Know a Good Spot for Bicycle Parking? There’s An App for That

Posted on May 3, 2024     Leave a Comment

By Chris Hamilton. Story is cross posted at KONK Life May 3, 2024. Follow us at  Friends of Car-Free Key West & Duval Street/Historic Downtown on Facebook.

Ever get to your favorite bar, restaurant or destination and wonder why there is no bike rack there? Or perhaps the rack in front of where you work is always full. Maybe you own or work at a local Mom & Pop Shop and want to attract more customers realizing for every car parking space in front, you could instead have 12 bike parking spaces. More shoppers = ka-ching! Possibly the building you live in has Residential Permit car parking spaces on the street, but nary a bike rack in sight. Or it could be that you are just tired of all the bikes on a certain block being locked up to trees, poles, and fences. Well, did you know, there’s an app to request bicycle parking?

It’s part of the City’s “Key West Connect” app available for Apple and Android devices and usable as a web interface too. And if you just take a few minutes and use it, you’ll be helping the City get their increasing inventory of bike parking on our streets more quickly and in the right places. Everybody wins.

The City Is Indeed Installing More Racks and You Can Help Direct Where They Go

If you follow the City’s official government and Car-Free Key West Facebook pages, you may have noticed a pattern over the last year plus as they post almost monthly a nice picture of a newly installed bike rack or even a bike corral (series of loop racks on rails). In 2022 they installed 125 parking spaces. In 2023 that jumped to 454 as it includes 136 that were funded by a “Final Mile” State grant to upgrade all Lower Keys Shuttle bus stops. So far in 2024 they’ve installed 75 spaces and hope to install another 100 including both “Post and Loop” style and the larger “Bike Corrals” or “Loop Racks On Rails” style. About a quarter of the installs are replacements with the majority being additional capacity, which now brings the total number of City provided bicycle parking spaces to 3,397 (May 1, 2024). And while the City assesses the needs on the street, Multi-Modal Coordinator Ryan Stachurski tell us that requests from citizens help staff make better decisions about where to install them and the locations are more likely to be prioritized and go in sooner as a result of a request.

Report Abandoned Bikes and Damaged Bike Racks Too

Key West Connect also allows you to let the City know about abandoned bikes and damaged bike racks. Everyone wins when abandoned bikes are removed and a mangled or vandalized bike rack is repaired.

How To Use Key West Connect

The City’s Key West Connect app (powered by SeeClickFix) helps residents reach the City online or via their smartphone or tablet to request services or help fix issues. You can use it for trash, recycling, yard waste, potholes, sidewalk issues, lights, trees, signs, code compliance and more. And for people on bikes you can Request a Bicycle Rack, Report an Abandoned Bicycle or Report Maintenance on a Bicycle Rack.

On Apple devices you can download the free app at the Apple App Store or on an Android device download it at the Google Play Store. From the app:

• Go to the bottom and hit the + sign that says, “New Request.”
• Next, you’ll be asked to share a picture or not.
• Then you’ll choose a location on the map. There’s an X in the middle so simply move the map to the desired location. The top window should show the address.
• Hit the next button at the top and now choose your category – the are listed alphabetically so Abandoned Bicycle, Bicycle Rack Maintenance and Bicycle Rack Request are right at the top.
• On the last screen you’ll see your picture, if you uploaded one – highly recommended, and you can then add additional text information and a rationale.
• Hit submit at the top right and you’re done!

At the bottom of the app is a “Requests” button. This is where you can see other requests and issues people have submitted. You can also create a profile and do much more.

Crowded Downtown Sidewalks Should Be for People – So Be Specific and Request a Bike Corral in a Car Parking Space 😉

Many of the recent bicycle parking installs, at least if the pictures posted on Facebook are an accurate depiction, have been put on sidewalks. As we’ve documented, our mostly narrow downtown sidewalks are already overcrowded with people. And in some spaces with chairs and tables. Our good friend and chronicler of the Key West condition via Key West Island News Linda Grist Cunningham has made similar observations that sidewalks should be for people.

Why are we putting bike parking and tables and chairs along with signs, newspaper boxes, and poles on our narrow sidewalks and making an overcrowded situation worse? Because we seem to value private car storage for the few over pleasant walking space for the many. As we put in more bike parking, we should insist it go in the street in bike corrals and you should please say so in your request.

Let’s Put More Parking In Bike Corrals On the Streets In Predictable Places

A bike corral can accommodate 12 bikes in the space of 1 car. We’ve made the case that not only should bike parking be in the street, but that along the entire length of Duval it should be located in the first car parking space in each cross street. And the next space should be for scooters. The consistency attracts users, and it helps intersection sight lines. This isn’t some crazy bike advocates’ idea. This is actually the idea of the City’s Parking Director. We’ve noticed a few like this but could use way more.

Every retail shop or group of shops all over Old Town should have an in-street bike corral and scooter parking right out front or adjacent to it. We’d fit 12 bikes and 6 scooters in the space of 2 cars. That’s a win for everyone and good for business. So again, when you Request Bicycle Parking, please be specific. Let the City know where there’s a good car-parking space to replace with bike parking.

When We Make It Easier to Bike, Our Island Wins

Having a safe and reliable place to park your bicycle at work, shopping and play makes it easier and thus more likely more of us will use a bike to get around instead of driving a car. That helps fight traffic and parking congestion, improves our environment, makes us healthier, makes our historic downtown more prosperous for Mom and Pop Shops, and yes, makes us happier too. It makes our little island more like the paradise it should be. We all win when we make it easier to bike!

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Rebuild of United Street With New Bike Lane & Improved Pedestrian Safety Complete. South Street Is Next

Posted on April 19, 2024     Leave a Comment

By Chris Hamilton. Story is cross posted at KONK Life on April 19, 2024.  Follow us at  Friends of Car-Free Key West & Duval Street/Historic Downtown on Facebook.

Work has just wrapped up on a complete rebuild of United Street between Whitehead and Grinnell Streets downtown that incorporated FKAA water main upgrades and a $4.8 million investment in all new curb and gutter that includes narrower and safer pedestrian crossings, lots of new trees, fresh and smooth asphalt, and a brand spanking new, extra-width bike lane where none had existed before heading out of town that connects up with the Crosstown Greenway bike facility. Let’s repeat that. A brand new, wider is safer, bike lane! But wait, there’s more.

One street over, as FKAA’s utilities work is wrapping up on South Street between Duval and Reynolds Streets, the City is just beginning work on $3.5 million dollars in improvements that include new paving, drainage, Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) sidewalks, curb ramps and pavement markings, landscaping, and trees similar to what’s been done on United. And yes, pinch us because it is true, another wider than usual, brand new bike lane for the length of the project going into town where none existed before.

Upon South Street’s completion in about a year, the two new bike lanes will act similarly to the Fleming and Southard Street bike lane pair in getting people on bikes in and out of downtown and will help create more of a connected network of lanes that promote safer and easier riding. Mayor Johnston has been asking for these kinds of improvements and our more progressive Engineering Department under the leadership of Director Gary Volenec and Multi-Modal Coordinator Ryan Stachurski have been delivering the goods. Here are some of the details…

Isn’t It Lovely, Isn’t It Wonderful

Okay we admit maybe using Stevie Wonder’s words to describe a new street is a bit much, but when you look at pictures of United Street before the work, the after pictures are indeed quite nice. And in a town that reveres car-convenience and parking we’re pleased at a genuine complete streets approach that includes more trees, narrower and safer pedestrian crossings and bike lanes and bike racks that have a cumulative effect of helping to slow vehicle traffic down and thus making the street safer for all users.

Here’s how Mr. Stachurski describes the projects:

“With the completion of the United Street road work, the City has an improved roadway that seeks to meet the needs of all users within our constrained right-of-way. Not only do motorists get a good ride, but pedestrians and bicyclists do as well. Pedestrians will notice some safety improvements like big and bright crosswalks, smooth rolling curb ramps, colorful shade trees and palms. Bicyclists, electric bicyclists, and stand-up motorized scooter operators will have a place to ride heading out of town or toward the beach along the Crosstown Greenway bicycle route. Design elements reinforce the 20 MPH speed limit to encourage safe behavior and support our City’s Vision Zero goal. A lot of these design elements have been incorporated in the design for South Street that’s about to begin construction.

South Street, already popular with non-motorized traffic, has been designed to expand the bicycle infrastructure from Reynolds Street all the way down to Duval Street. South Street is the westernmost leg of the Crosstown Greenway bicycle route, and wayfinding signage will help to define it. The bicycle box at South St and Reynolds Street is slated to get upgraded to new Federal standards (MUTCD). (The bike box gives casual riders an opportunity to turn left even when there’s automobile traffic.) Finally, new trees are planned along with similar pedestrian improvements you see installed along United Street.”

This is all good news.

About That Bike Box

The island’s only bike box is on Reynolds at South Street. It is getting repainted and slightly reconfigured as part of this project. A bike box is a designated area at the head of a traffic lane at a signalized intersection that provides bicyclists with a safe and visible way to get ahead of queuing traffic during the red signal phase. This will help people on bikes in the right-side bike lane along Reynolds Street to make a safer left turn onto the soon-to-come bike lane going downtown on South Street.

This is a good idea and believe we could use more of these box boxes around town to make bicycling even safer.

Wider Is Better and Safer

The new United Street bike lane between Whitehead Street and Simonton Street, where it is adjacent to on-street parking, is about to 7’ feet wide to provide some buffer space for bicyclists from car doors. The parking stalls are narrow to encourage motorists to park close to the curb. Compare this to the 5’ feet wide bike lanes along Southard and Fleming Streets next to parked cars. Along the rest of United, the bike lane is 5’ feet wide as there is no parking.

Along South Street the upcoming inbound bike lane is designed to be 4’ wide with 2’ feet of buffer space (for a total of 6’). We’re told this is considered narrow for a door-zone bike lane by State minimum standards, but it’s larger than the 5’ width local bicyclists are familiar with along Southard and Fleming Streets.

So wider is safer and that’s better and it is indeed progress.

New Bike Lanes and Signage Enhance the Network Effect

There are many examples in Key West of pieces of bike trails and lanes that just end, leaving riders with no choice but to mix with cars, Southard Street being our most egregious example, often on our most crowded and busy streets. In surveys across the land, people say that the lack of a connected network of safe bicycle facilities to get them to work, shop and play, is what inhibits many people from riding a bike for transportation. The new United and South Street bike lanes will help better connect with a growing network on this side of town.

Another new feature is a bunch of new Crosstown Greenway signs posted along the new bike lane. We’re told that the City will continue to install these along the entirety of the Greenway so bicyclists will know the path. And if the bond referendum for infrastructure projects passes this fall there will be some money to do more signage and pavement markings around town.

The bike lanes map here shows the new United and South Streets pair connecting to the Reynolds Street bike lanes which take you to Higgs Beach and beyond that on the Atlantic Boulevard Trail to the Bertha Trail and onto the S. Roosevelt Promenade. So, this gets people safely from the beaches into downtown without having to mix with traffic. Similarly, those using the Crosstown Greenway from the top of the island at the Cow Key Channel will now be able to get downtown on a safe bike lane. Mr. Stachurski tells us that new signage (depicted by the red dots in the picture) will help orient people to various points along the safe bike network.

Mayor Johnston Finally Getting Her Wish For New Bike Lanes

If you’ve been following our column for the past few years, you know we’ve quoted Mayor Teri Johnston on numerous occasions consistently asking staff to find ways to put in more bike facilities (here, here, here, here, here, here and numerous others). She was understandably pleased when we asked her last year about this particular project then just getting underway, saying:

“Dedicated bicycle lanes are essential in Key West. It is the solution for taking bikes and e-bikes off of the sidewalk and into a safe, dedicated lane in the street. With some thoughtful planning we can accommodate the same number of on street parking spots, add a bicycle lane and create a better flow of vehicular traffic.”

While we wish it were more, given the recalcitrance of the previously car-centric staff, when the Mayor leaves office later this year, she can rightfully point to at least a few victories in promoting bicycle and pedestrian safety. And she’s set some good forward momentum, that hopefully the next Mayor and Commission will expand upon.

Better, Safer Bicycling = Better Key West

Key West is full of cars AND bikes and that’s different than most places. According to the U.S. Census 15% of Key West residents’ commute to work by bicycle. That’s a lot more than some of the top “bike” cities in the country. Key West bike rental companies continue to do a record business. So, there’s a lot of bikes and now e-bikes and e-scooters mixing with golf carts, scooters, and cars. As so many of these people on the street are visitors from car-centric mainland places, they aren’t used to this jumble of vehicle types and that’s a dangerous mix. And that is why we need a seamless, connected, and safe network of bike facilities. It also helps keep bikes off our crowded sidewalks.

The United and South Streets project represents progress toward that end. To make our little island a bicycle paradise that will help us fight traffic and parking congestion, improve our environment, and make us healthier, more prosperous, and happier too. Let’s applaud the Mayor and staff for moving the ball forward.

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New Data Makes Duval Street Revitalization More Concrete

Posted on April 12, 2024     2 Comments

By Chris Hamilton. Story is cross posted at KONK Life on April 12, 2024.  Follow us at  Friends of Car-Free Key West & Duval Street/Historic Downtown on Facebook.

About 75 people, attended the April 4 Duval Street Revitalization & Resiliency Project Workshop at the Gato Building on Simonton. Three quarters of the attendees were business owners who were queried in three separate interactive sessions about their opinions on building preservation, green infrastructure and streetscape/operational (think loading zones, trash, vehicles, etc.) issues. The big difference in this workshop versus the January 31 kickoff meeting, was the consultants started sharing a wealth of data they’ve been gathering to provide participants with context for future decisions. And the key data takeaway for me seemed to be the sheer number and prevalence of pedestrians from noonish until late at night on upper and especially lower Duval.

In a take on an old saying, what’s good for Duval Street is good for Key West, so we’re pleased the Duval Street Revitalization & Resiliency Project is focusing on our main street’s future well-being. Here’s what happened at the workshop.

Buildings & Preservation

While an overall goal of the project is to protect and make the corridor’s streets and sidewalks resilient in the face of rising seas and weather events, the team wants to help individual property owners tie into this and protect their buildings as well. Preservation strategies include backflow prevention, dry floodproofing, mechanical systems flood protection, wind mitigation, seepage and waterproofing, flood resistant building materials, utility & life-safety flood projection, wet floodproofing and ADA accessibility features. And doing all of this with the knowledge that we’re operating in one of North America’s most treasured historic districts.

The team in this room had an array of flood maps broken down by block segment and were able to immediately pull up characteristics of the address I was interested in – my employer Red Barn Theatre at 319 Duval Street. The very able consultants walked me through how the property met the street, it’s elevation and discussed the building’s age and type and potential future hardening schemes. And they were able to do this with each business that walked through the door.

Green Infrastructure

In the second room, attendees discussed green infrastructure. The heart of making the street resilient in the face of sea level rise and weather events will require significant reconstruction. On the one hand, the water can be handled via a “greyer” or centralized engineered system that pumps the water away and is more costly but introduces seemingly less change to the street.

A “greener” approach that handles the water more naturally where it falls via trees, bumpouts, bioswales, raingardens, planters, permeable pavements, and absorbent landscaping is less costly and requires less energy but does introduce more change to the way the street looks.

Streetscape, Functional Issues, People and Traffic

With either approach, replacing and improving the existing underground infrastructure along Duval will require significant streetscape removal and reconstruction. The City and project engineers tell us there are no pre-determined plans for how the street will look after reconstruction. The street could be put back together to look nearly identical to what it looks like today, or it could include some alterations. And that’s what attendees thought through in a series of exercises in room number three.

To undergird discussions with participants the consultants presented a few big data boards. The first, Duval Streets Existing Street Design shared that Duval Street has a fairly constant 50-foot right-of-way – building face to building face – from one end to the other. What changes is how this space is allocated to different uses, depending upon the block.

The next board shared Duval Street vehicle traffic data, saying that the street carries about 5,000 cars a day compared to 37,000 on N. Roosevelt and 15,000 at Eaton and White. (Click on the picture and zoom in to get more data.)

Go to https://duval4all.com/apr-4-workshop/ to see clean versions of all the boards.

But by far the most interesting board shared how people traveled – whether by car, bike truck, golf cart or on foot – on Duval by block segment and by time of day for every 15-minutes. Here’s one example: “In the evening, the Green-to-Caroline block carries as many as 3,700 people moving along the street in a single hour. However, 75 percent of these people are traveling by foot.”

Given this context, participants were asked, in what had to be the most fun and interactive exercise of the day, to design the street they thought should be put back out after construction. While most people didn’t eliminate vehicles, they did provide vehicles less space than there is today, and many considered more restrictions on vehicles in the late afternoons and evenings.

We promise to revisit this particular topic in a future article. Especially as people on foot represent about 75 percent of the traffic but are relegated to less than 25% of the available space. Fodder for another day…

Go to https://duval4all.com/apr-4-workshop/ to see all 28 submissions done at the workshop on April 4.

Leveraging Resiliency Construction Dollars for Revitalizing Duval

We’re lucky to have such a capable Planning Director in Katie Halloran overseeing the project and she personally engaged the attendees throughout the day. We were also happy to see the progressive Director of the Engineering Department, Gary Volenec involved and doing the same. We asked Jared Beck, the Stantec Project Manager what he thought after the event and here’s what he had to say:

“I am very pleased with the feedback gained from the workshop. We recognize nobody knows Duval Street better than those who interact with it day in and day out. Our goal of the workshop was to hear firsthand and better understand the nuances impacting businesses, property owners, and residents, and that’s exactly what we got. This will all be used as we have further discussions with business and property owners along Duval Street, and then develop preliminary concept plans for presentation and community review.”

We’ll repeat what we said at the top. What’s good for Duval Street is good for Key West and that’s why this project is so important. Money spent hardening Duval Street and the infrastructure below and around it to meet future challenges with sea level rise and weather events is the perfect time to address any enhancements to the street above, as these are pennies on the dollar when doing such big construction work. Our beloved little historic district’s main street will be all the better for our community participating thoughtfully and making the Duval Street Revitalization and Resiliency Project a success.

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More Information and Duval Street Revitalization Project History

For more information on the current planning effort visit https://duval4all.com/. And If you wan to go directly to the materials from the April 4 workshop click here. If you want to dive into the background and history of this project, here’s 11 stories we’ve done on it over the last five years:

• Project Seeks To Make Duval Street Resilient in Face of Sea Level Rise, February 4, 2024
• Progress on Five Historic District Projects Means More Life, Locals, Prosperity, and Resiliency for Our Downtown , October 21, 2022
• Mallory Sq., Diesel Plant, Duval Street and Bahama Village Housing Projects Create Synergy to Bolster Downtown, January 14, 2022
• Duval Street Revitalization Back on Track, October 1, 2021
• With the Duval Street Revitalization Plan Way Behind Schedule, Here’s 3 Quick Wins for Pedestrianizing Duval Street Now, July 16, 2021  
• Do Key West Commercial Areas Need Business Improvement Districts (BIDS)? – Part 2: What BIDS in Key West Might Look Like, April 23, 2021     
• Eight Things We Can Do to Pedestrianize Duval and Still Allow Cars, March 6, 2021 
• The Wee Donkey, Whataboutism, Bathwater and Duval Street’s Future, February 19, 2021 
• Duval Street Revitalization Moves Forward, June 10, 2020  
• Duval Street Revitalization Help Sought Via RFQ, December 10, 2020 
• Duval Street Revitalization Project Brings Hope to Downtown, December 28, 2020

March Madness and the Duval Loop

Posted on March 29, 2024     3 Comments

In intending to update an older article on the Duval Loop for today’s column, I asked my friend, Thaddeus Cohen who lives in Bahama Village, for some thoughts on why the Duval Loop ridership has never recovered its pre-COVID highs, despite the fact that the number of visitors and our downtown economy have been thriving since then. His response was so timely and wonderful that I’m reprinting it in its entirety as a guest column. Enjoy! Story is cross posted at KONK Life on March 29, 2024.  Follow us at  Friends of Car-Free Key West & Duval Street/Historic Downtown on Facebook.

March Madness, it’s that time of year. Many of us are excited that our school has made it to the big dance. Time to fill out those brackets. Who are the number one seeds who will be Cinderella. Is my team hitting its stride now that it’s playoff time. Will our stars meet the moment. How’s my bracket doing.

Well… it looks like the Duval Loop is a bracket buster. It was our star. Transit surveys said it was the model for our transit system, number one in our region. What happened? How did we get knocked out in the first round?

When a team is not performing up to expectations or under achieving the coach inevitably says we have to focus on our fundamentals, back to basics.

The Duval Loop as envisioned had two missions. The first was to reduce tourist traffic downtown. That traffic was characterized by 1. tourists circling around downtown looking for a parking space clogging the roads and 2. short trips from the hotel to our attractions clogging the roads.

 The second mission was tied to the first traffic issue i.e. looking for parking which inevitably had cars parking in residential neighborhoods. The Loop was to reduce the number of tourist cars parking in the residential neighborhood.

The fix provided a circular bus route one block from Duval that was fun, free, and frequent. The Duval Loop was game ready, colorful uniforms (bus  wrap), press releases and literature working with the hospitality industry on how it worked got the Loop at its peak to over 450K riders and a dramatic reduction in neighborhood parking complaints. It had all the marking of a number one seed.

Okay, I get it. The landscape changed.

COVID, lack of CDL drivers, budget constraints, the system was expanded into adjacent areas like the Truman Waterfront Park and down into the historic seaport. However, the resulting changes are clearly not good; fewer buses equals longer wait times from 15 minutes or less to over 30 minutes, which is bad; loss of its uniforms i.e. now the Loop has non-descript vehicles, a mix of vehicles; and it appears to have lost the connection to our businesses. There is no star power. There’s not even a Cinderella story to tell.

So, you guessed it. The Loop needs to get back to basics, to fundamentals and execution.

Transit may now be competitive in attracting CDL drivers that’s a start. Think of it as the new NIL environment for drivers. The transit team has to tell its story as to why a driver wants to go with the Loop compared to other transit offers. Not easy, but we have to pay to play to stay in the game. In this environment the transfer portal is always open.

We need to tighten up the route, back to the original concept, a circular around Duval. The Loop can’t be all things to all riders. Execution, at least a two-bus route or whatever it takes to have a 15-minute wait time. Let’s get our uniforms back. The Loop needs to be colorful, distinctive, to show we are ready for prime time. The bus stops need to be rehabilitated with map holders, route stop numbers and coordinated with the bus attire.

Let’s connect again with our boosters, the hospitality industry and the businesses that drive the economy. The Loop was designed in part to encourage the use of public transit, reduce traffic congestion, pollution, and fuel consumption. It’s a win for employers, employees, the transit system, and the community.

The frustration of traffic congestion and parking in the neighborhood was front and center at the March District 6 community meeting.

It’s time to be a number one seed again. We have the blueprint to be a winner. It’s comeback time.

Thaddeus Cohen

Thaddeus Cohen has worked transit issue as a former Secretary Florida DCA, Assistant City Manager Pensacola, Florida, and developer of the Duval Loop while Key West Planning Director. Mr. Cohen lives in Bahama Village.

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Additional reading about the Duval Loop:

• Staff Takes Bull By Horns and Upgrades Embarrassing Duval Loop Stop Signs, August 20, 2022
• Duval Loop Ridership is Plummeting. Save the Duval Loop! June 3, 2022
• The Sorry State of Key West Bus Stops Revisited – What’s Happening a Year Later, May 6, 2022
• Ten Ways To Make Car-Free Key West a Reality for Visitors, April 8, 2022
• The Good, The Bad and the Ugly – A Dozen Marketing Things Key West Transit Can Do to Increase Ridership, April 9, 2021
• The Sorry State of Key West Bus Stops – We Just Don’t Care, April 2, 2021
• Why the Duval Loop Should Be Free for Everyone, December 22, 2020

Chris Hamilton

A native of the District of Columbia, where for a couple decades+ he led the nationally renown Commuter Services unit for Arlington County, VA’s DOT, Chris has lived in Key West since 2015. He lives car-free downtown and works and volunteers for a couple non-profits.

