The Birth of a Linear Park
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Thirteen Years Since Conception, Coral Gables’ Underline Finishes This Year
Photos By Rodolfo Benitez
By now, Meg Daly’s epiphany in 2013 is the stuff of urban legend. Unable to drive her car thanks to two broken arms, she started walking places. Her path took her under the Metrorail as it coursed through Coconut Grove on her way to physical therapy. One day she thought, why can’t this wasted space become a long linear park similar to the HighLine park in New York? That uber-successful elevated park was built on a historic freight rail line on Manhattan’s lower West Side. “I had been to the HighLine with my dad,” says Daly. “We went in the dead of winter and walked it. It was bitter cold, but people were out there walking.”
And so began Daly’s quest, starting with consulting with the folks from Miami-Dade County Parks department, and then proceeding with years of fundraising and flag waving. “I shopped the idea to anyone who would listen. Fortunately, there were some people who thought it wasn’t crazy.
She held public meetings everywhere – from the University of Miami to Temple Judea – any place she could attract an audience to hear her idea and get the community’s feedback. Finally, she got a $10,000 grant from the Knight Foundation to create a non-profit corporation and web site, and then funding from the cities of Coral Gables, Miami, and the Miami Foundation to create a master plan. In 2015, a student class at UM’s School of Architecture came up with early renderings for the vision.
After that, private donations and public grants began coming in, including more than $250,000, again from the Knight Foundation, to design an outdoor gym in the Brickell section of the Underline – part of Phase 1, the first half mile “Brickell Backyard” of the Underline’s 10 miles, which opened in 2021. Miami-Dade County had stepped in by then, providing right-of-way for 120 acres under the elevated Metrorail and coordinating construction through its Department of Transportation and Public Works, and its Parks Department, along with supplying significant funding.
For Coral Gables, the big breakthrough came in 2019, when the federal government awarded a $23 million BUILD grant for construction including the three miles of the Underline passing through the city. The following year, legislation written by then Vice Mayor Vince Lago committed $7 million to the project, funds drawn from any new development within 1,000 feet of the project. “He’s been an incredible leader during this whole process,” says Daly of Lago, who has been mayor since 2021. For his part, Mayor Lago has been an unabashed cheerleader for the linear park.
“I Shopped The Idea To Anyone Who Would Listen. Fortunately, There Were Some People Who Thought It Wasn’t Crazy….”
Meg Daly, The Visionary Behind The Underline, Shown Right
Above: Underline Plaza, A Community Space And Urban Beach
“It’s been a labor of love, but Meg Daly deserves all the credit. She is a visionary,” says Lago. “These are the kind of transformational projects that not only enhance quality of life, and increase property values, but redefine a community. The goal is to increase our open space catalog by over three miles, increase our tree canopy, and get people out, especially young professionals and young kids, to truly enjoy the natural splendor that is Coral Gables.”
The Underline is now on a fast track for completion by the end of this year, almost a decade ahead of its original timeline. Already four of the six community spaces planned for the Gables section have been completed, three of them activated. The remaining two are due for completion by year’s end.
The Gables spaces begin adjacent to the Douglas Road Metrorail station with The Underline Plaza, which includes an “urban beach” area, with seating beneath large shade umbrellas. “This is actually considered the center point of the Underline,” says Underline CMO Lisle Bowen. “We are five miles from the Miami River [where it starts] and five miles from Dadeland [where it ends]. It’s built as a community space – with an urban beach just to have something different. And yes, there is sand there.” Two of the Metrorail columns already have murals painted by Bahamian artist April Bey, and the goal for the space is to have it activated “with food trucks and experiences,” says Bowen.
The Six Coral Gables “Stations” On The Underline
The six miles of the Underline which pass through Coral Gables are the richest in terms of amenities. Like the rest of the Underline, the Gables section provides a continuous bike and pedestrian path. But because the public land adjacent to the Metrorail is widest here, it allows for substantial public spaces. Here are the six; the last two will be finished this year.
Rock Ridge Plaza
(Under Construction)
Location: Ponce de Leon at Stanford Drive, near University of Miami
Description: A block long installation with three distinct areas: an outdoor amphitheater/classroom (featuring natural boulder seating), a shady “vestibule” gathering space, and a Flex Plaza performance venue.
PineLand Courts
(Under Construction)
Location: Ponce de Leon near Carrillo Street and University of Miami
Description: Sponsored by Baptist Health, with 4 public pickleball courts, a regulation-size basketball court, seating, drinking fountains and bicycle parking.
The Wilds
(Completed)
Location: Ponce de Leon Blvd near Orduna Drive
Description: An ecosystem of native Everglades wetland flood- and drought-tolerant plants, with stormwater bioswales, boardwalks, and shady rest areas.
The Fitness Room
(Completed, To Be Activated)
Location: Ponce de Leon Blvd near Riviera Drive.
Description: Wellness area with body-weight exercise equipment, stretch area, half basketball court and minipitch soccer field, with community wellness programming.
