State Road 534.
You can’t find it on a local map—at least for now.
That’s the working designation for the eastern extension of Osceola Parkway, and the anticipated toll road corridor that’s been approved by both the Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission (FWC) and the Central Florida Expressway Authority (CFX).
The new toll road would start near the interchange of State Road 417 and Boggy Creek Road in Orange County, due south of the Orlando International Airport, It would head south into Osceola County, meet up with an extension of Simpson Road, then turn east along the Orange-Osceola line, eventually meeting Narcoossee Road near a realigned Clapp Simms Duda Road. Broken into three segments, construction is currently slated to start in late 2025 or early 2026, depending on the segment.
Long-range plans, passed from the then Osceola County Expressway Authority to CFX about a decade ago, call for the road to eventually expand east to the northeast portion of the county. Another road would then travel south from there, cross Nova Road and link up with Florida’s Turnpike south of St. Cloud, where it would meet the Southport Connector, another planned road from Poinciana to the Turnpike. The final product would create a nearly full beltway around the county’s most populous areas — and open more land for development — when fully built out around 2040.
So the rub here is this—the Osceola Parkway extension is not a new concept. The original Project Development & Environment (PD&E) study was completed in 2017.
It is that portion east of Narcoossee Road, which likely wouldn’t be built until about 2030, that has drawn the ire of nature conservationists. It passes through a swath of the Split Oak Forest, land that Osceola and Orange counties purchased and set aside for conservation in the 1990s.
“The Osceola Parkway Extension is unique because there is no viable alternative to build the road without touching conservation land,” the PD&E study reads.
“This doesn’t address current needs. It’s a development-enabling road,” Valerie Anderson, who represents the Friends of Split Oak, told the Osceola County Commission during the process to approve building the road.
On May 1, despite a 2020 referendum that passed in Orange County to maintain Split Oak’s sanctity, the FWC voted 6-1 to accept contingencies for the preserved land around the proposed corridor. Developer Tavistock’s offer to donate 1,550 other adjacent acres for preservation and $24 million to FWC to manage it all are a big part of those contingencies.
A day later, CFX—of which Osceola County Commissioner Brandon Arrington is a board member—approved the plans, along with the Florida Communities Trust. That’s a state agency that had to approve the easements through Split Oak since state funding was used to create the Forest.
Without debate, the CFX board voted 7-1 in favor, with Orange County Mayor Jerry Demings voting against, saying he supported the 2020 Orange voters’ referendum. CFX officials said they anticipate initiating design work on State Road SR 534 in late 2024.
