[0:04] all right folks well good evening everybody and welcome to the uh city council meeting [0:11] uh it is Monday December 9th 2024 6:00 601 and uh as director benot mentioned [0:20] we're handling these meetings that involve public hearings or meetings of the city council on a hybrid sort of [0:25] basis so folks will be able to watch online uh uh on cable TV or on YouTube [0:32] uh.com or DV uh and so uh they may want to call in [0:38] for this uh public hearing that we're going to have with respect to the proposed uh reconstruction of uh streets [0:44] in the president's neighborhood and um so we'll let them call in but we'll [0:52] take testimony from our residents that are here this evening first but before we get there we're going to um then call [0:58] the meeting to order and I'll do that now and ask our clerk Sharon Allison to call the [1:07] role council member agu here council member Jackson here council member Pierce here council member Risser here [1:14] mayor hubin here here uh next folks is the Pledge of [1:20] Allegiance Pledge ALG to the FL United States of America and to the Republic [1:27] for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liy and justice for [1:37] all we've got a form of meeting agenda in front of us this evening does anyone on staff or Council wish to modify the [1:43] agenda in any form all right is there a motion to adopt the meeting agenda is published so [1:49] move second member pece moves member Jackson seconds the adoption of the meeting agenda is published any further [1:55] discussion all those in favor of adopting the meeting agenda is published say I I I posed carried the meeting [2:02] agenda is adopted uh we are going to have a singular public hearing this evening uh [2:09] folks this is the time of the year when we talk about Street reconstruction projects and um we've got about roughly [2:17] and director Milner is going to talk about this from a backgrounding standpoint we've got about roughly half the streets in town redone 60 to 70 year [2:23] old streets that are just uh in a state of repair where we need to have a methodical way of going about replacing [2:30] them he's going to talk about how we do that neighborhood by neighborhood what sort of test we use to determine where [2:36] to go next uh what we're trying to accomplish here and why we're trying to accomplish it uh so that we all take [2:43] care of what we own together we've changed the the methodology that we use for Street reconstruction uh assessments [2:50] over time uh you're going to be the beneficiary of that he's going to talk about that that changing methodology a [2:57] little bit where we switched uh from several years ago where we charged everybody for uh the roadway [3:04] reconstruction everything under the street being paid for by all of us together uh as well as KB and gutter but [3:10] he'll explain that in a little bit more detail as we go into the the process and and talk about where we are on that um [3:17] sort of amortization schedule of uh of slowly incorporating uh the um uh the cost of [3:24] doing Special assessments or Street reconstruction into the general fund uh but we're still in that process where [3:30] we're converting over on this 16year cycle so we'll talk a little bit about that as well and I'm sure you're all [3:35] interested knowing why why your neighborhood why now and so we're pleased that you're all here to um to [3:42] offer us up your thoughts and to listen to director Milner and his presentation to understand uh what we're trying to [3:48] accomplish in our town uh with your neighborhood being proposed as being the next place that we uh improve the [3:54] streets and everything that's under the streets so director Milner I'll turn to you thank you mayor M of council here [4:00] tonight to talk about the 2025 Street reconstruction program be doing the majority of the of the conversation or [4:05] the presentation here this evening we have Andrew skion our transportation planner is going to talk about the bike and ped master plan Aaron ditler [4:13] assistant City Engineers is really going to get into the utilities and the roads and the cost and those special assessments mayor that you mentioned and [4:19] then Andy Lewis is with us from the Transportation Commission to give a point of view from the commission's uh point of view and like the mayor said [4:26] we're here to talk about the president's neighborhood uh project for for 2025 first I want to thank you the council [4:32] and staff for being here tonight we do this special meeting it's another meeting on your agenda in December every [4:38] year and you're willing to do that for us it's great and then we also want to welcome the residents that are here this evening to participate either in person [4:46] uh or over the phone and the residents have already participated online uh at our meetings or a Better Together uh [4:53] website so we're going to talk about infrastructure replacement talk about that multimodal uh information and then [4:59] really focus on the president's A and B neighborhood so this really ties back to the budget work plan right pillar number [5:05] one that you guys see and developed was the strong Foundation we want to make sure our infrastructure meets the community needs now and into the future [5:13] uh we're going to do that from a whole host of different different methods the multimodal transportation Network our [5:19] roads and sidewalks and bike facilities we want to provide clean and safe drinking water with our Distribution [5:25] Systems but also for fire protection sanitation with the sanitary sewer and flood protection with storm sewer pipes [5:31] lakes and ponds one of the major things we look at is the pav and condition index and this [5:36] is the Citywide average and you can see this graph is uh 2010 on the left hand [5:42] side to 2024 this is a number that we rate the condition and you'll hear this a little bit more for the neighborhood [5:48] but it's on a scale of 0 to 100 with 100 being a new pavement and you can see we've we've adjusted our our proactive [5:55] pavement maintenance program over the years and we're slowly ratcheting up being in that good as a city average and [6:00] I think that's where we want to be with our city Pavements and this program that we're going to talk about tonight is really a key to that part of it but also [6:07] is the mill and overlay program and our other maintenance operations so we put we could put little influxes of money in [6:13] and that's what this is showing is pavement conditions on the Le hand side Goods at the top seriously failed on the [6:20] bottom and then the pavement age with our proactive maintenance we want to get the longest amount of time out of these [6:25] new Pavements that we put in the street and we do that with various overlays with reite projects and sealing cracks [6:32] and stuff like that so if we can input money at the right time we can really extend the pavement [6:38] life it's not only pavement we're talking about tonight it's all the underground utilities and many people don't know all the different pipes and [6:44] systems that are under our streets that provide the water for you when you turn on your faucets but also where's that [6:50] Wastewater go so there's water and storm sewer and sanitary systems water storage [6:55] tanks Wells that pull up raw water and then our treatment water treatment plants to provide that clean Safe [7:01] Drinking Water this was a slide we put together Ross bner helped put this together on a [7:07] kind of an asset management thing and this is goes directly to your conversations last week on the budget you can see in the 50s and 60s there was [7:13] a huge wave of infrastructure streets utilities Park shelter buildings all the stuff a lot of the stuff in town then we [7:21] had this kind of second cycle we call that the buildout it's the first cycle infrastructure dividends we didn't have [7:27] to do a lot in those uh 80s and 90s early 2000s now it's really that commitment to reinvest in our [7:33] infrastructure and what we want to do from an engineering and Public Works side is flatten that curve out so we can have a nice steady stream you know nice [7:40] steady budget every year to flatten that out so this is our first infrastructure cycle and as we have more and more of [7:46] them we feel we can really flatten out those uh expenditures over time to be consistent moving [7:52] forward tonight we're going to talk about presidents A and B it's all local streets there's no Municipal state aid [7:58] streets at all it's right on the border of Hopkins we'll talk a little bit about some shared streets in this neighborhood and there's 301 [8:06] properties and like the mayor said why my street we group streets together in neighborhoods it helps with the [8:11] economies of scale when we go up for bid because a contractor can work in one area over that summer and it really [8:18] helps us extend that pavement life when we do it all together because when we come back for those other operations maintenance operations we can just do [8:24] the whole Mill and overlay within that neighborhood or other operations and this is all part of that proactive [8:29] pavement man Management program that I talked about to extend the life of the pavement and keep that average pavement [8:35] condition index high in town but it's not only the pavement again it's based on pavement but it's also underground [8:41] utility information and then the bike and ped system needs and gaps within the city because that's another master plan [8:47] that we're trying to identify and apply to these projects so with that I'll hand it over [8:52] to Andrew skion and you'll get into more of the bike and ped master plan thank you director Miller welcome [8:59] Mr cipion thank you mayor members of council um these projects provide us with a very rare opportunity to make [9:05] pretty significant changes in our city so whenever we're scoping out these projects we start by looking at our [9:10] guiding documents those include the comprehensive plan our race and Equity plan climate action living streets the [9:16] pet and bike master plan and our active routes School plan we also uh work to incorporate our budget pillars strong [9:22] Foundation as uh director Milner mentioned reliable service livable City and better together um there are many [9:30] different objectives that are mentioned in these plans but kind of four overarching ones that relate specifically to this project include [9:37] providing connectivity for everyday uses um schools Parks Transit uh places of [9:42] employment uh meeting the needs of all users and abilities so that includes our vulnerable users pedestrians cyclists [9:49] Transit users and motorists um encouraging alternative transportation by providing uh uh pedestrian and [9:56] bicycle infrastructure and and uh encourag ing Transit use uh which reduces congestion on our local streets [10:02] and emissions in our neighborhoods as well as improving safety and comfort by providing facilities that are separated [10:08] for motor vehicle traffic so um in more detail tonight you'll hear about the uh [10:15] components of this project that include narrowing streets removing on street parking putting reallocating right away [10:21] for sidewalks and shared use paths as well as replacing sign engine pavement markings um all of these improvements [10:28] are tailored to meet the these objectives within these plans um if we're serious about meeting the [10:33] objectives of all these plans these are the types of improvements that we need to make uh and with that I will hand it [10:39] over to assistant city engineer Aaron ditler to talk more specifically about this project all right thank you Mr [10:45] cioni Mr dler welcome thank you much and thank you Andrew for highlighting some [10:52] of our pedestrian and bicycle goals as we transition into the specifics of our [10:58] project here tonight as Andrew mentioned my name is Aaron ditzler mayor members of the council [11:05] thank you for the opportunity to present the roadway reconstruction improvements [11:10] for the president's a andb [11:17] neighborhood all right on the screen uh the president's aamb neighborhood is bounded on the west by Washington Avenue [11:26] on the North by 3rd Street and 2nd Street these two streets are also the border [11:33] the city limits of Edina and Hopkins it's also Border in the east by Tyler [11:39] Avenue and in the South by Maloney Avenue Maloney Avenue is not included in [11:45] the project area it is a municipal state aid Street the remainder of the streets are local [11:51] streets Second Street is also not included in the project area Second [11:57] Street was reconstructed in in 2013 and a project that was uh helmed by the City [12:04] of Hopkins Tyler Court South of Maloney Avenue this callac is included in the [12:11] project area project details include there's 301 properties 2.7 miles of Road and over [12:19] 35,000 yards square yards of Street [12:25] pavement let's kick things off with the utility Improvement based on the existing watermain [12:31] conditions we're proposing to replace all of the water main pipe all of the water [12:37] services all of the gate valves and all the hydrants the new hydrants will have the [12:44] stores coupling for quicker fire department connections we're also going to verify that the hydrants have [12:51] appropriate spacing and if needed we'll be adding additional hydrants all the watermain improvements [12:58] will be paid for by the water main fund sanitary sewer improvements we're [13:05] proposing Short Spot trunk main pipe repairs as well as the installation of [13:11] cured in place pipeliners to reduce infiltration the pipe liner will be a [13:19] hot water or steam cured liner which is a structural liner inside the Old Clay [13:26] host pipe we're also proposing to replace manhole [13:32] castings and Rings which will prevent inflow and all the sanitary sewer improvements will be paid for by the [13:39] sanitary sewer fund you might want to explain on that slide what II is I ini [13:45] is inflow and infiltration thank [13:57] you okay storm soon improvements we're proposing modifications to the roadway and storm sewer to improve existing [14:03] drainage issues what we mean by that for the roadway we're proposing to increase [14:09] the street grades where warranted and feasible to improve drainage as well as [14:15] extending or upgrading storm sewer as necessary we're proposing to replace all [14:23] of the concrete curb and gutter as well as install a sump drain [14:28] pipe where are feasible we're also going to be communicating with property owners [14:33] that they have an opportunity to connect their private sump drain pipes to the [14:39] city's sump drain pipe that'll be located just below the grass by the [14:45] concrete curb and gutter this will be a completely optional opportunity for [14:50] residents to do that only if they choose all the storm sewer improvements will be paid for by the storm sewer fund [15:00] that wraps up the utility improvements let's move on to the roadways the roads roadways are [15:06] originally constructed uh with the gravel surface in the 1950s followed by the installation of [15:12] sanitary sewer water M and storm sewer and then finally Asphalt Paving in [15:18] the 1960s all the street wids are 30 ft wide [15:24] in the project area and the soils underneath the roadways are Prim clay soils with some [15:30] silty Sandy soils the city rates each uh streets [15:38] pavement condition once every four years the Citywide average pavement condition index rating is [15:45] 78 and the present a andb neighborhood average pavement condition rating for [15:50] the streets is [15:56] 26 we also have a couple alleys I'd like to point out tonight we've got one gravel Alley between Washington and [16:02] Adams Avenue as well as an asphalt Alley between Jefferson and Madison [16:07] Avenues these two alleys in particular generate concerns uh from our public [16:13] works department primarily uh about required snow maintenance uh maintenance [16:18] during snow plowing operations that's due to the uh gravel [16:24] material as well as the significant pavement deterioration on the Alley [16:29] between Jefferson and Madison Avenues therefore we are proposing [16:35] improvements to both alleys the uh gravel alley will get a new 10ft wide [16:41] asphalt alley and the existing asphalt Alley between Jefferson and Madison Avenues [16:47] will be fully reconstructed with new Pavement in both of these alleys we're going to review the subgrade soils [16:53] underneath the uh gravel base to make sure those soils are stable and able to [17:00] support vehicular [17:05] traffic I always like to point out with Street reconstruction projects that there are uh features within the city [17:11] right away particularly those that are up adjacent to the curban gutter that are likely to be impacted with [17:19] construction those include uh Landscaping features as well as uh steps and private outw walks to homes along [17:26] with uh retaining walls irrigation systems and pet containment [17:32] fences as well as well as Property Owners Lawns we build will be restoring [17:38] Lawns with new top soil and sod our current practice is to replace [17:45] irrigation systems and containment fences that are impacted by construction [17:50] we're also going to be replacing impacted retaining walls as well as steps and outw [17:57] walks in particular particular we will be coordinating with uh property owners [18:02] that have impacted Landscaping so we can replace these Landscaping features after [18:08] the roadway work is complete one more unique thing I'd like [18:15] to point out before we go into the proposed roadway improvements uh generally these [18:20] neighborhoods may have one or two non-standard driveways uh presidents A and B has approximately 20 non-standard [18:28] driveways and what do I mean by that we've got uh a number of um [18:34] driveways that do not have garages today we've got some examples [18:40] of uh gravel driveways uh again with with [18:46] multiple uh concrete curb driveway openings another example we've got [18:52] concrete driveway aprons that are more narrow than the existing driveway we [18:57] also have other driveway aprons that are wider than the existing uh [19:03] driveway so we will be reaching out to Property Owners to if we're going to be [19:08] potentially refining some of these non-standard driveways during [19:16] construction okay proposed roadway improvements the street widths will vary throughout the project [19:22] area U most go back to that prior slide please and I think folks should be interested knowing what you're going to [19:28] be in contact with them but for what purpose what what what's your notion here on those non-standard driveways yep [19:35] we're likely going to be talking so for these we're not going to we're not going to remove people's driveways that don't [19:42] have garages we not proposing to do that uh this instance we'll be coordinating with property owners are likely going to [19:48] be widening this driveway apron here to match their driveway with there might be [19:54] other ones that we're going to shorten ones that are too wide uh some folks have I think this particular property [20:01] might have another driveway apron that goes to a a garage on uh bmore this [20:07] driveway pin may be removed during construction uh those are some of the examples of corresponds that we'll be [20:15] having with the property owners is that is a gravel uh driveway [20:21] on the left side of that photo is that actually a driveway or is that just a parking area does that continue onto the [20:27] back of the house no it stops it's generally a parking area I think this property does have another driveway [20:32] apron with a garage too on the this is a corner lot here okay so the notion there would be to eliminate the curb [20:39] cut most likely yes you'll talk to the homeowner about that correct [20:45] okay the homeowner may be here we don't know we'll find out yes thank [20:53] you okay uh Street widths are going to vary throughout the project area most will be 27 7 ft wide when you measure it [21:00] between the face of curb and the face of curb the majority are going to have no [21:06] changes to their current parking and there will be exceptions to this which we'll touch on in a few [21:15] slides let's start out with the local Street standard and again all the streets in this project area are local [21:23] streets the uh proposed Street width for local streets uh without multimodal [21:30] facilities is 27 feet wide again all the streets in the project area are 30 feet [21:35] wide today so we'll be reducing the street width by 3 feet generally in instances like this we [21:42] will try to narrow evenly on each side of the street as a starting point during our [21:48] design um that's not a a etched and stone rule we always look at things like [21:54] topography existing trees other infrastructure so that may not be the rule but we usually start with [22:01] that um parking on both sides is proposed to remain and again this is the local [22:08] Street standard for sidewalk or streets without sidewalk or shared use path improvements so all but four of the [22:16] streets will have this typical section and we'll get in those four streets beginning with third [22:22] street again Third Street is the uh North Boundary of the project area the [22:28] this street is shared with udina on the south side and City of Hopkins on the North [22:34] side uh this street has a shared use path on the North side 10 ft wide right on the back of [22:42] curb we are proposing to narrow the street width from 30 ft wide to 24 ft [22:50] wide which is the standard for streets with a sidewalker shared use path on [22:56] it this is a reduction the street width of 6 ft we are proposing that that narrowing [23:04] occur completely on the south side of the street the reason is to protect the [23:10] existing curban Gutter and shared use path on the North side that shared use path was constructed in [23:16] 2013 By the city Hopkins who also maintains that shared use [23:23] path and parking we're proposing to change the from parking on both sides to [23:30] parking on only one side there's no homes on the North side today so we're proposing parking on the [23:38] South side at this time I'm going to turn it back over to Andrew skion Transportation [23:44] planner he's going to talk about the other three streets that have sidewalk and shared use paths associated with [23:50] them he'll talk a little bit more about the pen and bike master plan and the changes to it for this particular [23:57] Neighborhood Mr D council member U has a question for you thank you um so when [24:04] we're doing this work um will that 8 and 1/2t drive lane on the North side be a [24:11] buding the shared used path or is there any like Boulevard or or grass in [24:17] between the two good question member U uh there will [24:22] not be any Boulevard there's no Boulevard there today it's directly on the uh back curb there today there is a [24:30] buffer with the parking Lane there on the North side uh but to answer your question there'd be no additional buffer [24:37] there the I would point out theed juice path is 10 ft wide so generous amount of [24:42] space to um you know stay away from vehicular traffic in that part of the [24:48] lane and so you're saying you're not going to even be touching the curb on that side that's correct okay and then [24:54] if we could go back one slide um help me understand the implications or [25:02] intent in moving from 30 feet to 27 feet what's the benefit by reducing the [25:08] width well again this is our local Street standard for the living streets [25:15] plan uh benefits include uh less costs again these projects are assessed so [25:21] less cost the residents less cost for maintenance of the pavement of the street there's also um generally [25:30] narrowing the street um Narrows things up with parking so generally Vehicles [25:37] travel slower typically so it provides a traffic calming uh as well another big [25:43] aspect to it is it um reduces the impacts of things like trees which is an [25:49] important aspect as well and then the general just um less more of the uh [25:56] storm water rainfall just um uh go into the grass and infiltrate [26:01] into the grass thank you and then residents pick up another foot and a [26:07] half on each side of the street for a front yard correct all right and would [26:13] you go back to the next slide again before Mr sepion talks what why did you decide to [26:19] put the parking recommend the parking be on the south side of Third Street as opposed to uh the parking Lane being [26:26] next to the shared use path it's good question to buffer to buffer those [26:31] people that are using the path yep and we very well could do that that's an [26:36] option to do we chose that simply there's no homes um on the North side [26:43] today the north side of this shared juice path here is the old U Super Value [26:50] or the UNFI um industrial kind of area there [26:55] the the only homes on this third are on the South Side so we put parking on the [27:01] South Side it could go on the North side that that's an option we could [27:08] consider May our thought was that the most likely users of that on street parking would be the Residential Properties on the South Side so rather [27:15] than require them to park on the North side and cross the street to get to their properties or thought was it it would be more convenient to park on [27:21] their side of the street and then they pick up on the [27:27] proposed 4ot Road width looks like they're picking up about six additional feet of sidey yard correct because we're [27:35] planning to hold that North curb line so the the reduction in the street would be seen on the South Side okay [27:44] thanks uh council member Jackson and council member rer yeah so just briefly [27:50] when we talk about traffic caling um can you tell us where the data and Analysis [27:57] comes from the narrowing the streets calms the traffic uh that's a good question [28:04] yeah um uh when we were developing our living streets plan in 2014 2015 um [28:11] there was a lot of kind of industrywide uh research that was done to come up with those Street widths for that [28:16] rationale since then as we've implemented living streets we've done post reconstruction uh traffic counts [28:23] and volume counts on these streets and we have seen you know anywhere from 1 to 2 m per hour to as much as a 5 m hour [28:30] reduction in uh speeds on these local streets so we do have the data to support that there is a traffic calming [28:37] benefit terrific thank youer [28:46] I um but one of my concerns is that [28:52] residents only get one option really uh and that is sad and I I know we did do [28:59] the street reconstruction in my neighborhood and I specifically requested a clover seed mix which was [29:04] great because I got it but I had to be proactive and as I go back and I look at [29:09] all of the material uh there is no information about something other than [29:17] sad and it is such a water intensive thing and you have to care for it and [29:23] our climate action plan specifically notes that we really need to reduce [29:31] dependence on Turf and grass and you know I think this is a wonderful [29:38] opportunity to try to give people some more options it may even save the city some money certainly it would save on [29:45] the amount of water that's being used so it would be great if that language could be put into information going out to [29:53] Residents and I know after the fact somebody said hey why does your yard look different than in mine oh my gosh I [29:59] would have done that if I had known so um just want to report back on [30:06] that Marissa thank you for the comments we can gener we can definitely reach out [30:11] we'll be doing a construction kickoff a notification we can put that in the notification that sad is the the [30:19] standard method but certainly other options can be considered if residents are interested question yeah Council uh [30:28] thanks Mr M so I think this is much further back in the deck so don't try to [30:34] find the slide um when um there's a slide that show the [30:40] average health of the the streets at I think 72 this neighborhood is 26 and so can [30:48] you give like kind of give us some sense of what that means because you know [30:54] often times we drive on our streets and we're like well this street seems fine to me um and so help us understand what [31:01] we might experience with a um street that has pavement condition at a [31:08] 26 sure M Pierce thank you for the question I guess just another reminder [31:13] to a pavement rating of a 100 would be a brand new Street and a pavement rating [31:18] of zero would be essentially be a gravel Street and this one being um so uh 80 uh [31:27] excuse me 78 78 was the Citywide average this one [31:32] being 26 um you're likely going to be experiencing things like uh not as good [31:40] of a ride maybe the some uneven pavement surfaces as well as a significant amount [31:46] of uh cracks um potential alligator cracking um as well as uh [31:54] potholes um you may have noticed things in other neighborhoods too there's uh utility [32:02] private utility repairs uh sewer and water repairs patches in the street [32:08] things like that um that would be a number of examples of things that you [32:13] may see that would reduce the rating to a [32:19] 26 thank you I'm just thinking about I don't know [32:26] if uh council member r was on the council at the time but we did a project over near Melody Lake and we used Hydro [32:33] Seating they didn't like that they didn't like the outcome of that so we went to sod and now we're using [32:39] sod and and and the reason is because we had such a bad experience with whoever [32:44] was doing the Landscaping over there as I recall so it wasn't just so member rer talks about well maybe we should use [32:50] hydro seeding instead of sod you know we've got we've got mixed opinions on that and not and I think that's not what [32:57] I'm talking about oh she wants natural Landscaping stuff we can do that and they have done it and it's a clover [33:03] grass seed mix it's not what you're talking about and I did make that request before the change happened and [33:11] conquered and you know hearing that residents will be told they don't have to just do sad but without [33:17] clear um language that notes there's another it could be a clover mix you [33:25] know giving them a clear option apart from sad which is often times [33:31] grown on fields that are fertilized with sludge so it is something that can move [33:36] posos around I really I think there needs to be more clarity and specificity [33:42] and a Clear Choice thank you yeah thanks for that clarification and we can do [33:48] that we'll give residents the opportunity we send out lots of communications yet before [33:55] construction go ahead Mr reion I think is up again thank you mayor members of council [34:03] uh in the neighborhood right now there's very few multi Moto facilities uh as Aon mentioned we have a shared use path on [34:09] Third Street and Second Street to the north um this path also extends uh to the east along the South property line [34:16] of the Blake school all the way out to Blake Road there's a shared use path in Alden Park that provides access to um [34:23] soccer fields uh and a playground and then there's a sidewalk on the north side of of Maloney uh which is on the [34:29] south end of this project Andrew before you go go back one I just want to make it clear to the council the Hopkins [34:35] Idina border is right down the center of the street so that's another reason we're trying to protect that trail on [34:41] the North protect the curb over there because that's in Hopkins and they don't have funding they don't have any of [34:46] their CIP to participate in this project so just want to make that clear if it seems weird why we're trying to protect that north side that it's actually in [34:52] the City of Hopkins okay the one thing that I've been curious about is why you don't have Maloney included so and you [34:59] said it was a state aid street but corre I need more information than that [35:04] because it seems like that's the main thoroughfare through there I I can't remember what the condition of it was [35:11] having walked over there in that neighborhood maybe he visited with some of you at your homes uh during the reelection campaign [35:17] but um Maloney being the main thoroughfare through there I want to make sure that uh we're not shortsighted [35:24] here if we're if we're thinking about doing this and we decide to go forward with it of course thank you for the question [35:29] mayor so as director Miler mentioned Maloney is a state aid road which means that it gets funding from a different Source than our local streets U Maloney [35:36] was reconstructed in 2011 so it is a newer newer condition than these local streets okay thank you for that that's a [35:44] more thorough explanation and and understandable then why we wouldn't be doing Maloney again if it was done 13 [35:51] years ago of course all right um so as I mentioned before one of the main uh documents that we look to [35:57] when we're designing these projects is a pedestrian and bicycle master plan so within this neighborhood the pen and bike master plan recommends a sidewalk [36:04] on Monroe Avenue sidewalk and bike Lanes on Washington Avenue um which is we'll [36:10] explain a little bit more later but it's difficult to get both of those facilities in due to limited right of way on Washington um and the the plan [36:18] also provides no uh multimodal connection to alen Park which is right in the middle of this neighborhood um we [36:24] also consulted with the City of Hopkins they have a pedestrian bicycle master plan um within this area their plan uh [36:31] recommends a a bike Boulevard on Third Street and Second Street it's noted in the pink dotted line here um uh after [36:38] speaking to Hopkins staff they no longer support that type of facility um a bike Boulevard would mean cherls on the lane [36:45] on the pavement and signage uh but essentially it would be a shared Lane between bikes and motor vehicles um so [36:52] as Hopkins is no longer supportive of these kind of facilities and because there already exists and off Street [36:58] facility for bicyclists that shared use path uh we're not recommending to add the bike Boulevard as part of this [37:05] project so what we are proposing is to uh seek kind of a balance between our [37:11] strategic goals input that we've heard from residents from the commission and uh construction impacts so we are [37:17] proposing that sidewalk on Monroe on the east side that is recommended by the pen and bike master plan we're also [37:23] recommending a shared use path on the east side of Washington um this is based on the p and bike master plan [37:29] recommendation in that it provides a facility for pedestrians and cyclists but it combines them into one facility [37:36] where the plan recommends a separate sidewalk and bike Lanes uh in addition we're proposing a shared use path on [37:43] Belmore Lane on the North side um between Washington and Dearborn Court um [37:48] this is not in the p and bike master plan but we feel that this provides a connection to the park and in doing so [37:54] uh fulfills a lot of the objectives in those guiding plans these facilities will connect to [38:00] existing facilities and proposed on second and third Street Monroe Maloney and Lincoln Drive outside the project [38:06] limits they also provide multimodal connections to Alden Park Harley Hopkins [38:11] Park and Van venberg Park to hop Harley Hopkins family center in the Blake school to downtown Hopkins as well as to [38:18] Metro Transit Route 612 and the metrotransit green line extension or Southwest [38:24] LRT could you tell us what they proposed width is for the shared use pathway on [38:30] Belmore it is 8 feet I'm about to get into those in those next slides very [38:35] good yes council member Jackson yes thank you so the outside the project borders where [38:44] are there existing sidewalks so there's looks like there's an existing sidewalk on Maloney is there an existing sidewalk [38:50] on Belmore to the east or not there is not there are no facilities on Belmore [38:55] outside the project limits um the sidewalk on Monro kind of cuts up here but this sidewalk extends to North all [39:00] the way to exceler Boulevard uh also on uh vanban uh Avenue on both sides of the [39:06] street that sidewalk extends all the way to excelsia Boulevard um there are no facilities on Lincoln Drive to the South [39:13] here right now but there's proposed a standard bike lane as well as a sidewalk [39:18] and then uh there's this shared use path here kind of on by Third Street goes underneath uh Highway 169 and connects [39:26] to other shared use P that eventually get you to excelsia Boulevard in downtown Hopkins okay so there are no existing [39:34] sort of endof thee line sidewalks that we're what we're adding is that's new is [39:41] new and I'm just trying to think because it seemed like at some point in time in that neighborhood there is some place [39:47] where the sidewalk just kind of stops but that's outside this area yeah they all they're all technically just outside [39:54] the project limit so for example Maloney Avenue to the east connects to Blake Road to the West it just dead ends at [40:00] Washington similarly the sidewalks that are in Hopkins on Monroe and vbin um [40:06] they end at that shared use path on second and third but there's nowhere to go south of there other than on the street okay good thank [40:14] you council member rer um this came up with the conquered Street and sidewalk [40:22] um creation who is going to be responsible for clearing the new new [40:27] shared use pathway on Belmore Lane for the snow and all of that sure I'd be [40:33] happy uh I have that answer in a couple slides uh so I'll start with um Monroe [40:39] Avenue so we are proposing to reduce the overall Street width by six feet um we would remove parking on the west side of [40:46] the street so parking would still be permitted on the east side uh and on that East Side we would have a 5 foot uh [40:52] Boulevard separated sidewalk um this sidewalk is proposed to be maintained by the adjacent Property [40:59] Owners on Belmore Lane again we're proposing to reduce Street width by 6 feet uh we will remove parking on the [41:05] south side and permit parking continue to permit parking on the North side we're proposing a new 8ft shared use [41:11] path on the North side uh from Washington to Dearborn um this shared use path will be maintained by the city [41:17] adjacent to the park but it will be maintained by private property owners [41:22] otherwise and then on Washington Avenue again a six foot reduction in the street width um the parking on the east side is [41:29] proposed to remain and then we're proposing an 8ft shared use path on the east side from Maloney to third in place [41:35] of that sidewalk in bike lane that the pen and bike plan recommends this path will also be maintained by adjacent [41:40] Property Owners the Transportation Commission had an opportunity to review this study at [41:47] their October regular meeting um at that meeting they supported our proposed facilities on Belmore and Monroe um they [41:54] recommended separated pedestrian and bicycle facil facilities on Washington so essentially consistent with what the [41:59] p and bike plan recommends um here these Graphics you can see the top one is what staff is proposing for Washington on the [42:06] south is or underneath that is a mockup of what the ETC is recommending so there you see the separated on street bike [42:12] lanes and then a a standard 5 foot sidewalk um this fa this uh section [42:18] would require us to completely remove the on street parking on Washington Avenue to make room um the commission [42:25] also asked us to consider putting in New Street trees as part of this project um that's currently not part of the [42:31] proposal uh primarily due to cost the ETC has also written an [42:37] advisory communication which is part of this report uh related to the multimodal facilities in this project uh and so [42:43] I'll turn it over to uh chair of the ETC Andy Lewis who will speak to this advisory [42:51] communication thank you Andrew thank you council members mayor commissioner welcome absolutely so you'll see that we [42:58] did include an advisory communication pertaining to this project specifically in your packet and it pertains [43:04] specifically to as Andrew described the the dedicated and separated bike and pet [43:10] infrastructure on Washington Avenue so if you go back to what we spoke about earlier in terms of the bike ped master [43:17] plan that plan does call for dedicated bike facilities dedicated pedestrian facilities and so when we think about [43:25] this is our chance to redevelop this road and the spirit of director Milner's presentation earlier hopefully not touch [43:30] it for quite some time afterward this is our chance to do what is in the city's bik and ped master plan so we felt [43:37] strongly that we should fulfill the plan that's in front of us until there is a different plan and so hence putting that [43:43] communication in place more broadly speaking you'll see here there's a couple of other comments about shared use paths in general and so to council [43:51] member risser's uh point we had a discussion about this in the conquered BNC um [43:57] neighborhood reconstruction as well and so we've been back and forth on shared use paths we've favored them uh because [44:05] they have not impeded with snow removal uh they've sort of been an average solution to give us some bike [44:11] infrastructure some pet infrastructure um but it hasn't been consistent we have sidewalks we have [44:16] some on street bike we have some shared use paths um not all of which is consistent with the bed and Pike master [44:21] plan so from our standpoint we are trying to follow the plans in front of us until or unless we have different [44:27] guidance from Council as to how to move forward so you'll see here as I mentioned in B conquered BNC we had [44:35] sought separate bike pad facilities down Wooddale those didn't work out we sought different bike and Pad facilities on [44:41] conquered that didn't work out as well uh so less specific to the president's reconstruction uh part of our request on [44:48] a longer term basis is Clarity from Council as it pertains to these projects around we have a bike ped master plan [44:54] we're trying our best to uphold it with our input from from the commission um but also trying to seek what is the [45:01] perspective of council perspective of our residents so you'll see here the The Advisory commission is specific to the [45:07] project um but these are just some of the questions that as we've discussed this looking back at last year's initiative and when we've looked at this [45:13] one some of the questions that have come up um separated bike Lanes mean different things to different people um [45:20] but there's the question would we protect them with ballards with concrete we haven't done that before we know snow [45:26] removal is really important in the city we see it in quality of life surveys we know that that's very very important to [45:31] Residents um but it does constrict us in our ability to uphold what's in the ped and bike master plan and related to this [45:38] particular initiative it is true what we've proposed as a commission does remove parking and we don't take that [45:43] lightly uh but similarly uh we can't fulfill some of the objectives that are [45:48] ahead of us if we don't make some of those trade-offs so put a bow on all of it um that was our recommendation that [45:55] we felt strongly we put in front of you for this particular project but it leaves us with probably some questions for future reconstruction as [46:02] well questions for the chair yes member rer as far as shared use goes my [46:10] understanding is an 8 foot wide path is as narrow as you go is that true I'll [46:15] defer to Andrew but I believe so yes the 8 foot wide is essentially the industry minimum width you see him [46:22] anywhere from 8 feet to 12 feet okay [46:28] yes member U thank you so if we could go back to the view of um [46:36] Washington um I don't know I don't remember if there was another view but if you could help me understand what's [46:42] directly to the north that this could potentially be connecting to and then what is to the South existing [46:51] today thank you for the question so uh to the north there's there's not really much um there's a an industrial property [46:59] um That Sidewalk kind of stubs up a little bit there you can see the Orange Line uh on the graphic here and then the [47:06] shared use path as I mentioned before extends underneath 169 continues to the West uh through a primarily industrial [47:13] area until it connects to downtown Hopkins and is there parking to the [47:18] north along that industrial site I don't believe so but I would I [47:24] would have to take a look at that I couldn't tell from the street view either so okay and then sorry I [47:29] interrupted but you're going to tell me to the South to the South there's no multimodal infrastructure right now um [47:34] but again as I mentioned before there's proposed to be a sidewalk in bike Lanes is there any tentative timing on what [47:41] those could look like of when that would be installed to the South it is not currently in our 5year Capital [47:46] Improvement plan and it's unlikely to be within the next 10 years okay thank [47:53] you other questions yes council member yes go ahead so chair Lewis um how does [48:01] what is the feeling your feeling and if you can speak for your committee or for commission um about the safety of on [48:09] Street bicycle riding obviously you're recommending it but it's unlikely that [48:14] we're going to get cement things and some even the delineators are not particularly safe if you put them on so [48:22] uh see is there a trade-off and safety from going from the shared youth to the [48:27] uh Street lanes for bicyclists there absolutely is yeah I mean I'll speak from lived experience um I've biked this [48:35] street and biked many of the streets in the city here and it does feel better to [48:40] be off the street but I think to some of the more macro questions here I think [48:45] we're sort of struggling with what we've experienced and what's possible meaning [48:51] we've proposed cheered use paths sometimes we've put them in place I think about 62nd Street for example we [48:56] have it 58th Street we don't we back to conquered we talked about that on [49:01] Wooddale we talked about it on conquered we ended up with a sidewalk and don't have any infastructure so um at the risk of maybe lowering our [49:08] expectations we feel like it is dedicated bike infrastructure um would [49:14] we prefer it to be more protected than on street of course um but I maybe [49:19] didn't mention earlier we've heard I I believe from Council but certainly from residents about safety concerns on shed [49:25] use paths right cyclists don't feel safe because there are folks walking folks walking don't [49:31] feel safe because they're cyclists and so we're at least at a minimum trying to create separation there um obviously [49:37] that comes at the expense of a biker then not being separated from traffic but to the point of trade-offs we're [49:43] trying to balance all of those things and get as much clarity as we can on maybe the direction that you'd like us to [49:49] take so the consideration of putting the bike Lanes on the street [49:56] even though there is some trade-off edges towards more safety for the bike riders am I hearing that correctly I [50:02] would say bike riders and pedestrians I think the concern about pedestrians and [50:07] having bikers sharing space with pedestrians on shared use paths is something that we have heard before in [50:13] multiple different iterations so we're trying to be respectful of that as well um and when you picture the photos that [50:19] we put in place uh parents walking with a stroller down that sidewalk isn't always compatible with somebody who's [50:25] using that uh for cycling okay terrific thank you so much council member Pierce [50:31] uh just to follow up on that um I often times I think what our plan is isn't [50:39] what we get in practice and so I wonder for cyclists um I I still believe if we have [50:48] shareed use path and whether we have a dedicated road path or not I still think there's [50:55] going to be a fair number of of cyclists that prefer to be in the road because they are Road cyclists and so I think I [51:04] think we would end up with um cyclist on both paths but the Shar use path um I [51:12] what I've seen there is more what I guess I'll call the amateur cyclist it's [51:18] you know kids adults more out for a Leisure uh bike ride but I think we're [51:25] going to always end up with both no matter which option we choose is is that [51:30] fair I think it is and in in our advisory communication and as you've seen on the screen here we supported [51:37] assured use path as a part of this project right so I should probably say that part out loud that this isn't an absolutist position I think our point of [51:43] view on Washington specifically was this is a case where specifically says in the [51:48] PED bike master plan separate facilities for each if not now then when um but [51:54] it's not realistic I think with the diversity of different streets and projects that we're doing to say that in [52:00] every case it must be or has to be I don't think that's realistic to be sure and then maybe just on as side U just [52:07] curious um on The commission's View once you start to take the context I set and [52:13] then you add ebikes to that uh from a safety perspective um how does the [52:19] commission view that I think we have a lot of work to do on that front I think we've talked about that in some of our [52:24] working sessions as well I think probably at a bare minimum that's a case where I would probably return back to [52:31] separation which is whether Road whether on street bike facilities at a bare [52:36] minimum cheros or um that type of infrastructure still better than being [52:42] in the same environment as pedestrians so okay we have more work to do there but I think at a bare minimum we want to [52:48] make sure that they're away from pedestrians thank you director Miller remind me what we [52:54] did over on on Blake Road was that we put in a shared use pathway over there we did both in most locations as we got [53:01] closer to Hopkins kind of had to shrink That Sidewalk to protect those older trees but we have on Street 5 foot bike [53:09] lanes and a sidewalk that gets wider as you get further away from those trees and as you get down to the roundabout [53:15] they're 10 or 12 feet wide with bike Lanes too so we had both and that's Municipal State a street in a little [53:21] different context than the local Street yeah I yeah local Street I mean I [53:27] when I've been over there uh in the neighborhood I don't view it's a it's a Charming neighborhood [53:33] but once you get over in Washington Avenue uh though there are people living there and and and and happy living there [53:41] it it feels like you've got the sound wall on one side on on the highway and then you've got uh the housing on the [53:48] other side and it it feels it feels faster over there you know and I don't [53:53] know what do we have any speed and volume data from Washington Avenue oh [53:58] that might be influential and talking about we did I I may should have mentioned that Andrew you may recall the [54:03] numbers but I think it was a pretty high ADT on Washington I don't recall the numbers [54:09] off hand they are in the report I believe director Milner is looking them up but I believe the ADT on Washington [54:14] was upward of 2,000 vehicles per day yeah okay and do we know what everything about average speed over [54:21] there I believe it is in the report um I just don't have those numbers in front of me it's uh yeah 380t and speeds almost 39 miles an [54:30] hour so it's way higher than 40 miles an hour and 3,000 Vehicles a day on Washington on Washington that's the [54:36] highest for both volume and speeds yep so was that a basis for you [54:41] recommending the shared Pathway to keep everybody a little bit safer not on the [54:46] street that was part of it uh it had more to do with the limited RightWay as you mentioned there's uh there's the [54:53] highway on on the west side and there's a a there's infrastructure related to the highway that's in between the sound [55:00] wall and that curb that we really can't impact so we're really uh we're really [55:05] limited to holding that Western curb line and making changes on the east side [55:10] of the street um so and again in order to um if we wanted to put in um a what [55:17] the plan recommends a bike lane or two bike lanes and a sidewalk we would have to remove that on street parking which [55:24] would make Washington the only Street in this neighborhood neighborhood that has no on street parking okay and do we know the extent [55:31] that on street parking occurs on Washington Avenue now we do not have an [55:36] exact number no it's something that we surveyed but we only received I think about 20% response back on that survey [55:43] all right well I'm sure some of the folks in the neighborhood can help on that remember EG did you have a a followup I do because I this visual [55:49] helped uh is it actually a 13 foot planting strip on the left side [55:56] approximately okay what is the need to maintain that [56:02] and take away from the residents because I I understand there aren't any residents on the west side correct [56:09] correct uh there's a number of infrastructure related to the highway that is in there most of it is Street [56:14] lighting but on the Northern side of the project area there are two large uh Transformers or electrical boxes that [56:20] just they cannot be relocated and there's a big overhead sign for 169 the base is in that 13 ft so almost half of [56:28] that is a big base for a sign that goes over Highway [56:33] 169 okay all right Ember rer um it looks [56:39] like the 9M Creek Trail would be close to Washington is that true so if [56:45] you um and I could be looking at this incorrectly but it's down at the next [56:54] exit to the South well it goes through Hopkins on 8th Street yes right yeah it [57:01] goes across uh it goes across um just north of londondary road to the West [57:06] continues through smatana and uh I can't remember the names of those other [57:12] streets um there is uh closer to this project area north of exceler is the Cedar Lake [57:19] Trail okay so the Cedar Lake Trail would be the closest but that it is pretty close though isn't it correct yep it's [57:25] just on the north side of exceler Boulevard I might I think you might be [57:32] thinking of both the 9M Creek Trail I do think if you were to continue South as you see it on the screen here um where [57:39] the red and blue lines are that would bring you close to Nile [57:45] Creek May wind around they twist around a little bit get yeah it's the next exit to the [57:53] South we can show you some graphics if you want that for next time North that would be very helpful for [57:59] next time to see how it ties into any bike trails that are existing is like a mile [58:09] of unless there's any other questions I'll turn it back over to assistant city engineer Aaron ditler U to talk about [58:16] project we answered member U's question adequately R did yeah I don't I don't [58:23] think to the point member Jackson making there's no a access to the 9M Creek Trail from this [58:29] neighborhood corly we'll bring a map next time just to zoom out because you can take Third Street and get there and [58:36] you can go south a little bit and Meander through Hopkins so there's they're not that far but you can't go [58:41] south on Washington and get to the EK you have to go into your neighborhood the Parkwood Nills neighborhood to get [58:47] through there to get all the way down to Brandon londonairy but there's some little options so we can show you a map [58:52] next time yeah I would like to see just broader connectivity that this could enable um with a zoomed out picture of [59:01] whether it's 9 Mile Creek or others that might be in the area please certainly [59:08] okay thank you all right thanks thanks chair with that I'll hand it back over [59:15] to Aon okay thank [59:20] you let's review the estimated project cost and funding sources the total project costs [59:27] $17.6 million that estimated cost includes uh engineering clerical and [59:34] finance related costs it also includes a construction [59:40] contingency 2.5 million of this estimate it will be funded by special assessments [59:47] for roadway improvements $1,700 be funded by special assessments [59:54] for the gravel alley between Washington and Adams Avenue uh property taxes uh we pay for a [1:00:03] portion of the roadway improvements um Hopkins and scheduled to [1:00:10] uh fund a small portion of Third Street and there City Limits City utility funds will cover the [1:00:18] improvements for sanary sewer water M storm sewer and sump [1:00:23] drain and the pedestrians cyclist safety or PX fund will cover sidewalk and [1:00:30] shared use path improvements special assessments are [1:00:37] proposed for the project area they are signed to benefiting properties of [1:00:43] public improvements as mayor huband mentioned uh previous assessment [1:00:50] policy uh the roadway local roadway costs were assessed 100% to the property owners [1:00:57] prior to 2021 in 2021 Council authorized an assessment [1:01:04] policy change that said that assessments would transition from 100% [1:01:11] local roadway cost assessed over two property taxes incrementally over 16 [1:01:19] years so the current assessment policy says that for the construction [1:01:24] year 2025 5 the local roadway costs should be assess 57. [1:01:36] 86% all right what are the assessment assal assessment costs include they include roadway improvements for roadway [1:01:42] and driveway removals the asphalt pavement surface as well as the gravel base [1:01:49] underneath restoration of the driveways as well as uh top soil and [1:01:56] sad or Clover uh as well as indirect costs engineering Finance so investigations [1:02:04] and mailings so again 57.86 of the roadway project costs are [1:02:10] proposed to be assessed to president andb neighborhood the remainder covered by property [1:02:16] taxes so just to make a just as a reminder the rest under the restoration [1:02:21] category it would include any pet containment systems or IR ation systems [1:02:26] that people have that are disrupted due to the construction that is correct mayam repair of those facilities that is [1:02:33] correct okay so uh one more time not included in [1:02:39] the assessments again are improvements related to sanitary sewer water M storm [1:02:45] sewer sump drain concrete carbon gutter sidewalk paths also not included in [1:02:54] special assessments of are um if the soils underneath the [1:03:00] roadway and gravel base are uh poor and unstable we're going to replace those [1:03:05] soils with more stable soils to better uh support the road and the vehicles [1:03:11] that go on it so in this particular neighborhood those costs are expected to be [1:03:20] significant special assessments are distributed based on residential equivalent units are [1:03:27] us the reu factor is used to compare different land use classes to a single [1:03:34] family residential property that Ru factor is is [1:03:40] one the single family uh reu [1:03:45] Factor the it's for lot sizes regardless of the lot area or the lot front [1:03:52] footage and the theory on that is what uh Corner properties of both side [1:03:59] streets in the project area are just the same as somebody mid block [1:04:05] um a one acre property would be the same as a different property size [1:04:13] generally but generally these maintenance groups or these project areas typically generally have the same [1:04:18] size lot areas and the uh aren't the trips a factor as well estimated trips [1:04:24] per household correct that was why do we use an reu yeah in the past the the um the [1:04:32] assessment policy was based on front footage of properties uh before my time but I think [1:04:39] the policy was changed because the the idea was that everyone's using the roads [1:04:45] regardless of their uh lot front [1:04:52] footage we have an additional land use class in this project area it's a [1:04:57] multifam Residential Properties these are assessed at 0.8 reu per living [1:05:07] unit okay estimated roadway assessments there are 31 properties in the project [1:05:14] area single family homes are assessed one Ru these are shown in [1:05:20] Blue uh Corner properties with one side street outside the project area are [1:05:27] assessed 0.5 Rus those are shown in [1:05:32] yellow uh we've got a handful of multi uh family Residential Properties along [1:05:38] Washington Avenue uh the orange properties are uh [1:05:44] two units on one property so 0.8 Ru times 2 units 1.6 for the orange [1:05:54] properties we've got an an additional multifam residential property along [1:06:00] Washington and Maloney Avenue with one side street outside the project area this green properties is proposed [1:06:07] to be assessed 0.4 reu and then we've got the uh purple lot [1:06:14] is the city owned Alden Park which is proposed at four [1:06:20] Rus so we summarize up all of the Rus in the project area we get want to explain [1:06:26] why we take a we look at a city park as being a potential contributor to the [1:06:32] project how we do that correct uh generally we we assign Rus based on if [1:06:38] the property is a developable lot so the theory is that we would consider how [1:06:44] many developable Lots there would be along Belmore Lane so we determine that [1:06:50] there' potentially be four lots to be developed on that portion of the park [1:06:57] there thank you okay determining the estimated [1:07:02] roadway assessments we take the roadway project cost we separate out the [1:07:08] portion that will be covered by property taxes we take the $2.5 million divided [1:07:14] by the total number of Reus we get an estimated roadway assessment of [1:07:21] $8,600 per Ru this amount is estimated it will not [1:07:27] be final until after construction is complete this estimated amount does [1:07:34] include construction contingency so we do hope this amount does go [1:07:40] down uh side note um if we were using the prior assessment policy if this [1:07:48] neighborhood were to have been assessed 100% for the local roadway improvements [1:07:55] as well as the replacement of poor soils underneath the asphalt pavement and [1:08:01] gravel base which is again expected to be significant the assessment amount would [1:08:06] be nearly $223,000 per Ru but thankfully we don't have that [1:08:14] assessment policy we have the revised one that uh those things are not included so again $8,600 per Ru [1:08:21] estimated roadway assessment alley assessments uh if we review the [1:08:29] gravel Alley between Washington and Adams Avenue uh there's nine properties as shown in blue here that are adjacent [1:08:36] to the gravel alley we take the gravel alley project cost separate out the [1:08:43] portion covered by property taxes divided by the total number of Reus we [1:08:48] get an estimated La assessment of $1,300 per reu this as well also includes [1:08:56] construction contingency we hope this amount goes down we are proposing to improve the [1:09:03] alley between Madison and Jefferson Avenue uh there were some previous alley [1:09:08] improvements there back in 2006 um these properties were assessed [1:09:15] in Orange back in 2007 therefore we proposing zero Reus for these portion [1:09:23] these properties shown in Orange [1:09:31] okay State Statute chapter 429 has a special benefit test it says that [1:09:37] special assessments are valid if the assessment does not exceed the special benefit as measured by the increase in [1:09:44] market value due to the Improvement therefore we hired a licensed and qualified appraisal firm [1:09:52] they did prepare a preliminary Market benefit [1:09:57] estimate that report said that properties could see an average price benefit of 9 to 122,000 per buildable [1:10:05] lot for the roadway and the alleys could see an average price benefit of3 to [1:10:13] $4,000 and again based on our previous two slides the roadway assessment [1:10:18] $8,600 is below the prelimary market benefit estimate [1:10:23] range as well as the the gravel alley is [1:10:30] too let's review the assessment payment options the final assessment amount will be mailed to Property Owners one year [1:10:37] after the project is complete so in September 20126 is that [1:10:44] mailing payment options include paying the entire assessment amount upon [1:10:49] receiving the bill within that first 30 days to avoid future interest charges [1:10:56] es the next option is pay a minimum 25% within that first 30 days interest [1:11:04] free and the assessment balance rolls over to property taxes spread out over [1:11:09] 15 years with interest the next option is roll over [1:11:15] the entire assessment amount over the property taxes spread out over 15 years [1:11:22] with interest the the interest rate will be determined in September [1:11:29] 2026 historically it's range anywhere from 2 to 6% at the assessment hearing 2024 the [1:11:37] assessment or excuse me the interest rate was 4.7% finally Property Owners can defer [1:11:46] the payment if 65 years of age or older and meet specific income [1:11:52] requirements Property Owners can reach out to the assessment Department to learn about those [1:12:00] requirements okay we're close to wrapping up uh project [1:12:05] schedule typically staff reaches out generally two to three years before [1:12:11] reconstruction begins staff prepared a video presentation and made that available on [1:12:17] the Better Together Edina project web page we sent postcards about that video [1:12:23] in September 2022 and October [1:12:29] 2023 uh City staff invited residents to an open house at the Public Works facility on September [1:12:37] 24th that open house was also recorded and that video was made available on the [1:12:42] Better Together Edina project web page we sent a postcard to all the property [1:12:48] owners again inviting those to watch the video if they couldn't attend the open house [1:12:56] staff presented the draft Etc or draft engineering study to the Transportation Commission at the meeting on October [1:13:05] 24th tonight is the public hearing where residents can provide testimony to staff [1:13:11] and city council they may continue to provide that testimony until noon December 11th [1:13:19] when the public hearing will close the decision on the public hearing [1:13:25] schedule for uh the council meeting on December 17th that's where Council will decide [1:13:31] whether or not to move forward with the design of the project and authorize the contractor bidding [1:13:38] phase that moves forward staff will Design the plans and prepare [1:13:45] specifications in December through February contractor bidding occur in [1:13:50] March and April 2025 uh we'll be back to council to [1:13:56] consider awarding a Construction contract in April 2025 and construction will be scheduled [1:14:03] to begin in April or May 2025 construction scheduled to conclude [1:14:09] likely in November 2025 and the assessment hearing will [1:14:15] occur one year after constructions complete in October [1:14:22] 2026 quick reminder and that making any decisions tonight but uh approving [1:14:28] pedestrian and bicycle improvements requires a minimum of three out of five Council votes in favor to [1:14:35] pass so in conclusion staff believes the project is feasible cost effective and [1:14:41] necessary to improve the public infrastructure so we make a we recommend [1:14:46] the council make a motion to close the public hearing on noon December 11th and [1:14:52] continue the action on the item to the December 17th council meeting for improvement number ba [1:14:59] 466 which are the roadway improvements and a293 which are the [1:15:06] alley improvements that will conclude the presentation thank you for your [1:15:12] patience and staff will stand for additional questions and comments from [1:15:17] mayor and members of the council thank you right thank you Mr ditler um I see director Milner director Milner is [1:15:24] heading somewhere with I'm heading somewhere with the uh Mr skioni was able to get some Regional maps of the bike [1:15:29] trails in the area so we don't have to bring that all right back so right here [1:15:34] is that corner of Third Street in Washington we were talking about with 169 so just a little North is the Cedar [1:15:40] Lake Regional Trail Minnesota River Bluffs heads out towards uh minaka area [1:15:46] and chasa area here's the Nall Creek where it comes up 8th Street or 11th Street so you [1:15:52] could kind of cut through the neighborhood here's a different view of the 9mile Creek Regional Trail and here's Maloney and Washington right [1:15:59] there so there is some streets here you can get over to the trail so you're very close just a few blocks um but not a [1:16:06] direct connection but you know any proposed facilities that we're doing connects here to third where there is a [1:16:12] sidewalk on that facility and you're almost connecting to those Regional Trails so and then we just wanted to [1:16:17] tweak that motion ask you to close the public hearing tonight but we'll keep public testimony open till Wednesday at [1:16:24] noon I think we have that claric close close the inperson public heing we'll continue to take feedback until [1:16:29] Wednesday so we can get that in the packet for you for next Tuesday so like Aon mentioned we'd be happy to stand for [1:16:35] any additional questions you might have before we start the public hearing all right let's see if any council members [1:16:40] have any supplemental questions for staff council member EGU I have just a [1:16:46] couple um so this is going way back to the beginning of the presentation [1:16:51] tonight why are we replacing every related to the water mean there is the [1:16:58] side of where all of everything walk me through the logic in that yep good [1:17:03] question Memu so uh last year or a couple years ago we hired a firm to do [1:17:10] um acoustical testing of the water to determine if there was any pipe pipe [1:17:17] thickness loss in the water M we also have a history of water M breaks that [1:17:24] we've been telling up over the years that we've had to repair So based on the combination of those two things uh we [1:17:31] saw that the water M was deteriorated significantly enough that we didn't [1:17:36] think you know we generally we try to make these streets last for generally 60 [1:17:42] years with good maintenance so we didn't want to leave these water mains in poor [1:17:48] condition while we put in a brand new street so we felt that the water M had deteriorated enough to replace all of [1:17:55] the water mate thank you and during the Reconstruction if they happened upon [1:18:01] something that actually turned out to be still in good condition is there opportunity to still Salvage it or walk [1:18:06] me through how kind of the acoustic test might be different than what we find to [1:18:13] be reality so good question m u i I would say that would be challenging to do we [1:18:20] we we likely when we're replacing things like hydrant we could we can look at the condition of the water main that we're [1:18:27] close to connecting to I I would also note that we've been doing the acoustical testing for uh at least 10 [1:18:36] years