Coral Gables Watch

GREEN BUFFER DESTROYED FOR NOW? DOCTORS HOSPITAL

DOCTORS HOSPITAL bought its valet parking lot from the City of Coral Gable for was a very good price given the inflation of real estate prices in Coral Gables. It has now eliminated most of the green barrier between the parking lot and local residents road to apparent newly designed lot. The local residents will wait many months and year for a renovated equivalent green area in the back and side of their houses.

We all thinking about future generations, public lands should not be sold except in exceptional cases. One might imagine that In the case of Doctors Hospital they would have paid any large sum to keep and use the valet parking lot indefinitely, to the benefit of the city’s general budget.

The Brazilian Pepper plant which had overgrown the canal made up a big share of the green barrier is considered a weed by Miami-Dade, while the Australian pines in the area are considered equally bad plants but were not eliminated.

The lot was sold against the protests of local residents who stated that the sale and subsequent renovation of the lot will not benefit the residents, and will cause significant costs in reducing property values, significant local environmental impacts, including increased light pollution, loss of wildlife dependent on the green barrier, the increase in noise from the hospital, among others

The many community benefits of the green area, now lost, included:

• Provide wildlife habitat (birds, fish, reptiles, manatees…) diversity
• Traffic calming and noise mitigation
• Impeding views of car traffic, valet parking, buses and ambulances
• Impeding view of Doctors Hospital buildings
• Mitigate Doctors Hospital lighting
• Wind and temperature mitigation in storms and hurricanes
• CO2 capture
• Favor canal users’ recreational boating and fishing
• Bolster local property values

The BEFORE and AFTER pictures are, as follows: