Miami-Dade County has moved the long-delayed Ludlam Trail into its full design phase, approving a professional services agreement for the entire 5.6-mile corridor one day before county officials announced the milestone on Wednesday, July 22, 2026.
The Board of County Commissioners approved a contract award to Kimley-Horn and Associates for the Parks, Recreation and Open Spaces Department, according to the county's official July 21 agenda. The item lists a not-to-exceed value of $9,533,563, including an $843,960 contingency allowance, and a term of 1,825 calendar days.
For Miami residents, the decision matters because it turns years of planning into the construction-document stage for a promised walking and bicycling corridor between about NW 7th Street and SW 80th Street along the former Florida East Coast Railway right of way. It also gives neighbors a clearer public benchmark for tracking what the county must deliver next.
What changed
Miami-Dade's July 22 release says the contract advances 30 percent concept plans from the Project Development and Environment study into complete construction documents. The county says the design package is expected to cover an 18-foot-wide shared-use bicycle and pedestrian trail, landscaped buffers, lighting, shade trees, seating areas, wayfinding signs, neighborhood connections and park connections.
The county also says it has secured nearly $48 million toward the Ludlam Trail, including a recently approved $1.25 million state appropriation. Completing the design could strengthen the county's position when it seeks more transportation and infrastructure funding for construction.
Why neighbors are watching
The vote follows renewed scrutiny over how long the corridor has sat largely fenced off. Earlier this month, Hoodline reported that nearly six miles of promised trail remained mostly unopened years after a 2021 groundbreaking, and that advocates had pointed to roughly $42 million already spent or committed around the project.
County project materials say the route runs between 69th and 70th avenues in parts of unincorporated Miami-Dade and the City of Miami. The county's Ludlam Trail FAQ says the trail is planned to remain continuous through development nodes and that the county has an 18-foot-wide perpetual easement through those areas for public use.
Environmental cleanup remains part of the work ahead. The FAQ says contamination is present along the former rail corridor and describes a soil-management approach that may include removing topsoil, placing high-visibility geosynthetic fabric, capping areas with one foot of clean fill and using pavement as an engineering control.
What happens next
The newly approved agreement does not mean residents can use the full trail immediately. It starts the design phase for a project that still needs construction funding, remediation and later construction work. County officials said portions of the trail will open to the public as they are completed.
The practical takeaway for Miami is narrower but important: the county now has an approved designer for the whole Ludlam Trail corridor, a contract ceiling and a formal design window. The next local accountability test is whether that design work leads to funded construction, clean-up milestones and visible openings along the corridor.