now so it's been really a good indicator of uh the condition of the [1:18:43] water M so I would be very surprised if we end up doing uh uh keeping some of [1:18:49] the water m in but that could be an opportunity as we're replacing things like the [1:18:55] hydrants uh in advance of the new water main that we could conceivably look at [1:19:00] potentially making some changes thank you are there any alleys that are not [1:19:07] being impacted that are within this area yes there's one additional alley uh [1:19:16] east of uh Harrison it's a very short alley that I believe it serves one home [1:19:24] it's adjacent to another home it just has one garage to it uh the pavement is [1:19:30] in uh in relatively good condition so we're not proposing [1:19:36] to uh complete that uh alley when I'll just add on to it it's I wouldn't even [1:19:42] claw it an alley because it's serving one property it's basically a long driveway it just happens to go behind a [1:19:47] different property get to the next one there's like there's like two or three of those that are driveways so we're [1:19:52] working with those Property Owners saying that's not a city facility you should be maintaining that yourself okay [1:19:59] and then the one um Alleyway uh that we're not going to be [1:20:05] doing the Rus for yep um As I understood that is we just redid it it's not as [1:20:13] cohesive maybe as a reconstruction effort and therefore we aren't going to be passing those charges along because [1:20:19] it was just touched in 2007 did I understand that correctly yeah previous assessment for the alley so that was [1:20:25] just due to the alley but we didn't feel it was reasonable to assess people again because we potentially didn't build it [1:20:30] the way we should have back then it should have lasted longer than didn't even last 20 years so why we reassess [1:20:37] them again on something that wasn't done up to standard in my opinion okay and my [1:20:42] last I think question um are there any things that are unique to our approach [1:20:47] within this area one thing that did stand out to me was you know that there's about 20 non-standard driveways [1:20:54] but are there any other things that are unique to this [1:21:01] project good question uh there's a neighborhood park in the project area [1:21:06] that's something unique so we coordinate with our parks department see if there's [1:21:11] uh anything any Improvement opportunity there I think another one is there's a [1:21:18] treatment plant on the North half of the park there adjacent to second Street [1:21:25] water treatment plant water treatment plant so we got to work with public works on how do we do the water main Replacements as part of this project and [1:21:32] keep that operating I'll just go to the borders Border City right being alongside a highway that's kind of [1:21:38] unique we don't have a lot of projects where we got half a street is Highway uh with a big retaining wall there along [1:21:43] 169 but also the border of Hopkins being in there that's kind of a Unique Piece I don't know if Andrew had something else [1:21:48] I was also going to say being so close to those Regional Trails as we showed is unique to this project area as well as [1:21:54] uh how close this project area is to Southwest LRT um there are two stations Blake Road and downtown Hopkins that are [1:22:01] less than a mile away thank you those are the only [1:22:08] questions I have other council members all right well we're on that topic of of [1:22:13] uh replacing water mains folks might be interested knowing that they're in the audience uh how you supply water to [1:22:19] their homes During the period of time um we're redoing water mains [1:22:25] yep good question mayor so uh when we're replacing water M and we're going to be replacing the water services generally [1:22:32] from the water M to approximately the property line so they will be laying a [1:22:39] temporary water M that will be above ground it'll be roughly 3 to four inches [1:22:44] in size and then there'll be a a water service connection above ground that'll [1:22:50] tie in generally to the spigot of the home and it'll be tying in into the the [1:22:55] plumbing inside the home to provide temporary water while we are replacing the water mains and water services so [1:23:03] generally it may be three weeks or so while Property Owners will be on that [1:23:08] temporary water M till the new one can be uh implemented but no one denied [1:23:14] water main service during any period of time during the construction just a little bit why we make those connections [1:23:20] and do the new plumbing and work with them to make sure all the valves are turned appropriately inside the home but they're going to have the same water [1:23:26] that they get today it's just above ground pipes and the same service and then when it's when all the what new [1:23:31] water has been tested and can be put online then we'll switch it back over for them a lot of work with the contractor and working with each [1:23:37] individual resident and property owner on that work okay and this might be a good time to jump in and say um [1:23:43] presuming this project moves forward we get good bids and we move to construction we will be holding a [1:23:49] construction kickoff meeting uh prior to construction we'll invite the whole neighborhood and we'll have we'll be [1:23:55] talking about all sorts of things that impact in including water shut offs as [1:24:02] Chad mentioned there'll be a period of you know four to six hours while we're replacing hydrants and Val so there' [1:24:09] probably be three to four water shutdowns that'll be less than a day and [1:24:14] we'll be coordinating those with door hangers make sure everybody is aware of when those occur in advance of that [1:24:22] happening one thing you touch on Mr ditler I thought it would be important to talk about a little bit in a little [1:24:28] bit greater detail and it's something that came up during the time when we were talking about we had a task force [1:24:34] of residents people from your staff and outside Consultants working on [1:24:39] modification of our street uh assessment policy back in 2020 adopted I think you [1:24:45] said in 2021 but those soil conditions under the street that have so much variability [1:24:52] from one neighborhood to the other and you talked about that substrate I think is what we called it and in some parts [1:24:58] of town it may require a lot of clay or other kind of substandard soil removal [1:25:04] uh to be able to get the kind of Base in there that we want to be able to make sure that the roadways have the kind of [1:25:10] longevity that we want them to have based on the cost you might want to touch briefly on that and and that's [1:25:16] something that's just included in something everyone's paying for uh from the city just like we do with everything [1:25:21] under the everything else under the street yes good point mayor and prior to the [1:25:28] 2021 assessment policy change um replacement of poor soils with more [1:25:33] stable soils that could be millions of dollars on this project uh those were assessed to [1:25:39] Property Owners of that neighborhood and the task force determined that well how fair is that that they're paying you [1:25:46] know a few extra thousand dollars of assessment just because their neighborhood is in a an area with poor [1:25:52] soils so some neighborhoods have uh Sandy soils underneath the roadway very [1:25:59] little additional work is needed when you have Sandy soils underneath the [1:26:05] asphalt Pavement in the gravel base so you can pretty much put the gravel right on top of the sand and pave it and [1:26:10] you're you know little impact financially there's other neighborhoods [1:26:16] uh up in morning side we had Pete soil we needed multiple feet uh you know 3 [1:26:22] feet of soils needed to be removed D and more stable soils brought back [1:26:28] in uh you know really soft clay soils that could be 2 feet of material that [1:26:34] needs to be uh trucked off and uh you know uh larger rock material brought in [1:26:41] to make more stable soil so and uh those costs can be significant on these [1:26:48] projects and that's a cost we determined that we would not specially assess that's correct that would be cover [1:26:54] covered by the property tax yeah you can see that big jump in the first year we can't see the table but it was a 20% [1:27:00] reduction that first year in the policy because we wanted to get rid of retaining walls and sub Cuts that's what the task force felt was just not fair to [1:27:07] be assessing those of people because it was so variable by neighborhood good thanks for that update [1:27:13] all right any other that prompt any other questions from Council Members otherwise this is a public hearing matter I'm going to we've got uh some of [1:27:20] our fellow residents here and um you're welcome to uh address [1:27:26] the Council on any matters of concern that you have with regard to this potential project and when you come up [1:27:31] to the podium if you happen to have an overhead uh projection that you want to employ [1:27:38] we'll put you on the center Podium otherwise use the side ones and you'll have three minutes uh to make your [1:27:44] presentation you'll get a yellow little warning light when you got 30 seconds left and then to treat everybody the [1:27:50] same way when the red light comes on try to think about wrapping up your REM marks and then we've treated everybody [1:27:56] uh equally on the on their on their presentation so feel free to come forward and and tell us anything that [1:28:02] you want us to know from an informational standpoint so when we get to the 17th we've got as much [1:28:07] information as possible to make a good decision so please please feel free to [1:28:12] come up good evening good evening name is Aaron Hill [1:28:20] I'm a resident at 323 Monro Avenue South uh if you to look up at one of those maps you can see the intersection [1:28:26] between the red proposed sidewalk and the green shared use pathway that's my house so you can probably guess from [1:28:33] that introduction there that I'm a little concerned about the impact of the excess uh maintenance burden that these [1:28:39] improvements are going to put on uh homeowners especially very specific homeowners that are going to be impacted on this uh in in a way that is not uh [1:28:47] Equitable or not shared across the the entire uh Improvement plan I will say [1:28:53] that I do very strongly support and approve uh a roadway rebuilding [1:28:59] reconstruction uh re uh improving our Utility Services those are all wonderful [1:29:04] things I'm also very appreciative of efforts to help uh Washington Avenue and the traffic that that is going on there [1:29:10] and especially pedestrian and uh uh dog walker uh uh bicyclist uh safety there [1:29:16] that's a huge issue that said uh the significant changes to the street way [1:29:22] street ways uh are not something that are are have a ton of support in the neighborhood um I'm kind of disappointed [1:29:28] that we didn't talk very much here about the 82% of respondents who said they do not want the sidewalks uh in their [1:29:35] neighborhoods or in in front of their houses that's a pretty significant uh statement that we're hearing from uh our [1:29:42] neighbors uh and our constituents here that that are telling us what direction we should be pushing uh this kind of of [1:29:48] uh utility Improvement uh the last thing I want to mention very strongly is the Alden Park [1:29:55] uh Alden Park right now when it is used by for soccer baseball softball whatever [1:30:01] other uses are happen out there everybody drives in parks around it Parks up and down other streets we're [1:30:08] talking about removing virtually half literally half of the the parking that is currently used to support that we're [1:30:15] now going to have people parking several blocks away filling up the streets during those times in order to uh attend [1:30:22] their children's events I don't I think this is a wellth thought out process in terms of what that impact is going to be [1:30:28] uh the The Pedestrian safety that goes along with bringing all those kids uh across multiple streets that are parked [1:30:34] in tight uh so I uh would urge that we support some significant improvements in [1:30:42] uh the the construction of our roads let's [1:30:47] bring them back up to standard I I very much appreciate uh the work we're going on that and I think it's money well [1:30:52] spent that's said I don't think that we have uh not seen or heard a good case [1:30:58] for why we're going to change uh the look and feel of our neighborhood right and your your [1:31:04] thoughts on the alen park uh parking reduction and is that third yeah [1:31:10] third we Sorry Belmore Belmore on Belmore okay on Belmore and then of [1:31:16] course on on Monro as well we give Park people park around the corner in order to get over to the the park okay thanks [1:31:23] Mr h thank [1:31:35] you good evening hi my name is Nancy Hart and I own 323 Madison so I'm just a [1:31:42] block away from this neighbor um and I'd actually like some clarification on the [1:31:48] math on the redesign of bore [1:31:54] because I'm also on that corner um I was trying to add it up with the the [1:32:01] combination path and the remaining Street and I wasn't coming up with the existing 30 [1:32:09] ft yeah all right we'll have question yeah all right yeah thank you okay yeah [1:32:15] we'll deal with that [1:32:25] hi uh my name is Marissa esterly I live at 321 Washington uh my primary concern right [1:32:32] now is timing uh the proposed start time I believe would be in May and will take approximately 12 weeks to complete that [1:32:39] is my concern because uh I'm pregnant and due April 12th so that will basically cover my entire maternity [1:32:46] leave of dust noise I won't be able to go outside pretty much um which is a [1:32:53] bummer and summer uh as a soccer coach fre din soccer club I would concur with [1:32:59] what he said about Alden Park it's a highly parked area um and very busy [1:33:04] during the summer um I would also ask that parking is not taken away on Washington Avenue uh it is fairly highly [1:33:12] parked uh throughout the year and with part of my driveway being taken away [1:33:18] then there would be less parking in general in my driveway as well as on the street uh going [1:33:24] hand inand with that they mentioned that parking reduces speed uh with the proposed bike lane being added in there [1:33:31] as you heard 40 m hour average with the 25 mph speed limit that's kind of a [1:33:37] concern uh if the city could do anything about speed on that road that would be [1:33:43] great uh lastly we're right by UNFI on that street they have a lot of semi [1:33:50] trucks that constantly go down that road even though there's tiny sign asking them not to uh I'm assuming that that [1:33:57] leads to a lot of damage on the road over time I don't know if there's anything the city can do about that but [1:34:04] constantly there's semi- trucks going down that road thank you what were your thoughts on the shared [1:34:10] pathway um there's people walking there not much [1:34:16] because of the speed on the road uh whenever we walk on there we try to get [1:34:21] off of the street immediately um um the only part of that area that is highly [1:34:27] walked is trying to get to the dog park uh but they said that won't be addressed [1:34:33] for a long time so yeah thanks thanks for your [1:34:44] thoughts hi my name is Rhonda kolac I live at 404 Adams Avenue South and I'm [1:34:50] here to read a letter from my neighbor who couldn't make it tonight that's Mary Martinez who is at 406 Adams Avenue it [1:34:58] is my request that this letter be read into the council minutes it would seem that the city of Adina cannot leave well [1:35:05] enough alone West Minneapolis Heights is besieged periodically by real estate [1:35:10] salespeople who would like to displace this all so they can make money and now we are subject to Street Renewal and for [1:35:17] Adams Madison and Jefferson paved alleys I'm not familiar with the situation on [1:35:22] Madison or Jefferson but I'm reasonably sure that no one on Adams has requested that our alley be [1:35:28] paved by T minutus or otherwise I have lived in my property since June [1:35:34] 1972 and in all that time the clay alley has served its purpose with only an [1:35:39] occasional request for some small areas to be filled in if the goal is to be [1:35:45] environmentally friendly the clay surface is clearly a better option as water will and does seep down through [1:35:51] the clay and does not gender excess runoff a bituminous surface will create [1:35:58] a coal-based runoff and be much more slippery in the winter months it is my understanding that we are trying to use [1:36:05] fewer fossil-based products where possible I understand the need for [1:36:11] repaving the area streets but it would seem that the engineering staff has had dreams of Glory far beyond what is [1:36:17] necessary or reasonable therefore I object to Paving the alley between Washington and Adams and the unnecessary [1:36:24] widening of Belmore Washington and Monroe thank you m kak did you have [1:36:30] anything you wanted to add for yourself and we would take a copy of the letter if you will to yeah we can we can [1:36:37] take that letter and put it in the record too as pertains to your own property at [1:36:44] 404 items any anything you wanted to share with us no my Mo most main concern [1:36:49] has been about taxes okay thank you [1:36:59] anyone [1:37:07] else evening good evening uh I'm Joe esterly I live on 323 Adams Avenue uh right on [1:37:14] the corner of Adams and bour um so I I do share with my 323 neighbor here um I [1:37:22] fully support the up upgrade to the roads curb system sewage water lines those are all fantastic I know it's an [1:37:28] old neighborhood uh my children frequently play on both Adams and Belmore um my concerns lie in the [1:37:36] sidewalk project um one just in the lack of Statistics in terms of safety I don't [1:37:44] find a lot of comfort in it should slow down traffic as a good um response for [1:37:50] adding in a sidewalk or assessing 8T of my property as I'm familiar with paying [1:37:57] for that property I'm now being charged to have it taken away only to now add to my work in the winter time to shovel [1:38:04] that um part of the other concern and this was also brought up by both of my [1:38:10] children who are now six and nine is that they asked me will this sidewalk bring people closer to the house where [1:38:17] they play in the neighborhood uh and in my backyard my answer is yes I have no control over that right right now [1:38:23] there's a fair buffer between the street and my home and a lot of the Neighbors on Belmore on our side of the street [1:38:31] have homes that are closer to the road um so by adding in or removing parts of [1:38:37] our lot we now bring more foot traffic to the doors so um other concerns I have [1:38:45] not only for the safety of the kids and bringing traffic towards the houses but also my remaining tree that is on my [1:38:52] property on the corner is the only thing that provides shade in the summertime my energy bills will increase and I don't [1:38:59] think that that was factored in as a um as a position in terms of this upgrade um also the irrigation for the new sod [1:39:06] and the disruption that I now have to maintain in addition um to the energy bills is also something I have to pay [1:39:13] for as water is something that's assessed on on myself um let me see I [1:39:19] made some notes I'm it was my first meeting I thought it'd be more of a Q&A less of a say it and have you all look [1:39:26] at me so forgive me um let's see I wrote quickly I apologize [1:39:32] oh take your time Joe so what was it you were worried [1:39:37] about relative to the tree was it that you fear that it might be removed to [1:39:42] accommodate to sidewalk well I mean these unfortunately the pictures and the demonstrations were illustrations [1:39:48] forgive me um weren't very clear as to what exactly was going to happen with my property those questions still haven't [1:39:54] necessarily been answered um but my concern is I had several ash trees that [1:40:00] were covering our property which were fantastic and then they had emerald ash bore and we had to cut them down I have [1:40:06] one remaining tree that provides shade uh on the south side of my property which gets beaten with sun and that's [1:40:13] the one thing that helps reduce some of my energy costs um being in the HVAC [1:40:18] business I also assess energy cost and consumption uh as a profession and so I am uh acutely aware of what happens when [1:40:26] a house is beaten by Sun versus when it's shaded um that is an economic [1:40:31] impact that I'm going to have to now consider as a result of this um there [1:40:37] were comments made about increasing property values I don't know about [1:40:43] anybody here I can tell you I have never looked at a house based on its curb curb [1:40:48] appeal yes does the front door look nice is it painted well is it a new roof but [1:40:53] I have not looked at whether the literal curb or the sidewalk condition or the fact that it has one in determining [1:41:00] where I should or should not live um and I would be very curious as to what independent firm was used uh in terms of [1:41:08] assessing that and what went into that assessment to say that my property value will increase by between $9 or [1:41:14] 122,000 um did you have another part to that no I think I think I think it's time to [1:41:21] wrap up oh shoot I apolog ol forgive me anyways um in closing thank you for [1:41:27] letting us come here today I appreciate the questions asked by the both of you because it was very clarifying to me I [1:41:33] think uh in conclusion more data does need to be Pro uh provided to this [1:41:39] Council as well as our residents in order to have any kind of good feeling about this project moving forward uh in [1:41:45] terms of the sidewalk being proposed um I have not heard clear or concise um [1:41:51] information about what is it's for who it's for or why it's actually happening as most of those questions were answered [1:41:57] with I'm not quite sure we've heard different data thank you Joe thank you very [1:42:11] much other folks is a good chance for you I mean we're going to you know [1:42:17] you'll be able to submit written information uh to supplement any uh oral testimony or if you don't feel [1:42:23] comfortable getting up and speaking to the council about your concerns you'll have until noon on December 11th to [1:42:30] submit sending something and writing as well so keep that in mind too welcome hey thanks my name is John Nightingale I [1:42:36] live on 306 Monroe I just want to kind of echo uh a neighbor I wasn't aware of [1:42:42] that uh but the neighbors I have talked to uh on 306 Monroe are on Monroe um [1:42:48] just are not in favor of the mixed use bike path um to reduce are Street size [1:42:54] and uh I'm somewhat uh I I I work from home since Co so I'm kind of the nosy [1:43:01] neighbor I was looking out my window at my office seeing and bike traffic and walking traffic on Monroe is [1:43:09] negligible um it's going to and it's remember we have Winters here when there would be used even less so I would just [1:43:16] say that it's probably not a good uh use of funds I do know that I'm not sure [1:43:22] about the logic of narrowing the streets um just that there may be calming [1:43:29] traffic uh but you forget that now everyone gets everything delivered so now there's so many more delivery [1:43:35] vehicles on the roads I see every day Amazon and ups and that sort of thing but um yeah I just wanted to Echo that [1:43:42] uh the neighbors I hadn't talked to I had talked to that neighbor I don't know him but the ones I had to were just not [1:43:47] in favor of the bike path on Monroe thank you thank you Mr Nightingale [1:44:00] anyone [1:44:09] else good evening I'm uh Thomas wle over at 302 Monroe of South [1:44:16] um Thomas would you what street were you on uh 302 Monroe Monroe Avenue thank you [1:44:22] um probably just a broken record I like I like when I'm hearing about the Improvement of infrastructure in the [1:44:28] road that's all good and dandy um not not very thrilled about the [1:44:35] reduction width of the road and the reduction in parking as stated before at the local park when there's games and [1:44:41] stuff it is basically a one-way street because people Park on both sides it's [1:44:46] going to just get even more chaotic um not a big fan of the the widths of [1:44:52] the cars shown in the proposed images they most cars nowadays are [1:44:58] getting bigger and bigger and bigger they're going to take up more space roads are going to get more narrow it's going to be kind of a pain [1:45:05] I'm losing parking on my side of the street in front of my house so when my elderly parents visit especially in [1:45:11] Winter they're now going to have to cross an icy Street um my stepfather is disabled [1:45:18] can't get around very well so it's going to make it even more unsafe and difficult for him to to visit my house [1:45:27] um here and then I don't I don't know if you guys recall but when there was all [1:45:32] the construction for the light rail uh at 169 in Excel here the main detour was [1:45:37] Third Street and so by narrowing that road even more when a car parks on it two [1:45:44] cars are not going to really be able to get by each other on that road it's a main main connection and then it's still [1:45:51] unclear uh the proposers mentioned they would reach out to people with those unique uh driveways that are like an [1:45:59] alley but it's to one garage I have one of those and it's not paved it's [1:46:04] gravel so what I'm hearing is they're going to back fill with sad but I'd like to know what material options I'd have [1:46:10] to backfill my driveway that connects to Third Street when or if they extend it [1:46:16] by 6 fet um yeah yet again like uh like the the improvements [1:46:23] to the road improvements to infrastructure all for that but not a big fan of the the sidewalk on Monroe or [1:46:29] the reduction in roadwi thank you all right thank you [1:46:43] Thomas anyone else wish to speak to the council [1:46:53] okay do we have anybody online that wishes to speak to [1:46:59] us all right um director Milner is getting ready to [1:47:05] answer some of these questions I don't know if he wanted to have us close the public hearing for inperson [1:47:13] testimony then take questions which is our usual practice that is your usual practice there I think if you want do that so I think uh folks uh one last [1:47:21] chance anybody want to else want to testify [1:47:27] yeah yeah come on up you haven't been up before have you no come on [1:47:37] up Nick Wimer uh 415 van Beren is where I live so I'm yeah I'll not reiterate [1:47:44] what others have also said about um the uh you know love of the infrastructure and everything but I wanted to ask [1:47:50] specifically um on Van Bern they're not planning sidewalks so they're planning on narrowing the streets um and you know [1:47:58] I I'm an avid runner biker on on the streets and I've never had an issue with [1:48:04] the the traffic um whatsoever I um and I [1:48:09] want to ask specifically uh so the implications of the cost um if we were [1:48:15] to just repave the streets as is 30 feet wide which is what van be and others are [1:48:22] um um versus narrowing them to 27 and then restoring the RightWay what would [1:48:28] be the the change in cost there um to repay the streets as is rather than [1:48:34] doing the living living streets plan get your name to Y Nick [1:48:39] Wimer Nick Wimer yeah thanks Nick and your address on Van beon 415 [1:48:48] 415 okay thanks all right um anyone [1:48:56] else want to come forward all right staff's recommending that we uh close [1:49:02] the in-person public hearing this evening and keep the uh online public input open until noon on December 11th [1:49:09] and then continue the actioning item to the December 17 city council meeting is there a motion to that effect so moved [1:49:16] member EG moves second member Jackson seconds the motion as stated which would [1:49:21] be to close the iners some public hearing this evening and keep the online public input open until noon on December [1:49:28] 11th and continue the uh action on the item to the December 17th city council [1:49:34] meeting and discussion uh comment go ahead I'm just wondering if we can [1:49:39] extend the time period when people can write online I realize that we need to [1:49:44] get information in the packet but I also realize this gives people less than 48 hours to provide feedback and I'm [1:49:52] wondering if the packet you could capture the material that was turned in by noon on Wednesday but just put a note [1:49:59] saying that it will remain open and it will be on us to look it better together [1:50:04] and see if there are additional comments so it can at least get one day of the weekend available for people to comment [1:50:12] well I'll add one note the letter went out how long ago 10 days ago so people [1:50:18] already knew the website was open 10 days ago we've received a few comments on there we can collect feedback on [1:50:24] Wednesday afternoon and put it in the packet and then we could bring to the meeting I could just bring it here's [1:50:29] what we heard between Wednesday and the council meeting next Tuesday or you know [1:50:35] Tuesday am. I could pull that report so we can pull the weekend data it's it's not officially a public hearing at that [1:50:41] point because you're going to close it tonight so it's just more feedback and we could just bring those comments back [1:50:46] I would appreciate that we won't have them in the packet though so no one's going to be able to see those uh information between Wednesday [1:50:53] and the council meeting on Tuesday right but it it would give us more opportunity to get feedback from people and there [1:50:59] could be people watching or you know finding out about it and I mean it's only it's like 40 something hours [1:51:06] remaining from right now just won't have it in the packet which has been requested of council members to have [1:51:12] everything in the packet so um well I don't know how my colleagues feel um that's a it's a fair inquiry I [1:51:19] was wondering too about the short timeline here um but it seems to me that in the past [1:51:25] we've even had had it open until like Sunday noon we've always done Wednesday [1:51:31] two days later when since covid right this is our new so this is our third or [1:51:36] fourth year with Co and we've always done it two days later because we have the deadlines for the packet for the [1:51:42] next well even if we left it open until the 13th yep end of business on to our city [1:51:49] clerk she typically publishes the packet Friday so there's may be an opportunity to try [1:51:55] to get everything Thursday afternoon in there yes we could potentially make that work um publishing the packet is noon on [1:52:03] Friday the look at the [1:52:09] calendar the 13th y the 13th so we could pull everything Thursday afternoon that gives [1:52:15] another day if if we um if we went till noon on the 13th that would give people a couple extra days or a day and a half [1:52:21] on Thursday because it's got to be published by Friday at noon we got to get that information to sharing to get [1:52:27] it published and then we could still keep it open on the weekend and bring you the feedback and you guys can see [1:52:32] that stuff well if I can jump in as member Riser said the the the hearing comments are public for anybody to see [1:52:40] any one of uh members mayor mayor and members of the council could see them on Friday and Saturday and even Sunday as [1:52:48] well so we could share the link with where those public hearing comments are are if you want to see them as they come [1:52:54] in too yep I like that that's a brilliant idea [1:53:00] just include the link in the documentation that's perfect so what's [1:53:05] the notion leave the motion as it's stated and still let people submit close the inperson public hearing tonight yeah [1:53:12] and then public testimony will continue till the next council meeting and we'll pull up a report on Thursday afternoon [1:53:19] for the packet the maker and the second are comfortable with that yeah all right okay so we're [1:53:29] going to close the U in-person public hearing this evening keep the online public input open until um uh until the [1:53:37] council meeting on December 17th yep and you can watch those comments come in all right very good uh and you're [1:53:44] comfortable with that maker seconder okay consider that revised and um any [1:53:50] further discussion all those in favor of the motion of stated say I I I opposed [1:53:56] carried uh motion's approved and now let's go to uh questions and um director [1:54:01] Milner you are ready to go there I think yeah you want me to run through or do [1:54:08] you want to step through them mayor yeah I'm just going to start here at the beginning [1:54:15] um so uh Mr Hill uh who was at uh 323 mon R I think he's was at the corner mon [1:54:22] row and Belmore uh was concerned about uh parking on on Belmore if we limit it to [1:54:28] one side only reduce the street with that uh there's already kind there's already parking issues related to events [1:54:36] at the park and uh you know we'd be just compounding our problems if we allow [1:54:41] people to park on one side of the street what are your thoughts on that sure so looking at the map here's the property [1:54:48] so sidewalk on Monroe I think we want to clarify that there was some comments that that was a shared used path but [1:54:53] Monroe is a sidewalk and we'll show you that typical section the shared used path will be B bmore then we can show [1:54:59] you the typical section on Monroe is a 5 foot sidewalk with a Boulevard and one parking Lane so that is correct we would [1:55:06] reduce the parking and then on Belmore would be the shared Ed path with [1:55:12] one-sided parking so there would be a reduction in parking and people would have to walk further but now they have [1:55:17] sidewalks and a shared 's path to walk and not have to walk in the street in track traffic to get to the park if they [1:55:24] Park on Monroe or Belmore so there will be a reduction in [1:55:30] parking on those two [1:55:36] streets all right let us uh we'll we'll all ponder that [1:55:42] um and then Nancy Hart over in Madison had a she was requesting a clarification [1:55:47] on the uh on the math on the ru I think calculation yeah was the width numbers [1:55:53] right so on this graphic was from Curb to curb today is 30 ft and if we [1:56:00] continue with the shared use path proposal the street itself will be 24 and a three 0 to 3 foot grass [1:56:07] Boulevard so if we assume the widest 3 feet and then the aook trail that's 11 so it' be 35 ft total width from the [1:56:15] curb on the south to the edge of the trail on the North so it's actually 5T [1:56:22] wide than what's there today so yeah the math here is just curb [1:56:27] to curb but with the trail in there it's going to be wider public heing is closed I'm sorry [1:56:33] reduction in it might not have been her question [1:56:39] so okay that's a good question if we didn't we have 60 feet of right away we [1:56:45] would reach out to owners to see if they have built stuff in the right way or not and how can we accommodate maybe we go [1:56:50] down to a zero foot grass Boulevard and we can protect the fence or maybe we have to adjust the fence for the owner [1:56:57] so we would reach out when we get into design on trees fences landscaping retaining walls like we do with all of [1:57:03] our projects reach out to the owners and try to do a best fit uh for the [1:57:12] project um Marsha I think it was estling over at Washington Avenue I said the [1:57:19] timing