If you live in or near Aventura, chances are you're used to being stuck in traffic.

The city wants that to change.

Commissioner Zev Auerbach announced Tuesday that the Florida Department of Transportation plans to widen the on-and-off ramps at Ives Dairy Road and I-95 -- a major cause of traffic tie-ups in the city.

But Auerbach, speaking at the monthly commission meeting, said those changes alone won't be enough.

The improved traffic flow off the highway could create additional congestion approaching the overpass to U.S. 1 and Aventura Mall, he said.

''It's not going to bring more cars on that road, but if you get them off the highway faster, you bring them to that stretch of the road quicker,'' Auerbach said. ``So we're being very pro-active in asking FDOT to study the road.''

Although the Ives Dairy Road highway entrance and exit are outside city limits, Aventura is affected by traffic jams at the interchange.

In late August, Auerbach met with FDOT representatives and asked for the improvements to be expedited from two years to one, and expanded to include the U.S. 1 overpass.

Suggestions include: posting additional signs, adjusting traffic lights and adding a second south turning lane onto U.S. 1.

''This is really going to be big to alleviate a significant traffic problem in the city,'' Auerbach said Wednesday.

Brian Rick, a spokesman for the Florida Department of Transportation, said the I-95 at Ives Dairy Road improvements are scheduled to begin in December 2010.

Meanwhile, Auerbach said he, City Manager Eric Soroka, and Police Chief Steve Steinberg would meet next month with local FDOT representatives to discuss the updates further.

In other business, Mayor Susan Gottlieb asked for the commission's support to spend $1,000 on a joint advertising campaign with other Miami-Dade city mayors to defeat a proposed charter amendment relating to municipal fire services.

If approved, the charter will allow fire departments in Key Biscayne, Miami, Miami Beach, Hialeah and Coral Gables to keep providing service -- but not allow any of Miami-Dade's other 30 cities to opt out of contracts they now have with the county. Gottlieb, and other mayors from around the county, hope the charter change will be defeated.

The Aventura Commission agreed unanimously.

''It's not that we intend to leave the county,'' Gottlieb said. ``It's that it would forever preclude us.''

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