Monroe County to City’s Request for Bike Lane: Drop Dead

Posted on March 8, 2024     2 Comments

By Chris Hamilton. Story is cross posted at KONK Life on March 8, 2024.  Follow us at  Friends of Car-Free Key West & Duval Street/Historic Downtown on Facebook.

For those who remember the infamous New York City Daily News headline “FORD TO CITY: DROP DEAD” in 1975, prompted by then President Ford saying he would deny federal assistance to spare New York City from bankruptcy, Monroe County’s continued denial of a City of Key West request for one block of bike lane, seems appropriate. While Gerald R. Ford never explicitly said those words and no one at the County has either, the effect of the County’s actions, at least to date, is the same.

Southard Street has had a bike lane from White Street down to Whitehead at the Green Parrot for as long as anyone can remember. Last year when the City rebuilt the sidewalk and street in the 300 and 400 blocks of Southard, bicycle enthusiasts were hopeful that the Vision of the City’s adopted Bike Plan would be fulfilled, and the bike lane would finally be extended into the busy 300 block and on into the popular Truman Waterfront Park. Alas, as has happened with so many projects on this island, the 300 block was repainted exactly as it had been before, with “Reserved Parking” for County officials (State Attorney Investigators specifically) on the public right-of-way in the City’s street and no bike lane where the Bike Plan says there should be one. Why? Because the County apparently prioritizes convenient parking for a few employees’ private vehicles over the safety of the biking public. Even when there’s ample parking for employees behind their building.

We did a similar story this time last year, just as the paint was drying on a newly repaved 300 block of Southard. One year later, even though Mayor Teri Johnston and her staff have tried to get the bike lane done, they continue to be stymied by an uncooperative County staff and County Commissioner in the person of Jim Scholl. When we asked Mr. Scholl to intercede on behalf of people on bikes he replied: “At this time it is unlikely those parking spaces will be converted to other uses.” But it isn’t too late for the County to reverse its obstinate and selfish stand. Let’s dive into the details and circle back to history in the person of Gerald R. Ford.

What’s Out There Today

The one-way pair of Southard and Fleming Streets bicycle lanes are well known, covering the 1100 blocks from White Street all the way down to the 400 blocks at Whitehead. And with the 300 and 400 blocks of Southard recently rebuilt and repaved, the new and improved bike lane in the 400 block of Southard Street looks great until it peters out just before you get to Whitehead. So, all of a sudden, if you are going to the Truman Waterfront Park, bikes suddenly have to take the lane and move into car traffic just where the street becomes two-way and gets even busier.

What the Bike Plan Says To Do

The City’s adopted Bicycle and Pedestrian Master Plan, which proposes to link up pieces of bike lanes into a safer and cohesive network, indicates on page 34 of its Vision Network to replace the current sharrows in the 300 block with a proper bike lane to complete the network all the way into Truman Waterfront Park. The perfect time to make that change WAS during a repaving. But when construction was complete the street configuration was put back just the same as before, with parking on-street for County officials private vehicles and no bike lane.

Why didn’t they follow the Bike Plan?

A Parking Crunch in 2001, Due to Construction in the Area, Led to a Never-Ending Contract to Provide the County Spaces On City Right-of-Way

When we asked why no bike lane was put in, per the Bike Plan, we learned that the City and County have a contract dating back to 2001 to provide free on-street parking for County employees in the Jackson Square County Courthouse complex along this block during work hours. The agreement begins:

“WHEREAS, the County is experiencing parking problems at Jackson Square due to on-going construction in this area, and

WHEREAS, to help alleviate these parking problems, the City has agreed to lease certain parking areas to the County that are located on portions of City street that border Jackson Square…”

We’ve been told the County must agree to let go of these spaces, by amending the 23-year old contract. The document states: “This agreement may only be modified by a written amendment signed by duly authorized representatives of both parties.”

Must have been the same people who penned a similar never-ending agreement with Pier B allowing cruise ships in perpetuity unless BOTH parties agree to change it. I mean who in the world writes all these unfavorable contracts at the City’s expense? And why wasn’t a sunset date put on a solution that was meant to address a temporary parking crunch that no longer exists?

On recent weekday mornings and afternoons we’ve been in the 300 block of Southard and noticed that most of the cars parking for free on the block, don’t have a “Monroe County Jackson Square Parking Permit” so it seems like it is just free parking for anyone, undercutting Mr. Scholl’s office response that there’s a “demand” for that parking by State Attorney Investigators. AND each time we’ve been in the neighborhood, there’s been enough empty County parking spaces on Thomas Street and the County lot behind the building to accommodate the number of cars parked on Southard – permit or not. I suppose the State Attorney Investigators would have to walk another couple hundred feet though. So, their parking convenience trumps following the Bike Plan and completing the Southard Street Bike Lane. Hmmm….

President Ford Changed His Mind. Can Monroe County?

For a few years now Mayor Teri Johnston has repeated the mantra to staff that she wants to see opportunities for bike and pedestrian improvements with every street rebuild or repaving and we’ve captured some of those instances here, here, here, here, here, here and on other occasions. She’s also been birddogging this particular issue too. She asked the then City Manager Patti McLaughlin and the City Attorney’s Office to get this bike lane done. Both offices hit stone walls with their counterparts at the County. We asked County Commissioner Jim Scholl to help, and his response was similar. That’s where we stand today.

Back in 1975, after that infamous “Drop Dead” headline, President Ford eventually DID indeed change his mind and sign legislation that provided federal loans to New York City. Let’s hope Monroe County officials relent, change their minds and finally agree to do the right thing. Completing this bike lane all the way through to the park, as the Bike Plan calls for, helps achieve a safer bicycle network. And that’s better for everyone. People in cars and on bikes.

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Key West Improving Infrastructure for Pedestrian Safety

Posted on March 1, 2024     Leave a Comment

By Chris Hamilton. Story is cross posted at KONK Life on March 1, 2024.  Follow us at  Friends of Car-Free Key West & Duval Street/Historic Downtown on Facebook.

Perhaps you’ve seen the Rectangular Rapid Flashing Beacons recently installed along Northside Dr. near the Clayton Sterling Baseball Complex and along Eaton Street at Frances Street. Or maybe you’ve come across the new high visibility stamped brick pattern crosswalks near Horace O’Bryant (HOB) School along Pearl Street at Virginia Street and on Catherine Street at Leon Street. And if you’ve been in the Seaport neighborhood, in a car or on foot, you’ve likely noticed a bunch of new crosswalks on Eaton and Fleming Streets that in multiple locations on Eaton also include in-street signs saying, “State Law – Stop for Pedestrians Within Crosswalk.” And low and behold we’ve actually witnessed cars stopping and yielding to pedestrians.

These small safety projects, along with major upgrades coming soon to pedestrian and bicycle facilities included in the current rebuilds of United and South Streets downtown are part of the City Engineering Department’s increased focus on pedestrian and bicycle safety. In a town that for decades has slavishly catered to the whims of car-convenience and car-parking above all else and has often believed safety meant the police educating bicyclists and pedestrians on how to properly adhere to vehicular rules, these infrastructure efforts are a little bit of progress that’s better and safer for everyone, whether on two-feet, two-wheels or behind the wheel.

Rectangular Rapid Flashing Beacons or RRFBs

In the last year the City has installed two Rectangular Rapid Flashing Beacons, called RRFBs, within Key West. The first was installed along Northside Dr. near the Clayton Sterling Baseball Complex. The second was installed along Eaton Street at Frances Street. Ryan Stachurski the City’s Multimodal Transportation Coordinator says:

“These are great because studies have shown they’re really effective at reducing pedestrian crashes. Since they’re solar powered, they’re also very affordable. It’s important for pedestrians to understand that the beacons won’t stop traffic, but the signals will call attention to make sure the pedestrians are visible. Motorists must remember that Florida statute requires drivers to stop for pedestrians within a crosswalk.”

High Visibility Stamped Brick Pattern Sidewalks

The City of Key West is testing two new crosswalks near Horace O’Bryant School. One is along Pearl Street at the intersection with Virginia Street and the other is on Catherine Street at Leon Street. The new installation technique makes use of a high visibility stamped brick pattern Ryan tells us is: “both stylish and safe.” He adds: “High-visibility crosswalks constructed from thermoplastic have been shown to reduce pedestrian injury crashes.”

In-Street Pedestrian Crossing Signs

Crosswalks have been installed during the last year along the one-way, busy, and fast moving Fleming Street at William, Margaret, Grinnell, and Frances Streets. On the even busier, two-way, and hard to cross Eaton Street, all the same cross streets and Elizabeth have received upgrades. Says Mr. Stachurski:

“The City has also been testing in-street pedestrian crossing signs to call attention to pedestrians using unsignalized crossings. Oftentimes used temporarily in school zones, permanent signs are being tested at various intersections along Eaton Street and White Street. These crossings can be especially difficult for pedestrians because there may be uneven gaps in approaching traffic and motorists may not be expecting pedestrians. The in-street signs call attention to the crosswalks and offer a safer and easier crossing. Preliminary results show a reduction in injury crashes and collisions overall at these intersections.”

Of all of these projects Ryan says: “These one-off improvements have largely been called for by resident requests and supported with crash data. We would like to develop a plan to identify pedestrian improvement priorities across the City and have begun discussing how best to do this.”

Better Pedestrian and Bicycle Facilities Coming With the Rebuilds of United and South Streets

The perfect time to add or improve bicycle and pedestrian facilities is when a street is rebuilt or repaved. And that’s just what is happening on United and then South Streets, both of which are in different stages of street rebuilds between Whitehead and Grinnell Streets downtown. After utility work is done, there will be new curb and gutter and sidewalks that include narrower pedestrians crossings at intersections, lots of new trees and a brand spanking new, extra-width bike lane where none existed before (see our story on these improvements here). Mr. Stachurski told us:

“When larger project areas are being installed, as a number of blocks of United Street are right now, they get designed with updated safety features. United Street will include a number of new high-visibility crosswalks to help ease crossings. Every step helps us get closer to our Vision Zero goal of zero serious injuries or fatalities by 2035. It’s important to remember that we’re all pedestrians at some time, and we all want to be able to get to our destination safely.”

Key West Is Different Than Most of The Mainland – So Our Street Hierarchy Should Reflect That

Key West is full of pedestrians and cars AND bikes and that’s different than most places. According to the U.S. Census 15% of Key West residents’ commute to work by bicycle and another 8% walk to work. Bike shops are selling out of rentals and if you’ve been downtown, you’ve seen pedestrians crowding our narrow sidewalks. There’s a lot of bikes and e-bikes and e-scooters mixing with golf carts, scooters, pedestrians, and cars. As so many of these people on the street are visitors from car-centric mainland places, they aren’t used to these hordes of pedestrians and jumble of vehicle types and that’s a dangerous mix. And it is why our downtown streets should prioritize pedestrians and then bikes and other small vehicles like scooters and then cars.

And while we’ve yet to see any street parking taken away for wider sidewalks or bike lanes, yet, these projects are a start in the right direction. So, kudos to Engineering Director Gary Volenec and Multimodal Coordinator Ryan Stachurski for the new and progressive focus and to Mayor Teri Johnston who’s been egging them on. Doing more of this will make our little island paradise better for everyone.

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There Goes The Key West Gayborhood?

Posted on February 16, 2024     3 Comments

By Chris Hamilton. Story is cross posted at KONK Life on February 16, 2024.  Follow us at  Friends of Car-Free Key West & Duval Street/Historic Downtown on Facebook.

On February 5 the Equator Resort – the Male-Only – Clothing Optional hotel at 822 Fleming Street announced that after 27 years in business as the Equator, their last day of operation would be January 8, 2025, saying: “The company has not sold, however there are new shareholders that have expanded their view of the corporations future plans.” The “expanded view” means the 34 room hotel with beautiful grounds and two gorgeous pools will no longer be for gay men but rather be “welcome to all.” Insiders tell us the new name will be “Bishop Key West” and will not be clothing optional. And just like that Key West has lost one of the few remaining “Gay” hotels.

