Originally envisioned as the
Twentieth Street Tollway in 1964 (with a spur to the airport along LeJeune Road), construction on the
Fourteenth Street east–west Expressway between the
Palmetto Expressway and US 1 started in 1967 and was completed in 1969. Two years later, construction of the western extension to
Florida's Turnpike commenced, and was finished in 1974. Also in 1974, the name of the tollway was changed to commemorate the success of the
Miami Dolphins of the
NFL, after
back-to-
back wins in the
Super Bowl. The section of SR 836 signed as I-395 was supposed to open with the rest of the Dolphin Expressway in 1968, but was delayed due to a freeze at the federal level for road spending. The expressway opened on March 26, 1971. Initial plans for the
Interstate 75 extension to Miami in 1968 would have used the Dolphin Expressway as its final link to Interstate 95 (I-75 would have crossed the Everglades via
Tamiami Trail under this plan). However, these plans were abandoned in 1973 in favor of I-75's current route farther north. The fact that the Dolphin Expressway was not built to interstate standards and the expensive costs in upgrading it to such was one of the factors in changing I-75's proposed route. Construction of a second westward extension of SR 836 started in 2004. This extension, westward to Northwest 137th Avenue near Northwest 12th Street, opened June 22, 2007, was initially accessible only to motorists with
SunPass electronic toll-paying capability; there is no capacity for the collection of cash. The road has since opened to non SunPass users with the Toll by Plate system. Until July 1, 2007, the toll for eastbound automobiles was $1.25 ($1.00 for motorists with
SunPass), paid at a toll booth between Northwest 22nd and Northwest 17th Avenues (toll is not collected from westbound traffic). In conjunction with the completion of the new three-mile-long extension west of the Turnpike, tolls of $1.00 (75 cents for motorists with
SunPass) were collected from traffic in both directions west of
SR 973 (Northwest 87th Avenue/Galloway Road). Although the new toll was originally stated to be only for the extension, motorists going to the Florida Turnpike or Northwest 107th Avenue also have to pay. On July 21, 2013, the eastbound toll plaza near I-95 ceased cash collection and became all electronic, with those paying with SunPass paying $1, and Toll by Plate users paying $2. On November 15, 2014, the Dolphin Expressway became an all electronic toll road, no longer collecting cash, and the only ways to pay are either by the
SunPass transponders or billing by the toll-by-plate program, at double the cost of SunPass users. Toll gantries are located along the expressway and on interchanges to where there are no "free movement" sections of the expressway as existed previously. The move was first announced in 2010, and along with the nearby Airport Expressway, was the last of the
GMX expressways to be converted to
open road tolling. On May 24, 2010, construction began on the
Port Miami Tunnel, a $1 billion project that connects the port to other major highway arteries, including I-395, with the tunnel opening on August 3, 2014.
Recent History In 2016, the construction of additional lanes to match the rebuilt, higher capacity
Dolphin-Palmetto Interchange, with
SR 826 was completed. Following a widening project in the late 2010s, bus lanes were added along the shoulder of the Dolphin Expressway. The expressway is home to two of the state's
diverging-diamond interchanges after the reconstruction of two exits at Northwest
27th Avenue and
Northwest 57th Avenue. In May 2022, construction began on four new ramps that connect to the
HEFT. It includes: • From the
Miami-Dade Transit Dolphin station Park-n-Ride, a new ramp to westbound SR 836. • From eastbound SR 836, a new ramp to the Dolphin station Park-n-Ride and to northbound HEFT. • From southbound HEFT, a new ramp to westbound SR 836. In addition, improvements are being made to ramps from southbound HEFT to eastbound SR 836 and westbound SR 836 to northbound HEFT. The project is expected to cost $41.1 million and was supposed to be completed in spring 2024. The new ramps opened on October 23rd, 2024
Future Connecting Miami In January 2019, the construction of a new SR 836/
I-95/I-395 interchange project began. The
GMX is overseeing the construction of a new
double-decker span of the SR 836 (from NW 17 Avenue, rising over the center of the existing SR 836 roadway, and touching down at I-395, east of the I-95 interchange), while the
Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) is overseeing the construction of the complete replacement of the I-395 sector (from I-95 to the MacArthur Causeway), with a new "signature"
cable-stayed bridge extending across it and over
Biscayne Boulevard. Community parks, art installations, and
urban green spaces will be designed underneath the 1.4-mile stretch, from NW 3 Avenue to Biscayne Boulevard. In addition, I-95 will undergo concrete pavement reconstruction from NW 8 Street to NW 29 Street. The project is known as "Connecting Miami". The entire project is expected to cost $840 million and be completed in late 2027.
Kendall Parkway The Kendall Parkway is a planned new north–south extension of SR 836, a multimodal
transportation corridor mostly west of SW 167th Avenue from the current termini of SR 836 at NW 137th Avenue to SW 136th Street. The entire project is expected to cost over $1 billion. ==Exit list==