The Fort Lauderdale International Boat Show opened on Wednesday, October 28. It runs at six waterfront sites through Sunday, November 1. The public pages describe the footprint slightly differently: the 2026 maps page calls it a six-location show, and the shuttle page refers to seven. This is the first Boat Show held under the Coast Guard's new weekday schedule for the SE 17th Street Bridge. Up the Intracoastal, the East Sunrise Boulevard bridge is on a construction schedule that lasts through mid-November.
If you live near Seabreeze Boulevard, 17th Street or the Intracoastal, the hours that matter this week are the ones posted for those two drawbridges, more than the show's opening and closing times.
The 17th Street bridge changed its rhythm in February
For years the SE 17th Street Bridge, also called the Brooks Memorial Bridge, opened twice an hour for boats, on the hour and the half-hour. A final rule published in the Federal Register on January 20, 2026, changed that. It took effect on February 19. The Coast Guard put the new schedule in plain terms:
"On weekdays, the bridge will open only at the top of the hour from 6:50 a.m. to 9:10 a.m. and from 3:50 p.m. to 6:10 p.m. At all other times the bridge will open at the top and bottom of each hour."
The City of Fort Lauderdale asked for the change to ease weekday rush-hour congestion. The rulemaking drew 161 comments, and 145 supported it. According to the Coast Guard's summary, many of those commenters named the nearby convention center and recent development as the main causes of backups at the bridge. The Broward County Convention Center is the Boat Show's transportation hub, so the building those commenters cited is where most visitors park this week.
Boats that clear the bridge's 55-foot closed height can pass at any time. For drivers and for lower boats, the new schedule lines up with show days like this:
| Show day | Show hours | 17th Street Bridge openings |
|---|---|---|
| Wednesday, Oct. 28 | 12 p.m. to 7 p.m. | Top of the hour only, 6:50 to 9:10 a.m. and 3:50 to 6:10 p.m.; twice hourly otherwise |
| Thursday, Oct. 29 | 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. | Same weekday restriction |
| Friday, Oct. 30 | 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. | Same weekday restriction |
| Saturday, Oct. 31 | 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. | Top and bottom of every hour |
| Sunday, Nov. 1 | 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. | Top and bottom of every hour |
On Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, the evening restriction ends at 6:10 p.m., 50 minutes before the show closes. Show shuttles keep running until an hour after closing. So the crowd leaving between 7 and 8 p.m. meets a bridge back on its regular twice-hourly schedule. The rush-hour restriction does its job in the late afternoon, before the show lets out. On the weekend there's no restriction at all, and the bridge opens every 30 minutes all day.
Where the show sits along that corridor
The six sites on the official show overview cluster at two ends of the beach-side waterfront, with downtown's Las Olas Marina as an outlier:
- Bahia Mar Yachting Center, 801 Seabreeze Blvd.
- Hall of Fame Marina, 435 Seabreeze Blvd.
- Las Olas Marina, 240 E. Las Olas Circle
- Superyacht Village at Pier Sixty-Six South, 2150 SE 17th St.
- Pier Sixty-Six Marina, 2301 SE 17th St.
- Broward County Convention Center, 1950 Eisenhower Blvd.
Garage parking follows the same pattern. Besides the Convention Center garages, the show's parking page lists the Balfour Beatty Garage at 1799 SE 17th St., the Hilton Fort Lauderdale Marina at 1881 SE 17th St., and Beach Place at 17 S. Fort Lauderdale Beach Blvd. Two of those four garages are on 17th Street, the same road the bridge carries. The organizers' own advice is to park at the Convention Center, which has more than 3,000 spaces at a flat $40 a day, and take a shuttle, golf cart or water taxi from there.
The show is also promoting a new interactive map for 2026, built with MarineSource.com, and an expanded Windward VIP area at Hall of Fame Marina.
How the show moves people between sites
The shuttle and golf cart page lists four free bus loops. They start an hour before the show opens and stop an hour after it closes. That means 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. on Wednesday, 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. Thursday through Saturday, and 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Sunday.
- Purple Route: Convention Center to Bahia Mar, as a loop.