Is our gayborhood disappearing? Is Key West becoming less gay? What does the loss of gay spaces mean for gay businesses and our island LGBTQ+ community? Our downtown business district and our Key West community in general? Do proprietors of gay establishments have a responsibility to carry on and ensure their traditions? And what are some things we can do to Keep Key West Gay?

To try to answer these questions, we did some research on the waxing and waning of Key West and other cities’ experiences with gayborhoods and reached out to locals in the know and asked them their thoughts in light of the Equator Resort’s announcement. We received some heartfelt and thoughtful responses and are sharing them along with a little bit of historical context in hopes of sparking further conversation about the future.

Note that since we published this story the owners revealed their new website BishopKeyWest.com on February 20 with nary a whisper about the hotel’s past nor any explicit welcoming messages to its old customer base. Their slogan “Experience Key West from a different perspective” would have been more appropriate to The Equator Resort because the new offering seems generic and like every other corporate hotel on the island. Sigh…

“Is Key West Going Straight?”

That’s the title of a New York Times article that begins:

“FOR decades, the remote Florida town of Key West has been a refuge for gay tourists, a kind of Southern bookend to Provincetown, Mass. — a place where drag shows, all-male guest houses (complete with communal hot tubs) and a spirit of unbridled hedonism attracted everyone from closeted Midwest accountants to Tennessee Williams.

But recently, soaring real estate prices and the popularity of events like Fantasy Fest — an annual bacchanal of parades, masquerade balls and celebrity look-alike contests that began in 1979 as an effort by businesses to promote tourism and has since evolved into a drunken open-air party that would be right at home on fraternity row — have begun to attract a more heterogenous crowd, one that can at times make Key West look like any other tourist town getting ready for Spring Break.

You can feel the change… for many longtime gay visitors to this 5.9-square-mile island, located about 150 miles southwest of Miami, there is a growing sense that Key West is no longer the gay destination it once was.”

For many, this seems to ring true. Perhaps for you too.

Oh, the date of this article? November 18, 2005. Yes, 2005. So, people have been saying Key West isn’t what it once was, for a couple decades now. Here’s how Laura Zequeira -Smith, Manager of Alexander’s Guesthouse puts it:

“People have been saying for a long time that Key West isn’t as Gay as it once was. I don’t agree with that entirely, as there are many gay people who live and work in town. Do they go to or open exclusively LGBTQ businesses? Do LGBTQ visitors only visit LGBTQ businesses? Not so much anymore, as the younger generation enjoys the fruits of the fight of older generations. Fighting for equality and the fight against discrimination has brought so many wonderful changes, that are still evolving, merging minority groups with larger groups…creating our One Human Family.”

Gayborhoods and the Places We Hang Out In, Rise and Fall

In his groundbreaking, amply researched and much followed-up 2014 book, There Goes the Gayborhood? Professor Amin Ghaziani discussed how legendary gay neighborhoods such as the Castro in San Francisco, Greenwich Village in New York City, Boystown in Chicago and so many more long provided sexual minorities with safe havens. But as society increasingly accepts our LGBTQ+ community into the mainstream the book explores the question: Are gayborhoods destined to disappear? Smaller places like Key West, Provincetown, Ogunquit, Fire Island/The Pines, and Rehoboth Beach have similar histories to gayborhoods in the larger cities but on a city-wide scale.

Local entrepreneur Larry Ketron, Manager of the “gayest store in Key West” the In Touch gift shop at 706 Duval Street echoes Ghaziani saying: “From the days when the “mob” saw the money potential of creating “safe spaces” for the homosexual crowd to the vision of gay business owners things have been profit driven. Once the safe haven for young coming out and “closeted” men, things have changed. As clientele grew older, the younger generation didn’t feel the need for “safe havens” and have chosen to go anywhere they feel welcome. That and the changing dynamics of “sex hookups” via internet sites have left bathhouses, guest houses, and gay bars to decline. Check out the age of the clientele of most gay bars and bathhouses and the age is not the twenty somethings of the 70’s. Today, if you want to hookup, just grab your phone.” 

This isn’t just an academic exercise as even the front page of the Key West Business Guild’s gaykeywestfl.com visitors website feels the need to address the issue right up front with the headline: “IS KEY WEST STILL “GAY?” and goes on to say:

“Please, girlfriend. We’re still here. We’re still queer. Now come visit us! Seriously. Just like Provincetown, Palm Springs, Ft. Lauderdale and West Hollywood we’ve all heard the same question: “Where did the gays go?”

The site goes on to explain that back in the day Key West was one of the few truly accepting places and it still is as evidenced by the city’s official “One Human Family” motto.

The Business Guild’s Executive Director Rob Dougherty adds:

“In the late 60’s and 70’s, the focus of the movement was to be seen, to be heard, and to be afforded equal rights the right to live with dignity. The 1980’s should have been a time of great celebration; however, those of us who lived through the time, and buried so many of our own, know there was no celebration. We were literally fighting for our lives. In the 90’s, our community focused on political reform. The right to marry, to adopt children, and to change laws that made discrimination legal. In short, we fought for equality under the law. We deserved and demanded equality under the law. We made such amazing progress; however, that did not come without cost. We saw the shift from celebrating what made our culture so unique, to “we are just like you”. The problem is, as with any culture striving for assimilation, we may have lost the very core of our culture.”

That “cost” is the loss of gay businesses and gayborhoods.

Ghaziani’s book puts the changing face of gayborhoods into a larger urban planning context by pointing out that cities aren’t static places that stay the same. Gayborhoods are just like any other neighborhood and are organic and continually evolving places. Constant population change or turnover is a regular feature of most neighborhoods.

Ghaziani discusses how gayborhoods developed after WWII as men and women returned home and realized the coastal port cities they were discharged to, were places they could find others like themselves. This accelerated in the 1960’s and 70’s as a gay identity and liberation emerged and more and more people gravitated to these burgeoning gayborhoods that were centered on the presence of gay bars and businesses. But that was seemingly the heyday.

Ghaziani’s research tells us that between the 2000 and 2010 Census, the number of same-sex couples living in key traditional gayborhoods declined as gays realized they could live safely in many more places. It isn’t just that gay people are spreading out but that many of the places gay people hang out in (think bars, cabarets, discos, sex clubs, inns/resorts and the third places around them) have also disappeared. In a story in the Seattle Times last year asking the question Is Seattle Still An LGBTQ-Friendly City? they say “Nationally, the Washington Post reported that 45% of gay bars have closed since 2002.”

In the book I just started reading, Who Needs Gay Bars? Bar-Hopping Through America’s Endangered LGBTQ+ Places, May 2023 author Greggor Mattson says right up front “By my count 37 percent of gay bars closed between 2007 and 2019, and that was before COVID-19, brought the nation’s nightlife to its knees and shuttered an additional 16% by 2021. Fully 50 percent of gay bars closed in the nineteen years between 2012 and 2021.“

In Jeremy Atherton Lin’s engrossing book Gay Bar: Why We Went Out, February 2021 it is pointed out that gay bars are closing at an alarming rate and in the context of his personal story he explores what’s being lost as a result. I just finished Lucas Hildebrand’s November 2023 book The Bars Are Ours – Histories and Cultures of Gay Bars in America, 1960 and After and came away impressed by the depth and breadth of the cultural significance of having safe places to gather and the wonderful gaybhorhoods that often built up around them. It is a comprehensively researched and vividly written account that depicts how bars reflected the LGBTQ+ communities they attracted and, in many cases, at least in urban settings, helped solidify gayborhoods. So, when gay bars or gay businesses like the Equator Resort disappear it is fair to ask the question what’s happening? While it is undeniable based upon the research that the number of gay bars and places has been dwindling, the book leaves one hopeful that our places aren’t entirely disappearing but evolving in light of new technologies, marriage equality and a new generations’ increasing ability to be free to be.

Flaming and South Hard Streets And Gay Key West’s History

The books and research indicate that Key West’s experience is illustrative of what’s going on across most of the country with a few notable exceptions like the explosive growth of LGBTQ+ people and businesses in places like Wilton Manors in Fort Lauderdale.

An article on gaykeywestfl.com How The Gays Saved Key West by Guy Ross traces how Tennessee Williams and Leonard Bernstein’s, among other artists visits to Key West in the 1940’s, sparked word among newly forming gayborhoods in major east coast cities that Key West was an easy, live-and-let-live sanctuary. He goes on to say that “By the 1970s the stream of gay visitors to the island had turned into a torrent with more than 30 same sex guest houses on the small island catering to gay men.”

Peter Arnow, the Key West Business Guild’s longtime community liaison and photographer said of that time period when the Guild first formed: “The gay community has always sought out safe havens near the water “at the end of the line.” Establishment of earlier communities before Key West included Provincetown and Fired Island. At the time, Key West was economically depressed, which enabled visitors to locate year-round to the warm-weather environment at a low cost – and, in the process help to fix up the infrastructure.”

“When I first arrived in Key West in 1976, older queens were complaining that the island was no fun anymore because all the drunken sailors needing a blowjob were gone.” says Richard McGarry co-author of the recently expanded 2^nd edition of the book Gay Key West – A History in the context of people always complaining the past was better, when I asked him about the demise of the Equator. He goes on:

“The trend of gay guest houses switching to “all welcome” seems to have started in the 1990s and I think that Peter Arno of the Business Guild told me that there was something like 38 gay guest houses in Key West in the late 1980s. Many were a single old Conch house with maybe a half-dozen rooms and run by a gay couple. 

A week’s vacation in Key West was very affordable back then. As I noted in Gay Key West – A History, “the rooms were small and the bathroom was down the hall, but for less than $100 you could spend a whole week at ‘Big Ruby’s.’” It was the first gay guest house on the island in the early 1970s. 

The cost of a Key West vacation now prices out the kind of young gay men that filled lower Duval Street after dark in the era when the Village People were singing “I’m heading for Key-ey-ey West, the key to happiness.”  

The Monroe County Tourist Development Council (TDC)’s website The Florida Keys & Key West says “The Key West Business Guild and its LGBT Visitor Center first opened their doors in 1978 to support the community and promote tourism. Some of the founding business members included La Te Da and Coconut Grove accommodations, the Copa and Monster clubs and the fabled Atlantic Shores hotel.” Today, only La Te Da still exists. The Coconut Grove, which use to be at 815 Fleming Street across from the Equator Resort and the Oasis Guest House at 823 Fleming were both all-male clothing-optional resorts that are now part of the “all welcome” NYAH Hotel complex.

On Real Estate agent Gary Thomas’ blog that’s full of fun Key West history, in a 2013 post about the sale of a condo at the Seafoam building next door to the Equator, he says: “One of the most interesting condos in Key West is offered for sale at the asking price of $400,000. It is Unit #6 located on the top floor at 812 Fleming Street and has a front balcony that overlooks the gayest street in Key West. If you are a gay man or woman, of if you are just hip and love to be part of the action, this pied-a-terre may be the home of your dream or just the vacation getaway place you have been searching for.”

In younger days I recall visiting friends in Key West beginning in the mid-1990’s and being introduced to the gayborhood with the locals explaining that Fleming Street was to be called “Flaming Street” and Southard Street was to be called “South Hard Street” because of all the gay places and people. When my best friends Kenny and Steven got married in Key West in 2004, they put up the wedding party at the Coconut Grove and Oasis. And while I haven’t heard people use that terminology in years, the loss of the Coconut Grove, Oasis and now Equator Resort does seem to dim the flame of Flaming/Fleming Street’s lore.

What Does the Loss of Gay Places Mean for Downtown and Gay Key West?

