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by LEILANI FREEMAN

The Chisago City Council Jan. 28 workshop meeting to informally discuss development along Highway 8, Karmel Avenue and Liberty Lane drew an audience of nearly a dozen including residents of the area, commercial business owners and a property developer. Acting Mayor Craig Meyer presided in the absence of Mayor Jeremy Dresel.

The informal council discussion focused on traffic issues, street improvements and sidewalks, the planned bike trail, especially as it relates to extending city sewer west to Pioneer Road, and residential versus commercial land uses.
City Engineer Ryan Goodman began review of extending sewer force main west from the Karmel Avenue to the intersection of Pioneer Avenue and Highway 8. With the Highway 8 improvement project in motion, the city plans to incorporate its sewer extension into the highway re-construction project for efficiency, safety and cost savings.

“We hope to work with their project and have our projects implemented within their large bids,” explained Goodman. “That way we don’t have to worry about construction (of sewer) in the middle of a trunk highway, on our own.” The work will include construction of a lift station to bring sewage into the joint sewage treatment network.

Later in the meeting, it was pointed out that the proposed bike trail along Highway 8 plays a key role in the city’s sewer extension plans as it gives the city an open area to work on the sewer line (and to repair it in the future) without interrupting traffic on the highway.

Chisago City Administrator John Pechman invited questions and comments saying, “We know there is growth planned on Karmel and Liberty. It’s kind of a hot spot right now. It’s not too early to have these broad discussions, but it’s not too far away in terms of how we are going to use that road after the roundabout is put in on Highway 8.

Walking paths and bike lanes
Councilmember Marie Rivers said she likes the fact the plan includes a walking path. The council noted that careful planning is needed to ensure that the trail and path crossings are placed where people will use them.
Acting Mayor Meyer asked “Are we thinking of the walking path on the west side of Karmel?”

The council also noted standard width for bike trails is six feet but they had heard the new trail might be eight or 10 feet wide.

Pechman responded, “The Department of Natural Resources standard is 10 feet. We wouldn’t necessarily be required to do that, but if it was part of a state aid project they would have to use the state aid standard. Meyer said they would need to ask public works about the snow removal equipment handling that width.

Pechman mentioned that the city would like to develop a one-mile walking trail system around Martha Lake “much like what the Rotary is trying to do at School Lake,” Pechman displayed a photo showing Liberty Lane, a paved street where the city would like to create a “walkable lane;” however, the space available for a walking lane within the width of the existing road is limited. “It’s very expensive to rip out a paved street if it’s still in workable condition,” Pechman added.

Parking and traffic
Parking was discussed, including parking of large semis near the industrial park. A business owner told the council “We might get four or five trucks in a day and they line up down that road.

Acting Mayor Meyer asked, “Would it make sense to have the parking lane on the opposite side of the walking path?” Pechman said they will need to look at traffic flow.

When members of the audience asked if they could speak, the council welcomed them as part of the informal workshop discussion.

Randy Herreid, owner of Kendall Howard, a manufacturing facility in the industrial park, expressed concern about businesses access due to traffic back ups of vehicles waiting to get onto the highway.. He said trucks leaving their facility sometimes sit there for 10 minutes waiting to get on Highway 8. He said, “someone has put signs up saying, Please don’t block our access to the highway.

School buses coming and going from the nearby Chisago Lakes Lakeside Elementary School add to the traffic. He said they should work cooperatively with the school. The planned roundabout at the intersection of Karmel with Highway 8 is intended to relieve traffic problems. Administrator Pechman commented “The roundabout at Karmel is going to be interesting to see how it works out. Some roundabouts work well and some are kind of clunky,” Pechman stated.

Residential or commercial development?
Don Skelly of High Pointe Land Development asked council to clarify what High Pointe can do with the narrow strip of property they have been trying to develop on the west side of Karmel Avenue. The council initially approved Skelly’s proposed “Car Condo” project for the site, which was later dropped when it proved financially unfeasible. Skelly returned with plans for residential villas on the same site. That plan was unanimously denied by the planning commission and the council.

“This parcel is uniquely zoned as ‘Industrial/residential,’” said Skelly, adding, “Nobody knows what that means. We want to know what you want there because we have no idea., it’s very confusing for us. “We’re business people,” said Skelly. “We’re not emotional. We just want to know what you want.”
Council Member Marie Rivers responded, “We were thinking it should be more commercial.” She then said that perhaps the council should reconsider that decision given they are now expecting to develop a nearby industrial area of 56 acres.

“We would be happy to sell you that property for commercial (use),” Skelly told the council. “We want to do something with it and move it to commercial, or we need to develop it (for residential use)..”

“Now that we have a Plan B, maybe we should revisit it,” said Rivers. “It’s just one acre, and it actually feels like it wants to be residential. Maybe bring it back to the council,” she told Skelly.

Skelly explained High Pointe can not reapply for 12 months, which is in April or May.

On hearing the discussion regarding residential versus commercial development, Herreid told the council that Kendall Howard is “actively pursuing (purchase of) the 20 acres below us, possibly to develop a large campus there with five or six buildings and the possibility of 260 or more parking spots.”
He added, “It seems strange to have a lot of houses around what is going to be a very large industrial development. We’re having conversation with the architect right now. The modular buildings will be tied together. We’re not a very loud company, but we run 19 hours a day, soon to be 24 hours a day, with many cars and trucks coming and going,” said Herreid, expressing concern for nearby residences, and adding,”We don’t want to become a burden on the city either.”

Landowner suggestions
Jonathon Dodge, who lives nearby surrounded by school and light industrial property, spoke to the council. He described Kendall Howard as “a fantastic neighbor,” and endorsed the council’s plan to make the city more walkable. Dodge expressed concerns about the cost of streets, street lighting and other major improvements for the few residential properties located within the largely commercial area.

“This isn’t going to be like downtown; we don’t need (street) lighting,” Dodge said. He advocated for a stop sign or small roundabout at the intersection near the school and pointed out that when the fire siren sounds the area experiences a heavy influx of traffic with firefighters arriving and firetrucks, in the fire hall on Karmel, coming and going.

Acting Mayor Meyer said he has spoken to the fire chief about these issues.
Dodge also questioned the need for curb saying, “Other rural places have a three-foot shoulder and just asphalt.”

The city engineer said, “I would guess that Karmel will probably have curb,” but “beyond Liberty Lane it could be possible to go with no curb.”

As the meeting neared its close, an audience member asked if planners had given any thought to wrapping sewer all the way around Green Lake.
“We have studied that,” said Pechman, but planning hadn’t gotten that far because “the other thing we haven’t talked about yet is extending the municipal water system (to Pioneer Avenue).”

Pechman said that before extending city water to the west, the city will have to take a look at its water study and decide where to place a water treatment system in that area in the future.

“We could potentially put another water tower out there and then eventually connect the two water towers together,” suggested Acting Mayor Meyer as the meeting closed.

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