Venetian Causeway bascules and the run to Government Cut
Every Venetian lot is on water, but the causeway itself sits between half of them and the ocean. The two drawbridges are low when shut. The eastern one, between Rivo Alto and Belle Isle, gives 5 feet. The western one, over the Intracoastal, gives 12. In daylight both only open on the hour and the half hour, so a skipper can sit for up to 30 minutes each way.
Which shore your seawall faces matters more than which island you are on. From a south-facing dock you are already in the basin between the Venetian and the MacArthur, and neither drawbridge is in your way. From a north-facing dock you come back through one of the two bascules before you head south.
Star, Palm and Hibiscus: pick the 35-foot bridge or the 65-foot one
These three islands hang off the MacArthur Causeway, so the MacArthur is the only crossing between them and the cut. Going east, the fixed bridge near the Miami Beach end gives 35 feet and drops you into Meloy Channel, the short way out. Going west, you run to the Intracoastal and pass under the 65-foot span, then follow Miami Main Channel along the north side of the port, a federal project dredged to 36 feet, to Government Cut.
For a sportfisherman with a tower or anything with a mast, that western loop is what keeps these islands in the big-boat category. It is longer, but nothing on it opens or closes.
- MacArthur east fixed bridge: 35 ft above mean high water
- MacArthur span over the Intracoastal: 65 ft
- Government Cut project depth: 52 ft to inside the jetties
Biscayne and San Marco answer to the City of Miami
The Venetian chain crosses a city line. San Marino, Di Lido, Rivo Alto and Belle Isle are Miami Beach. Biscayne Island and San Marco Island, the two nearest the mainland, are the City of Miami, even though the post office calls every one of them 33139.
That changes the seawall arithmetic. On the Miami Beach islands the 2025 ordinance sets 5.7 feet NAVD88 once the job reaches $500 a linear foot. A 2023 study for the Town of Surfside summarises the City of Miami's 2020 rule as a 6.0-foot NAVD88 minimum for new walls on tidal water away from the Miami River. On either side, work in the bay also needs a county Class I permit. Tell us the island and we will price the wall under the right code.
Eight million dollars, and most of it is the dirt
Across the whole ZIP, 42 single-family houses closed in 2025 at a median of $8,000,000. That figure mixes Flamingo Park and inland streets with the islands, so treat it as a floor for bayfront rather than a price for your lot.
At these numbers the house on an island lot is often the smaller part of the value. We look at frontage, which way it faces, and which bridge sits between the dock and the jetties, and we do not mind a house that is coming down.