To place the loss of the Equator Resort in the context of what it means for downtown and our local LGBTQ+ community we asked some local stakeholders:

Here’s what Neil Chamberlain, owner of Graffiti Key West retail shop at 721 Duval Street and publisher of Q Magazine – the monthly guide to Gay Key West says: “That’s tough to say. LGBTQ+ visitors are already very much welcome anywhere in Key West. It’s not as if gay men aren’t welcome elsewhere and this takes away hotel rooms. The number of rooms is not changing in the city. However, what we don’t know is how many guests of Equator were only coming because of what the Equator offered. If these guests were coming for Key West primarily and for an LGBTQ+ property secondarily, they may still visit so the impact would be minimal. If these guests primary reason for visiting was the ability to be in the company of other LGBTQ+ men primarily and visit Key West secondarily, those visitors will likely look elsewhere, such as Fort Lauderdale or Puerta Vallarta for their vacation. Only time will tell what the long term implications will be.”

Jeffrey Smead, General Manager, Island House Resort says: “Island House is especially saddened that Equator has decided to rebrand and no longer be a gay establishment. They have been one of the Key West strongholds with 34 rooms dedicated to serving gay patrons seeking that kind of unique experience. When shifts like this happen, it makes it a lot harder to defend the destination to those who say, “Key West isn’t gay anymore” for the last 20 years.”

Laura Zequeira-Smith of Alexanders added: “When the Equator closes, some visitors may not come back to Key West, while others will continue to come.”

Cori Convertito, PhD, Curator & Historian, Key West Art & Historical Society and Key West Business Guild Board of Directors answered the question this way “The closure of Equator Resort is a loss for the gay community. Historically, Key West has been a safe haven for those in the gay community and having institutions like Equator Resort strengthened that safety and security for travelers.”

Larry Ketron of In-Touch gift shop chimes in that “People say that Key West is still a “gay” town. Yes, it is but the age of the gay residents is often over the age of 60. The results of the changes we fought for in the sixties, seventies and eighties were achieved at our loss. As a community, we have allowed our world to shrink, because of our own blindness. Soon, there will be fewer bars and guesthouses. It’s all about money not family.”

And Rob Dougherty of the Key West Business Guild says: “I’m not too sure what it will mean for downtown Key West as a whole; however, it will certainly impact the visibility of our thriving LGBTQ+ community. The absence of the Equator as a destination will absolutely impact our ability to promote our island as a welcoming place for Gay men to travel. That means less LGBTQ dollars being spent in businesses. It means existing LGBTQ and friendly businesses will have to examine their strategy to remain viable. In whole, this means there is the potential of the LGBTQ community having less of an influence in a city that at one time, relied on LGBTQ dollars to remain strong.” 

The consensus seems to be unsure what the loss of gay places means for the economics of our downtown but that losing gay places does have an impact on the LGBTQ+ community. Nearly everyone we talked to or researched voice some variation on theme that the loss of gay places or gay neighborhoods is in part due the acceptance of our community by the mainstream over the last couple of decades, and that that part at least is a good thing. “We’re a victim of our own success” multiple people have said.

Do Gay Proprietors Have a Responsibility to Their Communities?

I’ve always admired Neil Chamberlain’s thoughtful and reasoned approaches on issues of the day in Key West, so I was particularly taken with his notion that gay proprietors are stewards who have a responsibility to try to continue their businesses’ traditions. Here’s how Neil explains it:

“Obviously, I’m disappointed. (In the Equator Resort closing.) I would have preferred that they either continued on as it always has or potentially sold to someone that would have respected its history. I feel that owners of LGBTQ+ businesses are “stewards” of the business more than “owners.” I believe we have a responsibility to honor those that built these businesses and continue in those traditions. Ultimately, businesses are here to make money. If that’s the only agenda, then buy a generic business that doesn’t have a specific history that someone built from the ground up.”

He goes on to add his personal story in this regard:

“Almost 8 years ago, I purchased Graffitti, a primarily LGBTQ+ men’s clothing store. I wasn’t looking to buy a clothing store. I was very much enjoying my simple life as a DJ and publisher.  I walked in one day and saw that there was a lot of missing inventory. After a conversation with the owner, he told me he was starting to close the store to focus more on his own life. I was saddened that Key West was losing another long-term LGBTQ+ business. We spoke in great deal and over the next month, we negotiated a deal for me to buy the store and continue the tradition. I was fortunate I had the time and the ability to purchase the store, because I thought it was important to try to save another LGBTQ+ business. At the time there were two other stores that were similar to Graffitti. Sadly, both are also gone, but I have done everything to make sure Graffitti continues on, and it’s my intention to continue to do so for as long as I can. If there comes a time for me to hand over the reins, I will do everything I can to make sure the new owner continues on with this tradition. I know I can’t enforce that, but I will try to instill the importance of the history into a new owner one day.”

Neil’s thoughts and story touched a chord with me as Amin Ghaziani, Lucas Hilderbrand and Jeremy Atherton’s books each discussed the often revered status of gay establishments in their individual communities and how their owners were often beloved and vital cogs in their gayborhoods. I think that Christopher Rounds and Patrick Hegarty owners of La Te Da, Joey Schroeder owner of Bourbon Street Pub and New Orleans House, Bobi Lore owner of Island House and now Jonathan and Michael Barrett the new owners of the Aqqua Plex are all held in the same very high regard by the community.

To reach for a metaphor, think about sports teams owners. While for nearly every business the bottom line is profits, for iconic institutions that represent their community, like sports teams, most people say the owners have an additional responsibility to do right by their community too. Owners who move teams out of cities are thus justly vilified. While the Equator Resort certainly isn’t an institution, wouldn’t it have been better for our community had Equator Resort owner Richard Hoy sought the advice, counsel and help of the community to keep the establishment in gay hands?

So, to answer our own question, yes, we agree with Neil and think gay proprietors do have a responsibility to our community. Especially as it is our community that helped build them up. And Mr. Hoy should have thought the same way too. And like a sports team that moves away we can all rightly feel like we were let down by what he’s doing. (Note we did reach out to the owner and management of the Equator Resort and didn’t receive any responses to our inquires.)

So How Does the Community Move Forward?

In thinking about Key West’s future Neil says: “Our community doesn’t have the need to seek out these safe havens anymore, but Key West still has a lot to offer. It’s important that we continue to educate people on the history of the LGBTQ+ community and how places such as Key West served as a safe outlet to be ourselves. We can’t do that if we keep pushing our own people away.”

Jeffrey adds: “What hasn’t changed (and won’t), is that Key West remains a tropical domestic destination that is safe for gay people to visit, and still has all the ingredients for a vacation that gay people really love. World class food & drinks, warm weather, gorgeous water, unique accommodations, art, history, and endless party options. What’s important for us to remember, is the reason Island House was founded in 1976 to begin with, is exactly why it’s still relevant in 2024. A gay men’s resort like this is not just selling lodging- it sells an experience. So long as gay people still seek out gay experiences, and Island House keeps raising the bar of what a unique property like us can accomplish, we’re going to keep this place gay AF.”  

Laura says: “People still feel a natural pull to find other like-minded souls to connect with. So now, we try to find ways to gather, without excluding others. That is the balance the world is now trying to achieve, which I have faith we will… I think it is still important to have LGBTQA businesses where each of us can gather with those who understand us, to receive the support we need.

The Key West Business Guild is doing a wonderful job at launching a great Gay Key West campaign this year. We still have our Gayborhood down on Duval St. with the fun bars, fabulous drag shows and rainbow sidewalks. While Gay Key West may not look like it once did, it is evolving with its people, but always filled with colorful diversity and love.”

And Rob concludes: “I believe the issue is to address preserving the core of our culture. Gay bars are almost a thing of the past except for larger metro areas. While we have the strong support of Key West, from our local police to places of worship, LGBTQ businesses are the ones that will need to stand up. If there is to be any progress in preserving the core of our culture from fully disappearing, we must act as a unified community. Preserving and honoring our history matters if we are to move forward.”

In Key West, the most visible LGBTQ+ businesses are the foundation of the Key West Business Guild. Without their support, there would be no mission statement, no vision, and no resources to carry us forward. Without the LGBTQ+ community, one can make the argument, there would be no Key West, as we know it. While strong, it could be stronger. I believe that there have been political and social currents that have threatened progress our community has made over the last 5-decades. These currents are seen everywhere, and we cannot allow them to continue to dismantle the legacy of those who have fought, and have died, so that we can celebrate the freedom afforded to everyone in a Democracy.”

Things We Might Do To Continue and Forward a Gay Key West

In a book review and chat with the There Goes The Gayborhood? author Amin Ghaziani, VOX writer Matthew Yglesais and he talk about a couple of solutions for cities that want to shore up their gayborhoods. Those giving us feedback hit on a third.

1 – Commemorations

The first is called civic commemorations saying: “Chicago became the first city in the world to use tax funded dollars to municipally mark its gayborhood — Boystown. They installed art deco styled rainbow colored pylons along North Halsted Street, which is a main clear artery of the commercial and night life district in the city. We’ve seen versions of this in many cities across North America.

Philadelphia installed rainbow flags underneath the street signs that demarcate a portion of the Washington Square West neighborhood. Toronto did the same thing by installing rainbow flags underneath its street signs in the gayborhood. In Vancouver, recently, the city installed permanent rainbow colored crosswalks in the heart of the Davie Village gayborhood. West Hollywood has done the same thing.”

Here in Key West the City installed the Rainbow Crosswalks at the intersection of Duval and Petronia Streets. They’ve adopted the “One Human Family” motto and officially fly the Rainbow flag at City Hall and City events. I’ve always wondered why, during Pride week or month each year, Rainbow flags are only installed on the street poles in the few blocks of our gayborhood and not the entirety of Duval Street. Or maybe also along N. Roosevelt Boulevard as you come into the City or at the Historic Seaport and many more places? What other things could be done during Pride week or month and what permanent commemorations could be installed?

2 – Anchor Institutions

The second measure that they discussed was promotion of “anchor institutions” saying of them: “These are particular organizations or non-profit community centers, businesses that have particular importance or significance for the LGBTQ community. This could be something like the community center on Halsted in Chicago. It could be a particular bar that may have existed for a while that has special significance to the community. These anchor institutions will continually inspire people to visit and spend time in the neighborhood even if they no longer live there.” In his book there’s also talk about gay newspapers and periodicals and of providing subsidies to anchor institutions.

One of the recent bright spots in our gayborhood was when the recently deceased and much beloved gay Key West icon Michael Ingram sold the local gay institution, his Aqua Plex property, which include Aqua Bar & Nightclub, 22&Co, Back Bar, and the newly minted (formerly Sidebar) Birdcage Cabaret, at 711 Duval Street last May to Jonathan and Michael Barrett, a gay couple from Michigan. To his everlasting credit, Michael Ingram “wanted to keep its drag bar tradition.”

So how do we help other anchors/institutions thrive and continue and help their owners do what Michael Ingram did and not what Richard Hoy is doing?

3 – History

Many of our responders talked about the importance of “preserving and honoring our history” or “educating people about the history of our community” and “the need for our history and personal stories to be shared.”

There are many ways to keep the Key West LGBTQ+ history alive. How about a Rainbow Museum right here in Key West? The first gay museum opened in 2011 in San Francisco’s Castro District and many more since then. Here’s “The Top 10 LGBTQ+ Museums in the U.S.” An interesting museum spinoff idea is Chicago’s Legacy Walk with outdoor installations dedicated to highlighting world-changing members of the LGBTQ+ community. Given Key West’s vibrant history, either of these ideas would have much material to work with.

What else could we do?

The Key West Gayborhood and Its Anchor Institutions Are Important for Key West – Let’s Find a Way to Ensure That Continues

In writing about the There Goes The Gayborhood? book Matthew Yglesias says:

“Areas of concentrated minorities groups have been crucibles to cultural innovation,” Ghaziani observes, and they have inspired expressions from music to fashion, poetry and literature.” Preservation strategies can help us hang on to some of those valuable gayborhood contributions, as well as perhaps retaining a critical mass that’s necessary for political mobilization.”