The Bark Park
(Completed)
Location: 4500 Ponce de Leon Blvd (just south of where Ponce bends south, next to the Lifetime Building)
Description: Two adjacent parks, one for small dogs one for larger dogs, with cooling turf, agility tunnels and hydration stations
The Underline Plaza & Urban Beach
(Completed)
Location: 4500 Ponce de Leon Blvd (just south of where Ponce bends south, next to the Lifetime Building)
Description: Two adjacent parks, one for small dogs one for larger dogs, with cooling turf, agility tunnels and hydration stations
Next comes the Chewy Bark Park, a complex of two play areas – one 18,000-square-foot area for large dogs and one 13,000-squarefoot area for small dogs. It opened in January and since gained notoriety when it broke the Guinness World Record for largest dog pool party with 276 canines showing up.
Further down the line, opposite the Coral Gables fire station on U.S. 1, is a space called “The Fitness Room.” This is an “outdoor wellness area” that will include exercise equipment, a half-basketball court, a mini-pitch soccer area, and space for community exercise classes.
Next comes The Wilds, designed as a Florida wildlife area with seating for calm reflection –despite the periodic overhead rush of the Metrorail, which is soon forgotten among the native flora and fauna that populates the space. “The concept of the wilds is that it’s kind of like a little piece of the Everglades in Coral Gables,” says Bowen. “We have birdhouses and a lot of our pollinators here. You’re very immersed in nature within the wilds.”
The two remaining spaces were, at time of publication, still under construction: The Pineland Courts and Rock Ridge Plaza. Both are opposite one of the main entrances to the University of Miami. The Courts are just what they sound like: four pickleball courts and one full-sized basketball court. The Rock Ridge Plaza, on the other hand, is the pièce de résistance of the community spaces: a threepart plaza with an amphitheater, a woodsy multi-level area, and a large open court for events.
Throughout the Underline, there are un-interrupted pedestrian and bike paths (with five bike stations and 50 bicycles for rent), and periodic micro-forests designed for rapid growth. The entire length of it is punctuated by young native Dade County pines and southern Live Oaks. “Can you imagine in five or ten years, when all the trees have fully matured?” asks Underline publicist Jennyfer Grundler. “This is a commitment to mobility, nature and community, creating safe, accessible public space for the residents of Coral Gables.”
The Next Challenges
Now that the Underline is nearing completion, maintaining it is the next obstacle to overcome. Already the organization that Daly created, like the physical Underline itself, is evolving. Daly has turned daily operations over to CEO Eulois Cleckley while remaining Chair of the Board of Directors of Friends of the Underline, the fundraising arm of the project. Cleckley directs a staff of three dozen workers for the Underline Conservancy, whose job it is to maintain the linear park in pristine – and safe – condition.
“I still work all the time. I haven’t stopped working,” says Daly. “I think it’s the compression of the very rapid delivery of the last seven miles, and the compression of fundraising that has to happen because we [no longer] have a big runway.” Daly has also been tapped as an advisor for the Shoreline, a similar project along the Rickenbacker Causeway to Key Biscayne, and by the national Highline Network to mentor the director of the Rail Park in Philadelphia.
The big challenge for the Conservancy is, as you might expect, how to pay for keeping the Underline in shape. “The primary purpose is to provide safety and security for the users 24-seven, as well as landscaping and maintenance of the trail and the recreational amenity areas,” says Cleckley. “Those are the fundamentals, to be provided at a level that the City Beautiful expects, and our board expects, which is world class, first class.”
The estimated cost to maintain the Underline is approximately $900,000 annually per mile. The intention is to divide that cost three ways: one third from the county, one third from the private sector, and one third from the municipalities. The cities of Miami and South Miami have both committed $300,000 per mile for the next five years – $1.5 million annually for the five miles in Miami, and $600,000 annually for the two miles in South Miami. So far, however, Coral Gables has only committed $180,000 for the remainder of 2026.
The City Commission for Coral Gables, one of the most fiscally conservative cities in the nation, is reluctant to make a long term commitment prior to the results of the November vote on reducing property taxes in the state. That could take $5 million to $6 million away from city taxes. “I think it is important to fund the Underline, and we hold ourselves to a higher standard than other cities,” says Mayor Lago. “But I want to make sure [we have the dollars] before we commit. We are looking at a few things right now” – including the idea of having city staff maintain at least some of the Gables Underline sections or finding local sponsors for them. “I believe that once the community sees the Underline completely finished and the positive impact this linear park that traverses the city of Coral Gables has – the serenity, the beauty, the canopy, adjacent to the hustle and bustle of U.S.1 – I truly think that people are not just going to buy in, but are going to see that this is an investment well worth it.”
So, what began as a quest – which by any measure demonstrates the power of one determined person to change the world – is now coming to fruition in the hometown of its founder. Daly launched her vision with a tenacity and infectious enthusiasm that ultimately succeeded. “We’ve really put together a very unusual, I think, partnership between the county, the municipalities, and the private [Underline]organization,” says Daly. “People on the outside looking at us are saying, ‘That’s amazing how you’ve done that.’ What’s happening is that everybody’s contributing to this great public benefit.”
Concludes Mayor Lago, “This is a game changer. You’re taking a desolate area that was once underutilized and making it a community treasure.”