- Light Green Route: Convention Center to Superyacht Village to Bahia Mar, as a loop.
- Red Route: Brightline Fort Lauderdale Station to the Riverside Hotel, as a loop.
- Blue Route: West Marine Center to the Convention Center.
The Dark Green golf cart route, run by ICON Electric Vehicles during show hours, loops between Superyacht Village and Bahia Mar. None of the listed bus routes goes straight to Las Olas Marina. The Red Route stops at the Riverside Hotel, which is the closest connection to downtown.
The FLIBS Water Taxi runs on the same one-hour-before, one-hour-after schedule. Passes cost $15 for one day or $65 for five days, and children under 5 ride free. For anyone who lives on the water, the water taxi means a trip between Las Olas Marina and the Seabreeze docks that never waits on a bridge. Active-duty military and veterans can get one free general-admission day on any day of the show, according to the show FAQ. Last year that offer was limited to Sunday.
The second bridge is running on one leaf
Boaters coming south on the Intracoastal from north of Sunrise Boulevard have another schedule to plan around. The Coast Guard's Local Notice to Mariners dated October 16, 2026 says the East Sunrise Boulevard bridge is under rehabilitation. Work started June 1, 2026, and is expected to run to about September 2027, with crews working around the clock and equipment near the southeast fender and span.
Under a temporary deviation from its usual schedule, the bridge works this way from 7 a.m. on September 28 to 9 p.m. on November 14:
- It opens on the hour and half-hour, raising only one leaf.
- A full opening, with both leaves raised, needs two hours' advance notice to the bridge tender.
- From September 30 to November 14, the channel is partly blocked from 9 p.m. to 7 a.m., and the bridge provides no full openings overnight.
Boats that can pass without an opening may use the open side of the channel at any time, and the notice asks mariners to go through with caution. For a wide boat headed to a show-week dinner at Las Olas Marina, a single-leaf opening may not be enough. Requesting a full opening means calling the tender two hours ahead. Coming home after 9 p.m. means using the unobstructed side, because the bridge offers no full openings overnight. Bridge schedules can change on short notice. Boaters should check the Coast Guard's current notice before leaving, and this post doesn't replace the official regulation or the bridge tender's instructions.
Planning the rest of the week around both clocks
Weekday afternoons are when the 17th Street bridge restriction applies. From 3:50 to 6:10 p.m., a boat that needs an opening waits for the top of the hour. That same window is when the regular weekday commute overlaps with the show's last few hours.
Saturday is the busiest bridge day. The show runs a full 10 a.m. to 7 p.m., the 17th Street bridge opens every 30 minutes all day, and Sunrise is still raising one leaf at a time.
For a trip to the beach without the show, the city lists Fort Lauderdale Beach Park at 700 Seabreeze Blvd. with 438 spaces at the resident beach-parking rate. That's a general city listing. It doesn't promise availability on a show day, and the lot is on the same stretch of Seabreeze as Bahia Mar and Hall of Fame Marina.
One more item near Seabreeze: the city's news page announced a Holiday Drive asphalt improvement project on October 14, 2026. It covers resurfacing part of Holiday Drive east of Seabreeze Boulevard.
After Sunday, the calendar moves to December
The show closes at 5 p.m. on November 1. The 17th Street bridge stays on its new weekday schedule, which is a final rule rather than a temporary deviation. The East Sunrise Boulevard deviation ends at 9 p.m. on November 14, though the rehabilitation itself continues into 2027.
The next scheduled change on the water is already in the same Coast Guard notice. On Saturday, December 12, for the Seminole Hard Rock Winterfest Boat Parade, the East Sunrise Boulevard bridge will stay open to boats from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. The East Las Olas Boulevard bridge will stay open from 6:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. If you drive across either bridge that evening, plan for those windows.
When your property sits on the water, a bridge schedule shapes more than show week. It affects how a home with dockage is shown, how far it is by boat from downtown, and what a buyer coming from north of Sunrise should know before scheduling a visit. If you're thinking about how these bridge clocks affect a waterfront home you own or are considering, GK Realty Group can help. Request a confidential luxury market consultation, and we'll go over it with you dock by dock.