What Ghaziani notes here about gayborhoods contributions all over the country, is true right here on our little island home. One can’t really imagine the history of Key West since WWII, without acknowledging the LBGTQ+ community’s input. Key West is a wonderful and magical place because of this. It is part of Key West’s very fiber. So, how do we as a community, the entire community, ensure that we don’t lose our gay spaces and gayborhood and that we KEEP KEY WEST GAY? We’re rightly looking at the Key West Business Guild, our anchor institutions, and our community to further the discussion. If we succeed, Key West will be all the better for it. I’d like to end with this wonderful quote from Laura:

“While Gay Key West may not look like it once did, it is evolving with its people, but always filled with colorful diversity and love.  Many LGBTQA ++ have families now, are in long term relationships, while there are club hoppers out there too, many that come to Key West aren’t all going to the late night bars, they are going to dinner at 6pm instead and a drag show at 8pm. They DO still LOVE a good Tea Dance on a Sunday!  Can I get an Amen on that one, LOL!  May the Tea Dance live on FOREVER.  Gay Key West is evolving with the times, and I believe, will survive because we, the LGBTQA community are everywhere in Key West. It will naturally and organically evolve, as it changes to meet our present LGBTQA+ needs.”

# # #

My personal story about why I love Key West. Key West Ruins Everything Or Why I’m Grateful To Call Key West Home, November 23, 2023.

Below is an Addendum that includes the verbatim transcripts of everyone who responded to our inquiries about this story. Below that are links to sources and resources used for this story.

Addendum to the Story

The following are the verbatim responses I received. As people took care and time to provide responses, I thought our readers would appreciate seeing everything these wonderful stakeholders in our community had to say:

Neil Chamberlain, Owner, Graffiti Key West; Publisher, Q Magazine

What do you think about Equator Resort’s decision? 

“Obviously, I’m disappointed.  I would have preferred that they either continued on as it always has or potentially sold to someone that would have respected its history.  I feel that owners of LGBTQ+ businesses are “stewards” of the business more than “owners.”  I believe we have a responsibility to honor those that built these businesses and continue in those traditions.  Ultimately, businesses are here to make money.  If that’s the only agenda, then buy a generic business that doesn’t have a specific history that someone built from the ground up.  Of course, businesses need to evolve and if the demographic that supported the business in the past was no longer supporting the business, then I can understand having to adapt, but I have no indication that was an issue here.”

What do you think it means for downtown Key West? 

“That’s tough to say.  LGBTQ+ visitors are already very much welcome anywhere in Key West.  It’s not as if gay men aren’t welcome elsewhere and this takes away hotel rooms.  The number of rooms is not changing in the city.  However, what we don’t know is how many guests of Equator were only coming because of what the Equator offered.  If these guests were coming for Key West primarily and for an LGBTQ+ property secondarily, they may still visit so the impact would be minimal.  If these guests primary reason for visiting was the ability to be in the company of other LGBTQ+ men primarily and visit Key West secondarily, those visitors will likely look elsewhere, such as Fort Lauderdale or Puerta Vallarta for their vacation.  Only time will tell what the long term implications will be.”

What do you think it means for our future to lose gay places of any kind for the gay business community and for gay Key West in general?

“As I mentioned above, we really don’t know the impact at this time.  I certainly believe there are people in the second group that we will lose.  How many is what we don’t know.  Key West has changed a lot over the last 30 years, mostly because LGBTQ+ visitors now feel safe visiting many other destinations.  Key West was a “safe haven” for the LGBTQ+ community for decades when people didn’t feel safe being open where they live.  We’re a victim of our own success.  Our community doesn’t have the need to seek out these safe havens anymore, but Key West still has a lot to offer. It’s important that we continue to educate people on the history of the LGBTQ+ community and how places such as Key West served as a safe outlet to be ourselves.  We can’t do that if we keep pushing our own people away. 

          As a final note, almost 8 years ago, I purchased Graffitti, a primarily LGBTQ+ men’s clothing store.  I wasn’t looking to buy a clothing store.  I was very much enjoying my simple life as a DJ and publisher.  I walked in one day and saw that there was a lot of missing inventory.  After a conversation with the owner, he told me he was starting to close the store to focus more on his own life.  I was saddened that Key West was losing another long-term LGBTQ+ business.  We spoke in great deal and over the next month, we negotiated a deal for me to buy the store and continue the tradition.  I was fortunate I had the time and the ability to purchase the store, because I thought it was important to try to save another LGBTQ+ business.  At the time there were two other stores that were similar to Graffitti.  Sadly, both are also gone, but I have done everything to make sure Graffitti continues on, and it’s my intention to continue to do so for as long as I can.  If there comes a time for me to hand over the reins, I will do everything I can to make sure the new owner continues on with this tradition.  I know I can’t enforce that, but I will try to instill the importance of the history into a new owner one day.”

Laura Zequeira-Smith, General Manager, Alexander’s Guesthouse

“What do I think about Equator’s decision?  I can respect it and understand it.  As owners of these gay businesses get older and pass the businesses on to the family, if there isn’t someone there to continue flying the Pride flag, it will eventually turn to what the family knows. 

I am so glad, however, that Anthony the manager, will still stay on. 

I have been at Alexander’s for 18 years and it has always been the 3 of us along Fleming Street.  Over the years, it has always been about supporting one another in business, when it felt stressful, sending each other business when one of us was sold out, sharing staff with one another, asking each other how to do something when we were lost and so much more.

The 3 of us, Equator, Island House, and Alexander’s were never competitors, as we all represented a different part of the LGBTQA community, but mostly, we have all felt, like there was plenty to go around.  

People have been saying for a long time that Key West isn’t as Gay as it once was.  I don’t agree with that entirely, as there are many gay people who live and work in town.  Do they go to or open exclusively LGBTQ businesses?  Do LGBTQ visitors only visit LGBTQ businesses?  Not so much anymore, as the younger generation enjoys the fruits of the fight of older generations.  Fighting for equality and the fight against discrimination has brought so many wonderful changes, that are still evolving, merging minority groups with larger groups…creating our One Human Family. 

 I think, however, that people still feel a natural pull to find other like-minded souls to connect with.   So now, we try to find ways to gather, without excluding others.  That is the balance the world is now trying to achieve, which I have faith we will.  Humans are so amazing.

I can only speak for Alexander’s, but since I have been the General Manager, that’s what we have always done. We have created a place where like-minded people can gather, inclusive, not exclusive.  We have always welcomed everyone, gay, straight, lesbian, trans and the list goes on.  We just set a tone of mutual respect, given, and required.  We have always been open and upfront to all of our guests, that all groups are represented here.  All are aware of where they are coming to stay, and the guests are always respectful and kind to one another.  It is beautiful to see.  It gives us, the staff, hope for the future, as we see these beautiful humans arrive on our doorstep.

We hug them and hope they find healing while with us, so they can go out into the world to slay another day.  

 I think it is still important to have LGBTQA businesses where each of us can gather with those who understand us, to receive the support we need.  One reason is that there are still those who do not walk openly in their communities.  Another reason, even within the LGBTQ community, we are still learning about ourselves and one another, the young people need support, the history and personal stories need to be shared. 

For the future of Gay Key West?  When Equator closes, some visitors may not come back to Key West, while others will continue to come. 

The Key West Business Guild is doing a wonderful job at launching a great Gay Key West campaign this year.  We still have our Gayborhood down on Duval St. with the fun bars, fabulous drag shows and rainbow sidewalks.  

While Gay Key West may not look like it once did, it is evolving with its people, but always filled with colorful diversity and love.  Many LGBTQA ++ have families now, are in long term relationships, while there are club hoppers out there too, many that come to Key West aren’t all going to the late night bars, they are going to dinner at 6pm instead and a drag show at 8pm.  They DO still LOVE a good Tea Dance on a Sunday!  Can I get an Amen on that one, LOL!  May the Tea Dance live on FOREVER. 

Gay Key West is evolving with the times, and I believe, will survive because we, the LGBTQA community are everywhere in Key West.  It will naturally and organically evolve, as it changes to meet our present LGBTQA+ needs.”

Richard McGarry, co-author Gay Key West A History – Stories of the famous, infamous and forgotten gay men who transformed the island. Expanded 2^nd edition February 1, 2024

“The funny thing about Key West is that, if you ask any older gay man when the island was at its speak, they will name a year that coincides with when they were between 20 to 30 years old—and also at their peak. When I first arrived in Key West in 1976, older queens were complaining that the island was no fun anymore because all the drunken sailors needing a blowjob were gone. 

The trend of gay guest houses switching to “all welcome” seems to have started in the 1990s and I think that Peter Arno of the Business Guild told me that there was something like 38 gay guest houses in Key West in the late 1980s. Many were a single old Conch house with maybe a half-dozen rooms and run by a gay couple. 

A week’s vacation in Key West was very affordable back then. As I noted in Gay Key West – A History, “the rooms were small and the bathroom was down the hall, but for less than $100 you could spend a whole week at ‘Big Ruby’s.’” It was the first gay guest house on the island in the early 1970s. 

The cost of a Key West vacation now prices out the kind of young gay men that filled lower Duval Street after dark in the era when the Village People were singing “I’m heading for Key-ey-ey West, the key to happiness.”  

Cori Convertito, PhD, Curator & Historian, Key West Art & Historical Society and Key West Business Guild Board of Directors

What do you think about Equator Resort’s decision?

“As a privately owned business, I feel that they need to make the decision that best suits their situation.”

What do you think it means for downtown Key West? 

“The closure of Equator Resort is a loss for the gay community.  Historically, Key West has been a safe haven for those in the gay community and having institutions like Equator Resort strengthened that safety and security for travelers.”

What do you think it means for our future to lose gay places of any kind for the gay business community and for gay Key West in general?

“With the loss of the Equator Resort, after the loss of other gay resorts (Atlantic Shores, the Lighthouse Hotel, Pearl’s, etc.), now more than ever, our Key West Business Guild becomes more critical for gay tourists and residents.  Having a recognized institution that can share information on gay-friendly resorts and businesses can absorb some of the ‘unknown’ for those looking to visit our island and feel safe.”

Larry Ketron, Manager, In Touch – “Key West’s gayest, most fun store.” Gift Shop at 706 Duval St.

“The changes of things at Equator are merely the continuation of a trend. It’s called follow the money.

From the days when the “mob” saw the money potential of creating “safe spaces” for the homosexual crowd to the vision of gay business owners things have been profit driven.  Once the safe haven for young coming out and “closeted” men, things have changed.  As clientele grew older, the younger generation didn’t feel the need for “safe havens” and have chosen to go anywhere they feel welcome. That and the changing dynamics of “sex hookups” via internet sites have left bathhouses, guest houses, and gay bars to decline.  Check out the age of the clientele of most gay bars and bathhouses and the age is not the twenty somethings of the 70’s.  Today, if you want to hookup, just grab your phone.  

Yes, there are still customers of the few bars and guest house, but as they die off the younger generation does not seem to fill the gap.  People say that Key West is still a “gay” town.  Yes, it is but the age of the gay residents is often over the age of 60. The results of the changes we fought for in the sixties, seventies and eighties were achieved at our loss. As a community, we have allowed our world to shrink, because of our own blindness.

Soon, there will be fewer bars and guesthouses.  It’s all about money not family.”

Rob Dougherty, Executive Director, Key West Business Guild

What do you think about Equator Resort’s decision? 
Although I am deeply disappointed, their decision is their own. In a perfect world, the amazing thing about freedom, is that it is shared by all, and not just a lucky few. 

What do you think it means for downtown Key West? 
I’m not too sure what it will mean for downtown Key West as a whole; however, it will certainly impact the visibility of our thriving LGBTQ+ community. The absence of the Equator as a destination will absolutely impact our ability to promote our island as a welcoming place for Gay men to travel. That means less LGBTQ dollars being spent in businesses. It means existing LGBTQ and friendly businesses will have to examine their strategy to remain viable. In whole, this means there is the potential of the LGBTQ community having less of an influence in a city that at one time, relied on LGBTQ dollars to remain strong. 

What do you think it means for our future to lose gay places of any kind for the gay business community and for gay Key West in general?