wasn't so great for her because she's going to get she's pregnant and she's going to deliver and has a a [1:57:25] maternity leave period of time now I I don't think we've had people in a situation where they're housebound [1:57:31] before unless they want voluntarily want to be housebound would you want to comment on that you know she was worried [1:57:37] about she wouldn't be able to go outside it'll be Dusty dirty noisy we're not going to lie about that they'll have [1:57:43] access to the driveways every day except for a couple days when we pour concrete and if she needs vehicle access during [1:57:49] those days we can sometimes pour those aprons half at a time it's not a whole summer on a one street [1:57:55] it's typically 8 to 12 weeks per street so it's not going to be four months five months of construction right in front of [1:58:00] our house it's going to be the neighborhood is going to be phased uh in sections of the neighborhood we really [1:58:05] have to to make the water main work in the neighborhood so there's going to be issues there's going to be some of the [1:58:11] you know two to three months but not a full summer of five plus months in one area Okay and she will have [1:58:18] access Bru so my own experience maternity leave is sometimes 8ish to 12 [1:58:26] weeks um how much leway do we have in [1:58:32] the order of streets that we take this on within that neighborhood we really let the contractor decide for the most [1:58:39] part but this is a unique neighborhood in that we have the water treatment facility so there might be areas that we [1:58:45] have to do first or second so I think Aaron has spoke with public works on that if you got more [1:58:50] details uh yes if you're the first portion of the project will be to [1:58:56] replace the 12in water M that's on uh [1:59:01] bmore and Jackson as it goes south to um Maloney Avenue so I would [1:59:09] anticipate that being phase one but generally we don't tell the [1:59:16] contractor which streets to start on WE generally leave it up to them because there's a lot of efficiency in their [1:59:22] bidding and if we dictate start here or there and it might be more inefficient [1:59:27] from them and raise costs on the project potentially yeah I was just thinking [1:59:33] though because I I think she was specifically on Washington which is a edge street so if there is any flexibility maybe that could be a a [1:59:40] solution there to at least give her some advanced notice you know for sure we've worked with people that have medical [1:59:46] deliveries oxygen you know we work with with all of that she mentioned semi trcks we designed the road to handle the [1:59:52] trucks we know there's more trucks on Washington because of the indust even though they're not supposed to be there [1:59:57] we it's a public Street we cannot you have you can't tell them not to go there we there's suggestions but [2:00:04] they can use our streets um so we designed for those trucks and then there was comments about I don't see anybody [2:00:10] remember Jackson want to yes thank you so when we talked about specifically the [2:00:16] bike Lanes on Washington um with the semis aren't supposed to be [2:00:22] there but are there I to me having the what what is [2:00:28] your input on the safety then of of the bike lane on the street versus the shared use what's the bigger risk yeah [2:00:35] um you heard it from chair Lewis earlier and from Andrew right yeah in my opinion [2:00:42] the bikers that are on the street are the top 10 to 20% and they're going to ride in the street no matter what's [2:00:48] around you see them ripping around all over the place right we're trying to design facility for that other 60 to 80% [2:00:54] of people that are interested but too concerned to bike in the street that's why we want to create a wider facility [2:00:59] of a shared use so people mix in my re in my opinion the risk of hitting hit by [2:01:05] a car is way greater I mean it's not even my opinion that's the fact then if you're on a sidewalk where a bike and a [2:01:11] pedestrian would happen to interact the risk of a getting hit by cargo 30 plus [2:01:17] of death is a is a big number of the percentages so I would prefer to keep the interested and [2:01:22] families off the street and have a wider facility off the street which would allow parking on the street which would [2:01:28] also allow parking that's why we kind of came up with that Balan solution the three of us which differs from the ETC [2:01:34] but we felt it was important to hear from the commission this evening too well and I'm thinking too about even [2:01:40] greater risk with semis oh yeah yeah and that's so if with cars we've got the [2:01:47] analysis of safety but when you've got semis going at that can't stop as easily [2:01:53] as a car can um so Mr skion you look like you have an answer too no director [2:01:59] Milner I think hit the nail on the head um I would agree I mean from an equity standpoint again depending on what kind [2:02:04] of user we're trying to design for if we're trying to again focus on those most vulnerable Road users that off [2:02:11] Street shared use path is the most is the safest most comfortable facility um [2:02:16] there are still going to be users who bike in the street who choose to and are more comfortable there and that's just that's a risk that are willing to take [2:02:23] um yep and then she also had a comment about I don't see anybody walking today [2:02:29] because we designed sidewalks and Facilities like this for future users because it's not safe to walk in the facilities they don't feel comfortable [2:02:35] walking there today so we typically see the a major increase in the Walkers after you put in these off Street [2:02:41] sidewalks or shared use paths so here go ahead you had to follow up yeah follow up on Washington are the are the [2:02:47] driveways into the alleyway or onto the street or both there's some of both okay [2:02:53] believe on the southern end of the street generally the driveways are on Washington and then as you get to the North the driveways access to Alley [2:03:00] between Washington and Adams we can get you numbers of how many for next time yeah because if if we're looking at [2:03:06] deliveries you know and there's no parking I'm concerned about that so yep [2:03:12] we can get you the exact number driveways on the semi [2:03:19] isue if all we have is the bully p to use on that issue and I I get it [2:03:25] super values right over there uh but we had this problem on 70th Street with [2:03:30] respect to Super Target and we got a hold of Target and told them tell your [2:03:36] your transport people to stay off 70th Street go on the cross town uh down to [2:03:44] um down to Xerxes and then come in on Xerxes and then it changes into York [2:03:50] sure we don't see is on 70th very often somebody makes a mistake but it really [2:03:55] would be something that we should try to think about from a strategy standpoint even if it's a bully pulpit to try to [2:04:01] get Super Value to get their Transporters to change their habits [2:04:07] okay so all right [2:04:13] um uh Ronda kolac provided some information for us from her neighbor at [2:04:18] 406 Adams Avenue who said no one requested that the alley way be improved [2:04:25] um but the clay surface is still a better option so I don't know what if you want to provide us with your [2:04:30] thoughts on that from a staff standpoint yeah we disagree we've been trying to get rid of all the alley gravel alleys [2:04:36] in town because it has erosion that ends up in the storm sewer it's sediment in there that ends up in the creeks and it [2:04:42] silts up creeks and streams and ends up Downstream so um it's added maintenance [2:04:47] for our guys to continue to add gravel to those facilities we're pushing gravel in the yards and people got to clean it [2:04:53] up when our snow plows go through those alleys so we feel it's just Paving it is a better allaround facility from an [2:04:59] erosion and a maintenance standpoint just just to go back over to Washington for a moment on that shared [2:05:06] pathway shared use pathway um it was recommended then by staff that the [2:05:12] residents along Washington maintain that shared use pathway corre or are we going to maintain it no it would be resident [2:05:18] maintained for all these facilities within the neighborhood [2:05:24] um I thinkon wanted to add a little bit on the gravel alley I would just add to that uh Watershed districts and uh [2:05:33] Pollution Control agency who we we do our permitting from they consider gravel [2:05:39] alleys an impervious surface the same as asphalt now can some of it technically [2:05:47] uh infiltrate into the a uh gravel alley sure potentially but generally it's [2:05:54] considered an impervious surface member the um resident referred [2:06:01] to this driveway as a clay driveway what's the difference between clay and [2:06:07] gravel my good question Mary I I I would think it's a gravel alley I don't there [2:06:13] might be some clay underneath the the gravel base but generally it's a gravel [2:06:18] alley and can you confirm that it is City maintained yes even from a snow removal [2:06:26] perspective it is it's maintained uh so here's a picture oh if we can bring back [2:06:32] the screen here's a picture of that alley so it has a lightish color which people sometimes associate with Clay but [2:06:39] it's we've been putting reclaim and gravel on that facility and plowing it so and as Chad mentioned when some of [2:06:45] that gravel roads it may look like a clay alley but it's generally [2:06:52] supposed to be gravel alley yep so when we fill it in we fill it with gravel and not okay thank [2:07:02] you the um joing had some concerns that was I [2:07:09] think it was 323 Adams Wonder Adams and Belmore yep yeah [2:07:15] concerns he is concerned about the sidewalk uh he doesn't want to have to maintain the sidewalk traffic is closer [2:07:21] to of the house foot traffic um worried about the tree closer to [2:07:27] Belmore what'll happen to the property with the sidewalk relative to the sidewalk and the tree I think is kind of [2:07:33] the main thrust of his concerns yep I looked up his property there were four trees sounds like three are maybe gone [2:07:39] so we'd have to figure out which trees left uh if you know ash trees were taken out but people with this section on [2:07:45] thing will be closer to the house so that's for sure but now they'll be instead on the street on us shared use [2:07:52] path I think if I can jump in that was that probably an old uh Google Street View I think a couple of those trees [2:07:58] have already been removed yeah there's just one I think one a specifically at [2:08:04] the one tree that's left and just see how it fits within this if we can go down to a zero Boulevard and save the [2:08:10] tree we'll work with them on that I think [2:08:18] uh if we could get more clarification I'm looking at the municipal state aid [2:08:23] road map and I'm also seeing you know there's Blake Road there's interlock and [2:08:28] Maloney uh are these roads that already have sidewalks that the city is [2:08:35] maintaining and if so how much of a stressor would it be to have that [2:08:43] Washington Avenue two block area be added to the sidewalk clearing program [2:08:49] Yep this goes back to the previous discussion we had a recent work session we shared the practice of we maintain [2:08:55] state aid routes which on here is Maloney and Blake all the rest are local streets we don't maintain sidewalks on [2:09:00] local streets we do them adjacent to parks and we do them safe for else to schools um so in this neighborhood [2:09:06] nothing meets that criteria but Council as has happened a few times in the past just directed staff to to figure it out [2:09:13] and maintain it but if we keep doing that we're going to be short staffed short un equipment and eventually it's [2:09:18] going to lead to budget requests for more Staffing in and sidewalk machines are there any other um eight foot wide [2:09:26] sidewalks in EA that residents are responsible for clearing or is this [2:09:31] precedent setting look Andrew we can find that for you quickly [2:09:38] we can we don't expect 8 foot plow we expect 5 foot plow in the winter and that's the biggest thing to maintain it [2:09:43] like it is a 5 foot sidewalk because there's very few cyclists in the winter time on that facility so similar to when [2:09:50] we our are 5T so we go through we're only going to maintain 5T even if we do these are state aid so our expectation [2:09:56] is 5T in the winter time just like a 5ft sidewalk do we maintain uh from a city [2:10:02] standpoint anything over at the park we do we that what you see on the graphic we maintain through the park yep so [2:10:09] there is a park truck that goes through there maintains that trail uh to answer your question the [2:10:16] only shared use path we have right now that is privately maintained is a uh shared use path [2:10:21] adjacent to the Fred apartments that connects 77th Street to Fred Richards [2:10:27] Park yep just given the amount of traffic the use of the Road by semis and all of that [2:10:34] it seems like if there is a way that the city could maintain That Sidewalk it would be [2:10:41] in the best interests of um not just the residents who are there but for people [2:10:46] who are using that pathway and we could bring back more feedback at the next council meeting [2:10:52] talk to Public Works director I don't want to make that promise tonight if Council directs us to do it for sure but I'd like to talk to Brian Mr Olsson [2:10:59] first this is very reminiscent of the concrete conversation very similar so there's a few other questions [2:11:07] um remember Jackson has a question for you before you jump on question staying with uh Mr estling he also asked about [2:11:15] what's in the assessment and that it's my understanding that this is something that's been used the the way we do [2:11:21] assessment that adds value to the um property that's something that's been done for a long time and there's a lot [2:11:28] of data around that can you can you talk a little bit more in depth about that process yes we hire an appraiser that [2:11:35] does a market benefit review and the market says when streets are new curbs [2:11:41] and gutter are new that there's more of a market benefit that property values increase so this individual does metro [2:11:47] area assessments Statewide we helped us in court cases so he's a very repal appraiser and we gave you those rough [2:11:54] numbers that he put together for a potential benefit to these properties after the [2:11:59] project and Aaron has to follow up if I can jump in so that preliminary Market [2:12:05] benefit report is available on the president's A and B Better Together [2:12:10] website and I think the another question was who did it it was Mel appraisal [2:12:15] Incorporated so that's available for viewing and we heard our City Assessor [2:12:20] speak to budgets and things at the last council meeting so that's not an in instantaneous uh increase in property [2:12:26] values it's based on property sales within the areas that they do their appraisals on as a city too so it's it's [2:12:33] overtime okay thank you yeah if I may I also just wanted to add that the costs of the sidewalks and the shared use [2:12:39] paths are not in the assessment those are paid separately by The Pedestrian and cyclist safety fund but thank you [2:12:45] questions about that too yep [2:12:51] so back to member rer Point um tell us what we're maintaining in [2:12:56] that General neighborhood from a public standpoint for sidewalks we're doing [2:13:03] Maloney uh we're doing this little shared use or the sidewalk Trail through the park and we're doing Blake Road did [2:13:11] I miss anything Andrew uh nope okay that's helpful Hopkins is maintaining [2:13:17] the existing share juice path on Third Street and Second Street street so Hopkins has their own maintenance [2:13:23] operations on their side so the north side of Second Street Hopkins does and [2:13:28] the north side of Third Street Hopkins sounds like they maintain [2:13:33] those so they take care of that existing shared use pathway on the north side of third correct [2:13:43] okay so we're um you know what the strategy is now in terms of the just [2:13:48] sort of the operational aspect of it somebody goes over there with a piece of equipment they do Blake Road they do [2:13:56] Maloney and now they're it's possible they could just go [2:14:01] up Washington and uh come back across on Belmore because they got to go to the [2:14:08] park anyway I mean just I'll speak to miss director Olen every block we add [2:14:13] adds time and over time we're going to go down from two days of service to three days of service to four until we [2:14:21] more staff and machines so we can keep adding that it's just going to be a level of service is going to just decrease we've been adding sidewalks for [2:14:27] the last 10 years and added a one person I think in one piece of we understand [2:14:32] this well from the conversation on conquered but decided that we would have it publicly maintained so why don't you [2:14:38] talk to the public works director about what he sees in terms of incremental cost or incremental time okay uh [2:14:46] involved in uh just continuing that Loop yeah aon's got a follow up [2:14:51] yeah uh minor point but just semantics um Public Works uh maintains the [2:14:58] sidewalk on Maloney Avenue but actually the parks department would maintain the [2:15:03] snow in Alden Park so two different sets of Crews they're maintaining it's a good [2:15:11] point anything in the parks are parks guys take TR smaller Vehicles pickups and just understood do that where our [2:15:17] street guys do all the street stuff so it's that's good point yeah Fair Point U [2:15:23] couple of folks uh Mr Nightingale and uh Thomas Wendell were concerned about this [2:15:28] uh they didn't favor Street shrinkage and that's not the first time we've heard that