The nation’s first all-electric transit center is under construction in Miami, intended to charge and maintain a fleet of 100 battery-electric buses.
The Miami-Dade County Department of Transportation and Public Works began construction on the South Dade Traffic Operations Center (SDTOC) on June 25, with WSP providing design and construction services for the two-phase project, of $245 million, which will end on June 25. summer 2026.
WSP says the facility is the first of its kind in the United States, being the first all-electric facility and the first to house up to 100 zero-emission battery electric, or BEB, articulated buses.
The locally funded project is being built on a 20-acre county-owned parcel at Biscayne Drive and SW 127 Avenue in South Dade, and will include solar power, rapid charging stations and related infrastructure, xeriscape landscaping and a water recovered to mitigate the environmental impacts of bush washing.
Among the design innovations, WSP says the facility will include retractable platforms installed to reach the bus roofs, where the buses’ batteries are charged.
“When a bus returns, maintenance personnel can go up and down directly from the roof, making their work safer and more efficient,” says Angel Andre Chavarria, senior vice president and project manager for alternative delivery at WSP.
The center will serve as a component of Miami-Dade’s climate action strategy to operate a cleaner, more sustainable transit system and better serve the mobility needs of the county’s fastest growing area, which extends from Homestead and Dadeland to Florida City.
According to Miami-Dade County, the electrification of its Metrobus fleet is advancing the county’s climate action strategy, part of which is expanding its fleet to include 100 new articulated electric buses from 60 feet Its existing facilities cannot service, store, power, operate and maintain these buses, he says, and along with the area’s growth, they constitute the need for the SDTOC.
The project comes on the heels of Miami-Dade’s Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) project, the city’s first, which awarded a $368 million project to OHLA USA in 2020 for 14 new bus stations, including one with parking, rehabilitation of 32 existing bus stops and improvements to 46 intersections.
ENR reported on the 2023 BRT project, which is being built in a growing area of the county that officials say is expected to grow in population by 68 percent by 2040. Miami-Dade says the SDTOC will improve the efficiency of bus routes using the BRT Service.
