ROYAL PALM BEACH, Fla. — There are some homeowners unhappy about the possible expansion of Royal Palm Beach Boulevard.
"It's quieter up here, yes. We don't like living on the main road, but two lanes aren't too bad," Mathew Knowles said.
Knowles has steadily and methodically moved his family north from Miami to get away from traffic congestion. Now, Royal Palm Beach Boulevard, in front of his house, could soon go from a two-lane highway to a five-lane undivided roadway.
"I'm not OK with that," he said. "Like I said, we came up here to get away from that lifestyle."
Palm Beach County said plans for the roadway improvements near Loxahatchee would go from Royal Palm Beach Boulevard, the M Canal, to south of Orange Boulevard.
The project affects 45 properties with a total of 57 separate parcels to be bought.
The total appraised value of the 57 parcels is just over a million dollars. According to county documents, the attempts to negotiate the purchases have been unsuccessful.
Palm Beach County is looking at eminent domain proceedings in the process of acquiring the property for public use.
"You hate that they're going to take your property because you don't want the values to go down," Robert Rubino said.
Rubino isn't happy, so contacted a lawyer to fight.
"I know we got to move on with progress, but I hate to see that we have to take the brunt of taking our property," he said.
The project is scheduled for the next fiscal year at a cost of $6 million. WPTV asked the county to comment. The item could be discussed at Tuesday's commission meeting.