This is a difficult question to answer in one paragraph and requires an historical understanding of how our community has evolved, specifically over the last five-decades. In the late 60’s and 70’s, the focus of the movement was to be seen, to be heard, and to be afforded equal rights the right to live with dignity. The 1980’s should have been a time of great celebration; however, those of us who lived through the time, and buried so many of our own, know there was no celebration. We were literally fighting for our lives. In the 90’s, our community focused on political reform. The right to marry, to adopt children, and to change laws that made discrimination legal. In short, we fought for equality under the law. We deserved and demanded equality under the law. We made such amazing progress; however, that did not come without cost. We saw the shift from celebrating what made our culture so unique, to “we are just like you”. The problem is, as with any culture striving for assimilation, we may have lost the very core of our culture.

I believe the bigger issue is to address preserving the core of our culture. Gay bars are almost a thing of the past except for larger metro areas. Last count, there were just 21-bars that are primarily for our Lesbian sisters in the nation. That is less than one bar for every two states. While we have the strong support of Key West, from our local police to places of worship, LGBTQ businesses are the ones that will need to stand up. If there is to be any progress in preserving the core of our culture from fully disappearing, we must act as a unified community.  Preserving and honoring our history matters if we are to move forward.

In Key West, the most visible LGBTQ+ businesses are the foundation of the Key West Business Guild. Without their support, there would be no mission statement, no vision, and no resources to carry us forward. Without the LGBTQ+ community, one can make the argument, there would be no Key West, as we know it. While strong, it could be stronger. I believe that there have been political and social currents that have threatened progress our community has made over the last 5-decades. These currents are seen everywhere, and we cannot allow them to continue to dismantle the legacy of those who have fought, and have died, so that we can celebrate the freedom afforded to everyone in a Democracy. While I hate the fact the Equator will no longer be an exclusive resort, I know those invested in their business understand the amazing impact they have had over the years. I am confident they will continue to support us as an LGBTQ+ friendly establishment.”

Jeffrey Smead, General Manager, Island House Resort

“Indeed, Island House is especially saddened that Equator has decided to rebrand and no longer be a gay establishment. They have been one of the Key West strongholds with 34 rooms dedicated to serving gay patrons seeking that kind of unique experience. When shifts like this happen, it makes it a lot harder to defend the destination to those who say “Key West isn’t gay anymore” for the last 20 years. The reality is: this was a real estate move, just like the ones before. And of course, that fact will never change. But what hasn’t changed (and won’t), is that Key West remains a tropical domestic destination that is safe for gay people to visit, and still has all the ingredients for a vacation that gay people really love. World class food & drinks, warm weather, gorgeous water, unique accommodations, art, history, and endless party options. What’s important for us to remember, is the reason Island House was founded in 1976 to begin with, is exactly why it’s still relevant in 2024. A gay men’s resort like this is not just selling lodging- it sells an experience. So long as gay people still seek out gay experiences, and Island House keeps raising the bar of what a unique property like us can accomplish, we’re going to keep this place gay AF.”  

February 5, 2024, Announcement by Equator Resort on Facebook

“Important Announcement!

Since 1997 Equator Resort and its team have been proud to have developed so many long term friendships and memories with our guests from all over the world. Operating Equator Resort has been a truly rewarding experience, and we have cherished the relationships we’ve built with our guests. Your loyalty has been the cornerstone of our success, and we are truly thankful for the trust you placed in us. However, a new partnership has developed in our corporation that brings a new vision to our operation moving forward. 

It is with a heavy heart that we announce the closure of Equator Resort as of January 9th 2025. Our last day of operation will be January 8th 2025.We understand this news may be disappointing, but at the same time the team is excited to take on a new project with the company that offers a sense of new adventure for the property. The company has not sold, however there are new shareholders that have expanded their view of the corporations future plans.

If you have an existing reservation, do not worry, Equator will operate as normal until the closure date, and all reservations affected beyond the closure date have already been contacted and adjusted.

Once again, we thank you for all the wonderful years we have spent together. 

The Equator Resort Team”

Sources and Resources

The following are some sources used in this article and resources to help you dive into the subject further:

• There Goes The Gayborhood? by Amin Ghaziani, 2014
• Gay Bar – Why We Went Out by Jeremy Atherton Lin, 2021
• The Bars Are Ours – Histories and Cultures of Gay Bars in America, 1960 and After by Lucas Hilderbrand, 2023
• Stonewall National Museum & Archives, Fort Lauderdale, FL website
• “Is Key West Going Straight?” by Robert Andrew Powell, November 18, 2005, New York Times
• U.S. Census Bureau Pride June 2022 Pride Month exploration of statistics: https://www.census.gov/library/spotlights/by-the-numbers/june/
• U.S. Census Bureau 2021 Data Summit Series – Census Data for the LGBTQ Community PowerPoint, June 24, 2021
• As Seattle Changes Is It Still an LGBTQ-Friendly City? By Naomi Ishisaka, Seattle Times, June 23, 2023
• The Gayborhood – From Sexual Liberation to Cosmopolitan Spectacle, book by Christopher T. Conner, March, 2021
• Gay Enclaves Face Prospect of Being Passe’ by Patricia Leigh Brown, New York Times, October 30, 2007
• How The Gays Saved Key West, by Guy Ross, Gay Key West website
• The Rise and Fall of American Gayborhoods by Matthew Yglesias, August 8, 2014, VOX (he also interviews Amin Ghaziani)
• There Goes The Gayborhood, article by Scott James in the New York Times, June 21, 2017
• Who Are the People in Your Gayborhood? Understanding Population Change and Cultural Shifts in LGBTQ+ Neighborhoods, by Daniel Baldwin Hess & Alex Bitterman, March 20, 2021
• Gayborhood Resource Guide, Amber Graham, July 10, 2016
• Gay Bars Are Disappearing. Their Past Holds a Key To Their Future, article by Greggor Mattson, Washington Post, June 2, 2023
• Are Gay Neighborhoods Really Disappearing? Princeton University Press paper
• Oxford Academic Journal abstract of There Goes The Gayborhood – summary of each chapter, August 2014
• Who Needs Gay Bars? Bar-Hopping through America’s Endangered LGBTQ+ Places book by Greggor Mattson, May 2023
• The Number of Gay Bars Has Dwindled. A New Generation Plans to Bring Them Back by Casey Parks, December 10, 2021, Washington Post
• What Happens When a Gay Bar Becomes Just a Bar? By Lisa Bonos, July 8, 2016, Washington Post
• New Book Chronicles History of Gay Key West by David Beckwith, October 21, 2023, Keys Citizen newspaper
• LGBT Adults in Large U.S. Metropolitan Areas, March 2021 (great charts and graphs and rankings)
• Buffet Erased Gay Margaritaville? By Guy Ross, September 14, 2023, Mattachine Society of Washington, DC
• What A Drag! The Tradition of Men In Skirts Goes Back Decades In Key West by Laura Richardson, June 17, 2021 The Florida Weekly Key West
• Florida’s Anything-Goes Gay Getaway by Ed Walsh, November 21, 2006 Bay Area Reporter (SF) – stories of the guest houses at the time
• U.S. States Where the Highest and Lowest Shares of LGBTQ+ Adults Live, Axios, February 15, 2024
• The 10 Best LGBTQ-Friendly Small Towns in the U.S. by John Garry, Aril 26, 2022; 22 Small LGBTQ-Friendly Cities in the U.S. by John A. Hernandez, January 4, 2022; The Best LGBTQ+ Friendly Small Towns in the USA by Mark Williams U Erika Mailman, May 16, 2023; Most LGBTQ-Friendly Small Towns In America by Mariana Zapata, November 17, 2023; Human Rights Campaign Municipal Equality Index ratings for 506 cities but not Key West (KWBG needs to self apply) These stories all include Ptown, Ogunquit, Rehoboth, New Hope, Lost River and more but not Key West? Okay Key West IS included in this one The Gayest Cities in America, Stefan Arestis, January 4, 2024
• Map of Advertisers in Q Magazine as placeholder for current gay businesses https://www.keywestgayrag.com

Streets for People Improves Our Environment, Affordable Housing, Health, and Safety. It Boosts a Local’s Economy and Makes Us Happier Too

Posted on February 9, 2024     Leave a Comment

By Chris Hamilton. Story is cross posted at KONK Life on February 9, 2024. Follow us at  Friends of Car-Free Key West & Duval Street/Historic Downtown on Facebook.

Think about some of today’s big problems in Key West and cities across the country. A degrading environment, rising seas and threatening weather events. A lack of affordable housing. Climbing obesity and depression rates. Pedestrian deaths at 40-year high. Did you ever think that by using our streets and sidewalks just a bit differently they could be part of the solution to these problems? And even Improve our downtown local’s economy and make us happier? Well, yes, they certainly can.

We started writing about these issues here at Friends of Car-Free Key West & Duval Street/Historic Downtown during the COVID shutdown on April 22, 2020, with this popular article. With this being our 100^th article since then, we’re going back to our origin story about why our streets are so important that we named this column “Streets for People.”

Our Streets and Sidewalks, An Asset In Plain Sight

Streets and sidewalks take up 25 to 50 percent of a typical U.S. city’s land. New York City, for example, is on the lower end of that scale at 28 percent and Chicago (42 percent), Washington D.C. (43) and Portland, Oregon (47) are at the higher end. Key West City staff estimated our number to be about 26% which is in line with older cities.

As former New York City Transportation Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan says:

“Streets are some of the most valuable resources that a city has, and yet it’s an asset that’s largely hidden in plain sight.”

How does using this asset help us tackle these problems and improve our lives?

By designing our streets and sidewalks to prioritize people, not cars.

And since streets and sidewalks represent space that’s largely under control of our local government, that means we the people can do something about it and take responsibility to improve our own lives.

What the Research Says About These Issues and Car-Centric Cities

Emerging research over the last two decades tells us that using our streets more efficiently by prioritizing walking, bicycling and transit and using cars less addresses all of these problems. Here’s just a very small sampling:

On Our Environment

Says the non-profit America Walks: “When we design cities for cars, we’re actively making them more hostile for the planet as well as people who get around without driving. This hostility leads to negative outcomes in the areas of climate and public health.”

Yale Climate Connections says: “Transportation is the largest source of planet-warming gases in the United Sates, and passenger vehicles are the top emitters within the sector, to reduce car emissions, authorities ranging from the UN to the U.S. EPA and Department of Transportation say that people need to drive less.”

“Our transportation system is making us – and the planet – sick, and the problem lies in the fossil fuel-powered automobile which has taken over how we live an and use space. Thankfully, solid urban planning + new technology has opened the door for us to bring our cities back from the brink, but we need to act quickly to ensure our communities will be places we want to live.” Gabe Klein, Citifi in the “Cars Almost Killed Our Cities, But Here’s How We Can Bring Them Back” TED Talk.

On Affordable Housing

“Living in areas with limited transportation options can lead to higher transportation costs. Households in car-dependent neighborhoods spend up to 25% of their income on transportation, compared to just 9% in more walkable neighborhoods with more transit options.” From the Impact of Transportation on Access to Affordable Housing, Rajiv Desai.

