Route E
Aventura Mall to Miami Lakes
(Or to: Opa-Locka Tri-Rail Station - weekends only;
Miami Lakes Business Park- weekday rush-hours only.)
Vital Stats:
Division: Northeast (Weekdays), Coral Way (Weekends - Uses Paratransit vehicles.)
Operates: 5:48 AM to 9:02 PM weekdays, 9:01 AM to 7:36 PM weekends.
Destination Signs:
Eastbound-
E AVENTURA MALL
E AVENTURA (Mini-buses)
Westbound-
E MIAMI LAKES
E OPA-LOCKA (weekends, mini-buses)
E MIA LKS BUS PK (rush-hours. This sign is from the Blue Birds, which don't go that far west, big bus sign may be similar.)
THE ROUTE ITSELF:
This is one of those routes that is split between 2 garages. On weekends mimi-buses do the route. Weekdays Northeast buses do it. Although it is a lettered bus,like all the beach buses, it actually spends very little time on the beach- 11 minutes out of an hour and a half that the full trip lasts. The V bus is like this, too. This route makes so many turns that it makes no sense to describe it. You can see the map at the MDTA web site. The webmaster was assigned this route on Saturday,December 18, 1999. I had bus 6022 and was the first eastbound bus from the Tri-Rail station. I did only 3 round trips, but that was a total of 163 miles!! Shows you how long the bus is.
Basiclally the eastbound trip leaves the station, serves the Opa-Locka City Hall, then the Golden Glades Park-N-Ride. Continuing eastbound, it serves Parkway Regional Hospital, then the Mall at 163rd Street. It heads to the beach on the Sunny Isles Causeway. People live on the north side of the causeway, the south side is the Oleta River State Park, I believe. The S.I.C. is a 6 lane high speed causeway, though. So the bus turns off at the Interama Blvd. light and turns onto a westbound service road. Routes E, H and V all do this loop, in both directions. A small median separates the service road from the westbound lanes of the S.I.C. . The buses all go down to the end of the road, which is at NE 26 Avenue. Then the do a 180 at the light, from westbound on the service road and onto eastbound S.I.C. They go down to NE 35 Ave., which is the next light after Interama. Here the H goes on about it's business, but the E and V make another right and head up 35th, and enter the Eastern Shores neighborhood of North Miami Beach. The buses go through the guard booth and up to NE 171 St., where 35th ends. At this stop sign they execute another 180 and go back down 35th to the S.I.C. The map shows a little circle but it's actually just a u-turn. At the S.I.C. they make a left and go out to Collins Avenue - State Road A1A. The E (and the V, too.) never enters the city of Miami Beach itself but still runs on the island. It enters into the city of Sunny Isles Beach, which was incorporated as a town only recently. After a brief detour to serve Winston Towers and the other condos next to it, the buses reach the intersection of Collins and Gallahad Dade Blvd. (193 St.). Here we say goodbye to the V, which continues to the Diplomat Mall in Hallandale. The E, however, makes another U-turn at the light. It has it's own exclusive arrow from the far left lane. The S also make a 180 here. The bus returns to the mainland on the William Lehman Causeway, exiting on West Country Club Drive. Here is the Turnberry Isle Country Club (The club itself is served by route 3.). Then it enters the Aventura Mall at 199 St. And it's over.
Weekdays the route is longer than that. The westbound bus takes NW 135 St. along the southern edge of Opa-Locka Airport. the street becomes 138th and enters Miami Lakes. It lays over at Miami Lakes Drive and NW 60 Ave. At rush hour,it continues west along Miami Lakes Drive to the PRC in the Miami Lakes Business Park, near 79th Avenue.
The old timers at Northeast love driving this route (Or so I've heard.), but they've been there a while. I personally would rather trip over the food dish of a pitbull named Blackbeard while he's eating. than do this bus again anytime soon. My only problem is that there's only a few minutes of layover time at Aventura. At the food court. With all that yummy food to eat and no time to eat it. (UGH!!!)But the western layover is long- like 30 or 40 minutes. So one could buy the food and eat it at the western end, I guess. OH WELL!