State Road 23 (First Coast Expressway) serves as a vital multi-lane limited-access toll facility designed to transform regional mobility, alleviate congestion across Northeast Florida, and serve as a primary hurricane evacuation route. Spanning 46 miles through Duval, Clay, and St. Johns' counties, the project required a sophisticated, integrated electrical infrastructure. Our team was selected to execute the complex electrical scope across the past nine phases of SR 23 upgrades, working with various prime contractors and partnering with both the Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) and Florida’s Turnpike Enterprise.
Building an advanced electronic toll corridor across rural, suburban, and waterway zones presented multiple technical hurdles. Our team had to coordinate across multiple agencies and handle complex environmental conditions such as installing marine-grade navigational systems across river and creek bridge structures, all while maintaining strict environmental compliance. Additionally, we had to ensure continuous system reliability delivering high-speed data communications and backup power across 9 consecutive phases without interrupting regional traffic flow.
Our field teams managed and executed a comprehensive electrical systems installation tailored for long-term operational resilience including toll infrastructure, Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS), highway & navigational lighting, traffic signals & intersections. Through close collaboration with all the involved partners and agencies, we delivered a fully integrated, state-of-the-art transportation corridor on time and within budget. The project delivered robust back-up power and fiber infrastructure ensuring 100% operational uptime for electronic toll collection and traffic monitoring.
We were able to enhance highway safety, as upgraded lighting and ITS capabilities significantly improved nighttime visibility and emergency response times along the corridor. And finally, the entire project is delivering on the promise of scalable infrastructure. We designed and built electrical backbones capable of supporting future smart-city expansions and autonomous vehicle communications along SR 23.
