Out of Azalea Park: Five Miles From Downtown, Wired Like It
SR-408 at the doorstep, Colonial Drive north, Semoran to the airport, an executive airport on the boundary: Azalea Park's connections are the strongest thing about its map.
1 minute read
Azalea Park sits about five miles east of downtown Orlando, and its commute is a study in options. Few communities its size are this wired; the corridors that bound it are the same ones that move it.
The road web
The SR-408 (East-West Expressway) crosses the community’s southern doorstep, putting downtown minutes west and UCF minutes east. Colonial Drive (SR-50) runs the northern boundary — the surface-street alternative in both directions. Semoran Boulevard (SR-436) on the west is the airport road, south to Orlando International; Goldenrod Road (SR-551) on the east connects north to Winter Park and south toward the airport’s east side. A resident can reach downtown, the university, both airports and the SR-417 without ever leaving a state road that touches their own neighbourhood.
The airport on the line
Orlando Executive Airport forms part of the community’s northwestern boundary — general aviation on the doorstep, covered in this hub’s airport piece. Between the expressway, the corridors and the runways, Azalea Park’s practical geography is the inverse of its fame: nobody outside the east side talks about it, and everybody inside it can get anywhere. For a working community, that is the right way round.
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