“Three of the nation’s poorest cities are actually the most expensive places to live – when you factor in how much it costs to get around, and not how much it costs to pay the rent.” Says Kea Wilson in her article Car-Dependency Makes City-Life Too Expensive

On a Downtown’s Local’s Economy

“Street projects that improve safety and design and that welcome pedestrians, cyclists, and transit riders see higher retail sales.” From The Economic Benefits of Sustainable Streets

Twelve different studies in 12 different cities “And they all reach a similar conclusion: replacing on-street parking with a bike lane has little to no impact on local business, and in some cases might even increase business. While cyclists tend to spend less per shopping trips than drivers, they also tend to make more trips, pumping more total money into the local economy over time.” From the article The Complete Business Case for Converting Street Parking Into Bike Lanes

“We’ve got data unequivocally showing that people-oriented streets are more economically productive than auto-oriented streets.” From “Why Walkable Streets are More Economically Productive”

On Safety

“We should always be designing our roadways for people, not cars. Safety for pedestrians comes down to street design.” From Dangerous by Design? Why Planning for People Not Cars Creates Safer Roads by the Center for Planning Excellence

“The study found the main reason for this was the traffic calming effect protected bike lanes have on all road users. With protected bike lane street designs, traffic speeds are lowered, so when collisions do occur, they are far less likely to be fatal, and this protects everyone. Let’s face it, people make mistakes, but designing streets for slower speeds means fewer of those mistakes result in people dying.” From the article A Reminder that Protected Bike Lanes Can Make Streets Safer for Everyone

“New York City found that with protected bike lanes, serious injuries and accidents to all users – not just cyclists but drier too – dropped.” From Jeff Speck on Why Bikes Make Streets Safer for All

On Physical and Mental Health

Research brought to light by The Happy City author Charles Montgomery shows how car-centric places do bad things to our physical and mental health:

• They add unhealthy pounds to our bodies. They make us more likely to have heart and respiratory issues. They shorten our lives.
• Their streets are made for cars and to speed cars through. This is unsafe, not just for those who bike and walk but for those who drive too.
• They cause us more stress. That stress exacerbates physical and mental-health issues.
• They make us, especially those with longer car commutes, more likely to experience rage, fear, depression and even get divorced, more than people who walk, bike, or use transit to get to work.
• They make us feel isolated and less connected to one another, which causes us to feel less trusting, and ultimately less happy.

He goes on to say: “If you build the road space, the cars come. But if you build a city for pedestrians, for people, then you can actually create a more social city, a more connected city, and a happier city. And this is now happening in cities around the world.”

Addressing Today’s Problems By Prioritizing Streets for People over Cars

So, what can our local City of Key West and Monroe County governments do to address these problems via our streets and sidewalks?  Lots, especially by thinking creatively and fixing our car-centric infrastructure one street or one corridor or one project at a time.

Streets for People means prioritizing people who WALK over cars. 
It looks like skinny streets that are nine or 10 feet instead of the standard 12 feet per lane. Usually two-way, not one-way streets. Narrow crosswalks, including bulb outs. Mid-block crosswalks. Shortcuts. Paths. Places to rest and for refuge.

Streets for People means prioritizing people who BIKE over cars. 
It looks like more than just bike lanes, but protected and buffered bikeways. Not isolated projects but whole networks that connect us all over town. For example, finishing the Southard Street bike lane. It means taking car parking and converting it to bikeways and bike-corral parking in retail and dense residential areas.

Streets for People means prioritizing people who use TRANSIT over cars. 
It looks like we care about people who use transit because we provide amenities like benches, shelters, lighting, and trash cans. Real-time arrival signs. Maps and schedules. Branded and clean buses. And it most importantly means frequent and easy to understand service.

Streets for People means prioritizing people who want to shop, eat, sit, chat, socialize, and watch each other rather than prioritizing on-street car parking. 
It looks like the parklets made from parking spaces or reclaimed streets turned into pedestrian plazas with benches and tables and chairs. It means promoting retailers and restaurants to reclaim street space and even food trucks and pop-up retail in other places. It means street trees, trash cans, water fountains and public restrooms like are envisioned in the Duval Street Resiliency Plan.

Streets for People

If a city speaks of “balancing transportation choices” rather than prioritizing walking, biking, and transit, it’s still car centered. So, in Key West we need to turn upside down the prevailing car-centric mindset and even push back on those calling for balance.

If we make our streets and sidewalks more people centered, and if we help make it easy and safer for more people to walk, bike, and take transit, our little island paradise will be greener. More prosperous. More affordable. More physically healthy. And yes, more mentally healthy, and happy too.

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Featured photo at the top is from the Keys Weekly Newspaper.

Streets for People / Project Seeks To Make Duval Street Resilient in Face of Sea Level Rise

Posted on February 2, 2024     Leave a Comment

By Chris Hamilton. Story is cross posted at KONK Life on February 2, 2024. Follow us at  Friends of Car-Free Key West & Duval Street/Historic Downtown on Facebook.

Imagine maybe a hundred people waiting in line to get into a City meeting in Key West. I know, hard to picture right? But that’s what happened on Wednesday evening January 31out in front of the San Carlos Institute at 516 Duval as downtown business owners, retail workers and residents from all over Key West patiently lined up and signed in before they opened the doors to the Duval Street Revitalization & Resiliency project Open House at 5:00 pm. Officials estimated that a couple hundred people in all attended the two-hour event. The big crowd is good news and a reflection of the pent up excitement for a project that has been five years in the making and is near and dear to the hearts of those who love our island’s historic main street.

Attendees Got a Glimpse Of and Discussed the Future

Participants snaked their way through an exhibit that started in the lobby and made its way through the auditorium, examining story boards depicting elevations along the corridor, impacts on flooding of the street infrastructure, and strategies for saving historic buildings. Locals got to talk one on one with about a dozen City staffers and Stantec engineering and planning consultants and participated in an exercise indicating which samples they liked and disliked on street furniture (benches, bike racks, planters, water fountains – even doggie water fountains), art, landscaping, lighting, and signage. Everyone I talked to was excited that future vulnerabilities were finally being addressed.

Making Duval Street Resilient In the Face of Sea Level Rise, Climate Change and Weather Events

And that’s the impetus of the Duval Street project. The City and County are well into planning for what we need to do to help our low level island chain combat sea level rise and become resilient in the face of climate change and weather events (see our stories here and here).  LiDAR data is finished in the County and almost finished at the City. Based on the data, engineering analysis and plans are already underway to find resiliency solutions on how to deal with the increasing water in our city and throughout the Keys. As Duval Street is our main street and a critically important economic and social part of our community, it especially needs to be protected for decades to come.

Leveraging Resiliency Construction Projects for Revitalizing Duval

So as money is spent hardening Duval Street and the infrastructure below and around it (think water, sewer, stormwater, utilities, and roadbeds), it is the perfect time to address any enhancements to the street above (think benches, trees, sidewalks, water fountains, art, signage, safety for pedestrians) as these are pennies on the dollar when doing the big work. Leveraging available Federal and State grant dollars aimed at making Duval Street more resilient over the next decade enables the City to fold in revitalizing Duval Street at a minimal cost and THAT’S GOOD NEWS!

Mayor Teri Johnston Keeps Duval Street Project Moving Forward

We’ll end this story with a thank you to Mayor Teri Johnston. Mayor Johnston ran on a platform of revitalizing and making Duval Street resilient in 2018. She initiated a Mall on Duval pilot project in 2019 and that begat the first attempt at a plan later that year. A community survey in early 2021 backed the Mayor up by saying that our #2 issue, after affordable housing was combating sea level rise and that of all the potential projects needed, the Revitalization of Duval Street was #1. Mayor Johnston then ensured the project would get done as it was enshrined in the Key West Forward Strategic Plan. After a couple of fits and starts, Stantec was hired, and the process has started.

None of it would have happened without the Mayor’s pushing it forward. And we’re lucky to have such a capable Planning Director in Katie Halloran in overseeing the project. Our beloved little historic downtown will be all the better for us participating in and making the Duval Street Revitalization & Resiliency Project a success.

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More Information and Duval Street Revitalization Project History

For more information on the current planning effort visit https://duval4all.com/. If you want to dive into the background and history of this project, here’s 10 stories we’ve done on it over the last four years:

1. Duval Street Revitalization Moves Forward, June 10, 2020

2. Duval Street Revitalization Help Sought Via RFQ, December 10, 2020

3. Duval Street Revitalization Project Brings Hope to Downtown, December 28, 2020

4. The Wee Donkey, Whataboutism, Bathwater and Duval Street’s Future, February 19, 2021

5. Eight Things We Can Do to Pedestrianize Duval and Still Allow Cars, March 6, 2021

6. Do Key West Commercial Areas Need Business Improvement Districts (BIDS)? – Part 2: What BIDS in Key West Might Look Like, April 23, 2021

7. With the Duval Street Revitalization Plan Way Behind Schedule, Here’s 3 Quick Wins for Pedestrianizing Duval Street Now, July 16, 2021

8. Mallory Sq., Diesel Plant, Duval Street and Bahama Village Housing Projects Create Synergy to Bolster Downtown, January 14, 2022

9. Duval Street Revitalization Back on Track, October 1, 2021

10. Progress on Five Historic District Projects Means More Life, Locals, Prosperity, and Resiliency for Our Downtown , October 21, 2022

Key West Ruins Everything Or Why I’m Grateful to Call Key West Home

Posted on November 23, 2023     1 Comment

By Chris Hamilton. Story is cross posted at KONK Life on November 23, 2023. Support ($) our local journalism here. Follow us at  Friends of Car-Free Key West & Duval Street/Historic Downtown on Facebook.

December 1 marks Mikey and my 9^th anniversary of arriving to live in Key West. And for that decision we are very thankful this holiday. We left a good life in the District. Jobs we loved, family and friends developed over decades, season tickets to the Nationals and Redskins, a cute condo in a hip and thriving neighborhood near the trendy U Street Corridor, favorite café’s, an unparalleled ethnic food scene that we readily took advantage of, and a cool bikeshare and pervasive transit system that made it easy and inexpensive to hop about town without a car. Life was good. But here we are getting ready to celebrate our 9^th holiday season on the island. Key West has that kind of effect on people. It draws visitors in and makes them dream of, well, as the book says quitting your job and moving to Key West.

Which we did. And never for a moment have we regretted making the decision to uproot all we had going in D.C. and take a chance on life where we didn’t know a soul and had no work. Boy, do we love it here and consider ourselves fortunate to be residents and workers on this island.

Everyone who calls Key West home, and I’m including snowbirds, part-timers, and regular visitors because we love and need them all, have their own reasons to be thankful, but for us it starts with the fact that we’re urban rats and prefer a city-life where you can bike and walk to all of life’s needs. (Walkscore 94 and Bike Score 100) And living in Key West makes that easy. Being able to live car-free keeps life simple and more connected to our glorious surroundings. Oh, and it certainly helps us better afford the high cost of living in a sought after vacation destination.

We are grateful to live smack dab in the middle of North America’s largest historic district of wooden structures. Old Town is simply beautiful and reminds us of our old historic neighborhoods in D.C. and Old Town Alexandria – although those were brick. And our balcony overlooking Fleming Street provides us with ideal 12-months-a-year outdoor living while allowing us “front porch” viewing of a vibrant city life below.

Wearing shorts and t-shirts and being able to swim 12 months a year is an amazing plus. And saves money on wardrobe. It keeps us healthy too as we’re more apt to get out and about for exercise. And for my friends and family up north, yes, we have changing seasons, they’re just a lot more subtle.

It’s an easy, breezy, simple, and relaxed life because well, we’re all on Key West time. And everywhere we turn there’s the ocean, the gulf, or the seaport. Oh, and unlike in D.C., where we were often the oldest people wherever we went, now we seem to be the median age. It’s nice to live in a place that accepts us as we are. Which leads me to the main reason we are so gratified to live here. THE PEOPLE!

Maybe it’s because we’re such a small town so you get to know everyone. Wherever you go there’s a hello or a hug. Or maybe it’s because Key West attracts the best of humanity. We’re an island of misfits, and people on their second and third lives. We’re known to attract artists and creative types. And dreamers. And dropouts. And people who love to party and cut loose. And people who like to quietly paint, write or curl up with a good book. There’s always something to do and there’s always the option just to waste away. Everyone’s free to be you and me.

We live and let live and are willing to give anyone the benefit of the doubt. We’re generous to a fault – witness there’s a fundraiser every single week of the year, and resilient in the face of obstacles. We’re just too small a town not to include everyone and that spirit is embodied in our One Human Family slogan. It’s uplifting and hopeful and fun to live in a place with this kind of spirit and love. As a result, we’re blessed with amazing co-workers and lovely friends. I’ve never witnessed and felt this kind of close-knit and connected community.

So, you can have your mainland and your mainland ways of life. As Mikey said to me a few years ago, “Key West ruins everything!” And it does. Because living anywhere else just pales in comparison and so ruins anyplace else for us. I’m just so very thankful and grateful to live here.

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