I mean we've been if you go [2:15:35] over in Wooddale people are parking on one side and and there if there's cars that are trying to get back past each [2:15:40] other somebody has to wait a little bit we just had this same conversation down on Concord where we went to a 27 foot [2:15:48] wide street from a 30 foot wide Street and why don't you walk through the reasons way you do that again we think [2:15:54] it's a great idea when people have to wait because the biggest request we get from a traffic safety standpoint is cars [2:15:59] are going too fast they're not slowing down so when there's cars parked on one side two cars are coming you do have to [2:16:05] wait delivery trucks have to wait garbage trucks and that's a good thing from a traffic safety a personal safety [2:16:10] standpoint so we think that's good reducing the the street width is less storm water we got to manage to meet the [2:16:16] Watershed permits that Aaron brought up uh it's a less cost to the residents somebody asked asked what those cost [2:16:21] implications are and I'll was see if Aaron has a rough percentage now or we got to bring that back later so there's [2:16:27] a cost of the current construction but then cost of Maintenance moving forward it's much more expensive to maintain a [2:16:32] street than it is Grass Boulevard areas Ember Pierce uh thanks Mr Mayor so [2:16:39] I definitely agree on those aspects the [2:16:45] I had like two notes that I thought were the high for me that were high priority [2:16:51] in that context I felt like it was um the um use of the park and where people [2:17:00] would be able to park in peak times and so you can't really that doesn't [2:17:06] necessarily stand out on this view but I think it would be uh prudent upon us to [2:17:14] really look at Peak parking where that's going to overflow into the rest of the [2:17:20] neighborhood um and honestly if we look at that and we think there's an issue from uh [2:17:26] whether it be safety or ease of use of the park I kind of think that would be a [2:17:32] a good reason to look at altering that our plan uh but we definitely need to [2:17:38] look at the the data uh from a peak perspective and then mayor you covered [2:17:44] my my other one um you're talking about Belmore do I'm talking about Belmore [2:17:49] yeah thank you for that uh um and then you covered my other one for the truck [2:17:55] traffic um I anytime that we can go advocate for our residents um especially [2:18:03] to a commercial establishment I just think it's smart to do that um [2:18:10] they're having them outline this is the truck path you should use um just having [2:18:17] those conversations to me is wise um although we have very little control [2:18:22] over that and um since I have the mic I'm going to hit my third one we talked [2:18:28] about um earlier um I think it was Marsha um I [2:18:35] had a request there I think often times uh we think about these projects and we [2:18:41] have a the timeline associated with it but I always feel like it's an [2:18:49] upheaval of the neighbor neighborhood for the duration of the project so I I still think about driving over the [2:18:55] conquer and there are a few weeks over there where you couldn't even drive down [2:19:00] because everything was ripped up and uh but that's not necessarily the case for [2:19:05] the duration of the project so I think it would be good if we could articulate [2:19:11] what an expectation could be uh week by week for the duration of the project to [2:19:19] allow people to at at least start to plan for things and I I know the timing [2:19:24] shifts as there are delays and things like that um but I think if we can do [2:19:30] that that will at least allow people time to think through and kind of plan as best as they [2:19:39] can that would you find that slide on on Monroe we had a few folks that were [2:19:44] concerned about the having a sidewalk on Monroe and um I think the inferential [2:19:52] point was that wait a minute you got a sidewalk on Mon roll from um I think it [2:19:57] was all the way from third down to um Maloney yeah yep and uh you know and [2:20:03] none of these other North South Streets have sidewalks why why why Monroe first [2:20:09] threshold question why Monroe thanks for the question mayor so Monroe is one of the few streets in this [2:20:14] neighborhood that extends all the way up to exceler Boulevard um the other ones in the neighborhood I believe are van [2:20:20] Beren in Harrison um Monroe in the case of this neighborhood it's right in the middle again it's adjacent to uh both [2:20:27] Alden Park and Harley Hopkins Park in uh St Louis Park it's adjacent to Harley Hopkins family center sorry in Hopkins [2:20:34] not St Louis Park um and it also provides a connection a direct connection to a Metro Transit stop at uh [2:20:41] it's technically between Monroe and Jackson uh on exceler Boulevard um but it's really the most direct path to that [2:20:49] to that Transit stop okay and then would you go back to that slide on Monro what what the configuration was recommended [2:20:55] to be because I think others were concerned about you know as you get Monro Belmore they were concerned about [2:21:02] uh you know parking on yep so we typically narrow one side versus both [2:21:07] sides like it is now yeah so we typically take a 30 foot Road and if we do a sidewalk with 24 plus 10 we're at [2:21:14] 34 so it's not a big change to what's out there today so we could build a 27t [2:21:19] street and have parking on both sides and still build a sidewalk we're just going to impact people's what they think [2:21:25] is the front yard but it's RightWay City RightWay we're going to impact that more so we typically try to try to fit it [2:21:30] down in the narrow footprint and we found that going down the one side of parking is not a problem on most streets [2:21:36] that's just not not needed in this case maybe there's a difference where we should do still do a 27 foot Street and [2:21:43] the sidewalk on this case to address the park parking so that's something staff could look at and bring back next week [2:21:50] yeah maybe should do that take a look at that the residents that are here could uh Pine on that too the potential [2:21:56] impacts we could take a quick review yeah if there was so what you're saying is you could go to 27 ft and and have a [2:22:04] sidewalk or have no sidewalk Well we'd still recommend a sidewalk yep now it's do we have room for a Boulevard we [2:22:10] really like a Boulevard but maybe if we're going to 27 to it's all trade-offs and balance if we think we need [2:22:16] two-sided parking then maybe we go to the six foot right on the back of the sure curve which so you eliminate that 5 [2:22:22] foot Boulevard and go to the back of the bulkhead like we've not NE not necessarily there might be space for it [2:22:29] so that's we got look at so some examples where we've done 28 foot streets with or 27 foot streets with a [2:22:35] sidewalk are in the Gulf Terrace neighborhood from 2016 I believe um West Woodland Road Tower Street 56 Street um [2:22:42] those are all constructed with two-sided parking and a sidewalk okay [2:22:51] any yes remember rer okay I just had a thought looking at Google Maps in the image of Washington Avenue and um it's [2:22:59] making me think about how if we put the sidewalk on the um okay now I have my [2:23:08] directions all messed up but okay thank you Carolyn it's this chemo fog that stays with me um on the [2:23:15] east side we're running the sidewalk over driveways and we have the you know [2:23:21] breaking that up and it is would it be safer to put it on the opposite side of [2:23:27] the street so you would have this unbroken path um next to the [2:23:33] fencing in in one way yes in the other way you're you're making all of those users now across Washington which we've [2:23:41] as we've said before has high TR high traffic volumes high speeds um so we feel it's safer to keep those users from [2:23:48] having to cross Washington and cross a dve driveway with very low numbers and very very slow speeds compared to 40 m [2:23:55] hour on Washington so there's trade-offs yeah but we've got a lot of sidewalk [2:24:01] systems in our neighborhoods that cross driveways correct most of [2:24:07] them Ragu thank you so we did and I see you just pulled up the survey results um [2:24:13] we had gotten the question about some of this but I think before we even get into this I want to understand I had read [2:24:19] there was a 15 % response rate is that typical do we usually see better [2:24:26] response and and how should I think about only 15% of the residents responding to the [2:24:31] survey good question meu uh in full disclosure we we had a a a questionnaire [2:24:38] that was out there the uh and we closed it and the original percentage was [2:24:46] 15% we did open that questionnaire back up and we did get some additional [2:24:52] feedback um what you see on the screen there is the additional feedback so I think the the when we factored in the [2:25:00] second version I think it was 23% responded it's still a little bit [2:25:05] lower than we typically get we typically get somewhere around 40 [2:25:13] 40% um so it's it's still lower than we we'd like to [2:25:18] receive which if I could segue in I mean a big part of doing these questionnaires [2:25:25] it it gets us a feeling of what's happening in the neighborhood I think one of the questions was about parking [2:25:32] on the street I can read it from here I think uh 74% reported parking less than once [2:25:41] per month that doesn't account for for uh visitors parking of course and that's [2:25:49] that's the whole Pro that's the percentage that submitted the survey it's not done on a street by Street [2:25:55] basis so Monroe could be different than van beeren Etc but but this is the data [2:26:01] we have when we're making some of these suggestions too so to us it doesn't seem like parking on the street is a a major [2:26:11] factor and all the results are in your packet all the survey results yeah so is this caused me to [2:26:18] hearken back to Mr Hills uh observation I think you said 82 82% of the neighbors didn't want sidewalks and and why we [2:26:25] think about having a sidewalk system in in our community which sometimes seems [2:26:31] like you're putting a sidewalk in an area where that doesn't connect anything yet but here we you got that clear on [2:26:37] Monroe that clear connection between third and and excelsure Boulevard and things Beyond and and [2:26:44] Mone uh what is the reason that we think we want to have this sidewalk system in our city sure thank you for the question [2:26:51] mayor so um hearkening back again to the pet and bike master plan and our comprehensive plan the city is really [2:26:58] strategically trying to encourage people to not use single occupancy vehicles to use other modes of transportation um [2:27:05] both to to get around and for recreation so the best way to do that is to provide the infrastructure where people feel [2:27:11] safe to walk to roll to bike to take transit um as you mentioned these [2:27:16] facilities connect to a number of other facilities in the area uh local amenities um Belmore is maybe the only [2:27:23] exception as it as it dead ends within the project limits but if it is approved we would consider extending it out to [2:27:29] Blake um so that it all in all forms a a continuous comprehensive [2:27:37] Network just thinking about days gone by where uh we seems like we have a lot of [2:27:43] people now that want the sidewalks there was a period of time when not many people wanted sidewalks and and um [2:27:49] they've come to rely on on the sidewalk Network especially younger families I was thinking of over on Maple Road next [2:27:55] to 50th in France years ago they didn't want sidewalks but the people that [2:28:00] didn't want sidewalks for people my age that were they were going some way for [2:28:05] somewhere for the winter didn't want to have to maintain it but since then you know it it just when you separate people [2:28:12] from traffic you're inherently keeping them safer and and people use it once it's built so when you do build it they [2:28:20] do come and they do use it and I think that's something to think about too apologies um as we as we mentioned about [2:28:26] bikers on on Washington you know there are going to be a percentage of riders whether you provide an off Street [2:28:31] facility or not that are continue to ride in the street because that's where they feel most comfortable the same [2:28:37] applies to pedestrians there're certainly going to be and we've seen it there's certainly pedestrians even when there's a sidewalk who choose to be on [2:28:44] the street just for their own personal preference but there are generally other users who are not comfortable walking in [2:28:51] the street and so providing that facility for them uh really improves the overall Equity of our transportation [2:28:57] system and we used to assess for sidewalks that was a big issue that residents were assessed for it this we [2:29:03] don't do that anymore this is paid out a separate fund I think that's a key thing I keep reminding people that you're not paying for the sidewalks for the shared [2:29:09] use paths in this project that caused you to have a [2:29:15] comment or a question remember Jackson well I just keep thinking about the cars on Belmore when there's a soccer game going going on um they're significant so [2:29:22] if when you come back if you could show where the parking facility at Alden Park is that would be helpful too um to just [2:29:28] get a sense of because I remember going over there and just not even be able to [2:29:34] move around there were so many cars and I think about the kids having to walk in the middle of the street to get to the [2:29:39] field um so but if you could let us know what the parking lot there is that'd be helpful we'll look at Monroe and [2:29:45] belmore's sections around the park yeah that'd be great thank you uh yeah to to be clear Alden Park doesn't have a [2:29:51] surface lot it relies strictly on on street [2:29:57] parking yeah didn't look like it did it um Park you miss har ncy Hart's [2:30:06] comment from the audience about her fence I mean this is something we didn't talk about but we these are things that [2:30:12] we encounter as we do these projects is that people have pet containment [2:30:17] situations or irrigation systems or Landscaping in the right away fencing in [2:30:22] the right away um those are issues that we help those folks deal with yes we [2:30:28] repair those systems and sometimes when they build fences way too close to the street and the RightWay that's not allowed by city code so then we work [2:30:34] with them on moving them back and trying to find that balance of where it should go with the project so we would work [2:30:40] with those individuals once we identify all those landscaping or fences or trees [2:30:46] but irrigation systems we for sure fix all those and pet con system those good fixed too okay yep thank you um member U [2:30:55] this I think it's the last one a lot of questions here that's good so humor me [2:31:00] on this if we were to in any of these situations remove the sidewalk or the [2:31:07] shared use path facility would that have any impact on the overall assessment to [2:31:16] Residents no not in my opinion if we kept well the street with if we got rid of the sidewalk on any Street that's 24 [2:31:23] ft wide we would make it 27 now cuz there's no purpose so now you have Park [2:31:28] so it would increase assessments okay the how much it's question right [2:31:34] compared to all the other streets those two that are highlighted does that change it or is that part of the what's in the contingency that Aaron had [2:31:40] mentioned earlier we'd have to see on that piece okay thank you [2:31:46] y okay you got a couple of things to think about between now and the next meeting yes get together back together [2:31:52] again on the 17th and folks if you want to submit anything you've now got until [2:31:59] right up to the 17th to go ahead and submit something in writing to us if you want to willine further on some of these [2:32:05] questions that have been raised uh further thoughts uh for us to consider as we uh contemplate this project so [2:32:12] thanks for being here this evening I really appreciate your participation thank you staff and um think there's any other [2:32:20] business we don't have a a manager any longer to make any potential comments and um Council comments mayor [2:32:29] comments anybody on Council anything you want to share yes I do one because it's about Street assessments um but you know [2:32:37] as we were talking through here there were a couple of times that was mentioned um mailings and door hangers [2:32:44] and and that's the way that we communicate with residents throughout the life of the project and I don't [2:32:49] think it's necessarily something we could do for this one but I would challenge staff to think about are there [2:32:56] other mechanisms text message communication or other things that residents could opt into especially when [2:33:03] we think about travel and all these other things that can still be potentially impactful people getting [2:33:09] those Communications and staying in the loop on on how things are going so right good we do do text during construction [2:33:15] people can sign up and get some feedback um love it thank you cuz really where day-to-day operations change and it's [2:33:23] based on availability and how busy our inspectors are but we try to use the text system and some of those more [2:33:31] often okay good thanks um is there a motion to adjourn so moved a second [2:33:37] Jackson moves M agu seconds the adjournment of the meeting of the city council this uh ninth day of December [2:33:44] 2024 at 7:34 p.m. any further discuss or 8:34 [2:33:50] p.m. excuse me um any other discussion all those in favor of adjournment say I [2:33:56] I I POS carried we stand journ [2:34:26] history of sidewalk