The Crayton and Harbour Roundabout Missed Its Summer Start. Here's Where It Actually Stands.

The traffic signal at Harbour Drive and Crayton Road is still working this October, months after spring news coverage said crews would be digging by summer. The City of Naples posted the construction solicitation for the job on September 22, and sealed bids are due Thursday, October 22, 2026, at 2 p.m. After that, City Council still has to approve a construction contract.

For The Moorings, the argument over how to fix this intersection is settled, and has been since spring. What's left to decide is the calendar. The roughly 10-month build City staff described in March was planned as an off-season project. It will now take place while season traffic is on Crayton Road.

How the Signal-or-Roundabout Debate Ended

The intersection has been a planning question for most of a decade. According to Naples Press, City Council has gone back and forth between a roundabout and a mast-arm traffic signal since 2017. Earlier councils had cooled on roundabouts along Crayton Road. They cited residents' unfamiliarity with them and seasonal traffic. One member argued that available Metropolitan Planning Organization money would do more good at more congested locations.

Council's direction shifted after a fatal pedestrian crash at the intersection in November 2024. At that point, Johnson Engineering had been under contract for 11 months to design a signal for the corner. City Engineer Alison Bickett told Council the crash drove the community's push to compare roundabouts with signals. In April 2025, The Moorings held a town meeting on the project and asked city staff for that comparison. The votes followed.

The jump from a one-vote margin in 2025 to a unanimous vote in 2026 is the clearest sign of where the city now stands. City Manager Gary Young explained the urgency. When he took the job in February 2025, the project was not expected to get Florida Department of Transportation funding until 2029. "We said, 'Look, it's been too long already,'" Young said, as reported by Naples Press. The city went ahead without waiting for that money.

Why the Summer Start Moved to October Bids

At the March 4 meeting, staff laid out a quick schedule. Final design and utility coordination would run into April. A contractor would be chosen and the contract approved in May or June. Construction would start in summer 2026 and last about ten months. WBBH repeated that forecast on April 2.

That schedule depended on finishing the redesign. The project had first been engineered as a signal and then redirected, and the final drawings also had to account for water mains, a force main, street lighting and other utilities under the corner. The public record has no official statement explaining why the solicitation came in September rather than late spring. What the record does show is that bidding opened about four months later than the March plan assumed. By late April, the Naples Daily News was already reporting that the construction contract would go to Council "this fall."

So far, no award date or revised start date has been published. Bids open October 22, and the winning bid then goes to Council for approval. If the job takes anything close to the ten months staff described in March, starting any time after a fall award means the build runs through the 2027 winter and spring season, the busiest months on Crayton Road.

What the Bid Package Actually Buys

The City has budgeted $1.6 million for the project. The scope covers more than a ring of curb. It includes utility relocation, road restoration, ADA-compliant sidewalks, driveway reconstruction, stormwater work, new lighting, City utility installation, removal of the existing signal, and maintenance of traffic for the length of the job.

The March 2026 design presentation and the bid schedule show what the finished corner should look like:

• Crossings: a pedestrian refuge island at each of the four crosswalks, so walkers cross one lane at a time, with ADA-accessible ramps and rapid-flashing beacons at all four
• Bikes: cyclists can ride through the circle with traffic or take bike off-ramps to a shared-use path and cross at the crosswalks
• Footprint: the design is meant to fit within the existing right-of-way, keep access to nearby driveways, and limit effects on nearby homes, trees and utilities
• Pavement: 710 square yards of 6-inch concrete sidewalk and driveway, 181 square yards of 5,000-psi concrete sidewalk in the northwest quadrant, a 170-square-yard paver truck apron, 107 square yards of splitter islands, and 105 square yards of architectural driveway pavers
• Drainage: about seven drainage inlets replaced while keeping the existing drainage pattern
• Landscaping: 12 months of irrigation and landscape maintenance during the warranty period, with the planting plan open to changes before final bid documents

The truck apron is the detail most likely to answer the practical worries raised at Council. It is a slightly raised paver ring around the center island that large vehicles can roll over. Council member Scott Schultz, who argued for a mast arm, named fire trucks and beach renourishment trucks among his concerns, according to Naples Press.

The searchable RFP text does not include a project-specific lane-closure plan, detour route, work-hour limits or seasonal restrictions. Maintenance of traffic appears as a single lump-sum bid item. The details of how traffic moves during construction may be in the plan sheets, or they may be worked out after a contractor is chosen.

The Neighborhood Argument, in the Neighborhood's Words

Support at the deciding meeting came from residents, bicycle and pedestrian safety groups, and several neighborhood associations, as reported by Naples Press. Nat Smith, director of the Naples Pathways Coalition, told Council it had "heard overwhelmingly from the residents in the neighborhood." Shawn Connors, a Moorings Property Owners Association board member, noted that there are 11,000 roundabouts nationwide and 1,500 in Florida. He described the difference this way:

"I look at a roundabout more as a community ice-skating rink, where you kind of blend into it and you intuitively know how to get around safely. And a traffic light in our neighborhoods seems to operate more like a hockey game."

The concerns against the plan were specific too. Schultz described waiting seven or eight minutes at the Central Avenue and Eighth Street roundabout, the city's existing local example. He also argued that a mast arm would be simpler to maintain. A homeowner told WBBH that turning into a driveway right after leaving the circle could be hazardous, because drivers would be looking the other way. A city presentation acknowledged concerns about access, safety and emergency response, and the city went ahead with the project. The driveway reconstruction in the RFP scope and the 105 square yards of driveway pavers in the bid schedule are where that concern shows up in the drawings.

What Season Around the Corner Looks Like

Nearby, the fall and holiday calendar is already set. The Village on Venetian Bay has Grand Illuminations on November 21, a Thanksgiving Day 5K, and Holiday on the Bay on December 12. Artis—Naples, at the eastern edge of the neighborhood, hosts the Naples International Film Festival October 22–25, Hamilton November 24–29, and Handel's Messiah on December 3. None of those dates depends on the bid opening. Any construction schedule that follows the award will run alongside this kind of season calendar.

The next public step is the bid opening at 2 p.m. on Thursday, October 22. After that, a contract award will appear on a City Council agenda, and that meeting will set the first firm construction date this project has had.

The CVJ Team follows Moorings infrastructure projects like this one because they affect how a block lives day to day and how a home there shows during season. If you own near Harbour Drive or Crayton Road and want to know how construction timing could fit with a sale or a purchase in 2027, Joe Caveney and the team can walk you through it. Request Private Access & Home Valuation.