CITRUS COUNTY, Fla. — Citrus County saw heavy traffic and slowdowns on U.S. 19 just before Hurricane Irma last year, as people tried to evacuate north.
Florida Department of Transportation representatives say now there are new cameras in place to help the agency keep traffic moving in the case of another mass evacuation.
- Cameras in place since July
- Feeds monitored remotely
- In case of another evacuation, cameras used to keep lights green
Just days before Hurricane Irma, U.S. 19 looked more like a parking lot than a road.
"It was pretty bad," resident Deborah Ward told us. "I only had to go up the street to my son's house, but it still took us a while to get up that way."
Many were seeing red, both figuratively and literally. Drivers say having to stop for lights made the backup much worse.
"It took us 8 hours to get from Clearwater to the border," George Bailey said.
"The smaller towns north, like Homosassa, Crystal River and so forth, with all their little stop lights, traffic, construction, it really got bad," Bailey continued. "We wondered at the time why they didn't just open up the lights and let everybody go through."
That's exactly what FDOT now plans to do.
The organization worked with the Citrus County Sheriff's Office to install cameras along U.S. 19 in the county that teams will monitor remotely. If there's another emergency, FDOT will be able to keep all the lights green to keep traffic moving.
FDOT representatives say the cameras have been in place since July.
"I think it would help a lot. This way they can tell when you can go and when you can't go," Ward said.
"Whatever would assist would alleviate that problem will be good," Bailey added.