed areas.

Key findings of the biological evaluation show:
-Freshwater wetlands are “one of the last wetland/beach ecotones remaining in Miami Dade County.” (The only other wetland/beach ecotone of this kind within the County is located at the Bear Cut Preserve on Key Biscayne).
-A 13-acre maritime hammock forest at the center of the island is the “best example of this forest type” in Miami-Dade County, where many plant and animal species are listed as rare or endangered. The forest is a vital resource for wildlife species, including rare, migrating songbirds that travel down the Atlantic coast. 
-Beaches and dunes on Virginia Key, including essential sea-turtle nesting areas frequented by loggerhead and green sea turtles, comprise a “significant amount” of this type of community in Miami-Dade County.
-The Bill Sadowski Critical Wildlife Area (CWA), a 700-acre state-designated refuge with “extraordinary habitat values” that contains the island’s largest remaining portion of unaltered mangrove forest and largest amount of unaltered, submerged land, is an important undisturbed spawning area for many species of fish and invertebrates.  The diversity of bird species in the refuge is well-documented and includes at least a dozen species of raptors - American kestral and ospreys among them. Ospreys, eagles and falcons are a common site, particularly during migration times. 
-The waters surrounding Virginia Key, bordered on the east by the Atlantic Ocean and on the west by Biscayne Bay, are used by manatees for feeding, resting, mating, traveling and calving. (Atlantic bottlenose dolphins also use the water.)

The evaluation was completed as part of an application filed by The Sierra Club Miami Group, Tropical Audubon Society and Izaak Walton League South Florida Chapter last year seeking protection of vulnerable environmental lands on the island.

The Miami Dade County EEL program was created in 1990 to acquire, restore and maintain environmentally significant lands in our community. The program is voluntary and inclusion of any of Virginia Key’s natural areas in the program would have to be approved by Miami-Dade County and the City of Miami.

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