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The Victoria GAZETTE |
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City Scoop Continued |
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AUBURN NEIGHBORHOOD NEEDS STREETS AND SANITARY SEWER AND MUNICIPAL WATER Council voted 4-0 on January 25th (Councilmember Kim Roden absent) to authorize staff to accept the city engineer’s feasibility report and authorize a public hearing on street and utility improvements for the Auburn neighborhood located on the south/west side of Lake Auburn. The public hearing was scheduled for Monday, February 22nd, at the regularly scheduled city council meeting. “The existing road is gravel. There are steep grades and frequent washouts,” said City Engineer Cara Geheren. “There is not a well defined ditch system.” She recommended 24-foot wide streets, which means parking is allowed on one side of the street, concrete curb and gutter. She recommended stormsewer be included in the project and evaluating the extension of municipal water to the neighborhood, bringing stubs to the property line. “The most cost effective time to install watermain is now,” she added, when the streets are being improved for the long term. As for sanitary sewer, the engineer stated, “The existing system was built in the mid ‘80’s by Laketown Township. There is a septic system in each yard. They’re pumped regularly, and pumped to the lift station. The city is responsible for that. If we don’t recommend that now, we’d be committed to that system for the life of the road.” Total project cost, if all of the above improvements were done, was estimated at $1,253,228. Cara said the city’s share of that total is estimated to be $853,548 with the remainder ($399,680) being assessed to benefitting property owners. Unit assessments are estimated at $19,984. She added, “There is potential that cost would decrease.” In breaking that amount down, “The watermain extension is primarily paid by the residents through assessments,” she explained, “and is estimated about $7,000 per unit. The sanitary sewer cost ($537,630) is paid by the city.” Further breakdown, street reconstruction with stormsewer is estimated at $514,069. City share of that amount is $257,034 with benefitting properties picking up $12,852 per unit, which means most of the assessment cost is related to street work. Cara reported that she held a meeting with affected residents on January 7th and did the full 45-minute presentation. “In general discussion it was acknowledged by residents that the streets are in bad condition,” she said. “There was not strong opposition and not strong approval. Fire protection was on everyone’s mind because of the recent fire in that neighborhood.” If the public hearing is held on February 22nd, she said bids could be received on June 10th with a June to July construction start and completion in August to September. “There is not a large footprint,” she explained. Final assessment hearing would be October 20th with residents seeing their assessments payable in 2012. Stated Mayor Mary Thun, “I want to clarify that tonight we’re only authorizing the public hearing and accepting the report, not ordering the improvement.” The engineer pointed out that the project would include looking at the access road to the lift station, and checking for views of the Fire Department. “My guess is that generally they do not want it to go away. Also, access onto Highway 5 is extremely challenging because of the grades. Maybe one of their accesses to Hwy 5 would be eliminated.” She added, “We try to minimize at this time the amount of money we should expend.”
LOOKING AT COMPLETE STREETS POLICY HOW DOES VICTORIA PARTNER WITH MNDOT? Council tabled a resolution January 25th that would support a Statewide Complete Streets Policy. As staff summarized, “The Minnesota Department of Transportation is working to create a partnership of state agencies, local governments, and other stakeholders to develop and implement a MnDOT policy on Complete Streets.” The flexible policy includes safety and needs of all users in planning and design, topography, function, traffic speed, pedestrian and bicycle demand, local land use, and other factors for users regardless of age or ability. Regarding city support of the policy, Councilmember Tom O’Connor asked, “Do we know what that means? Sounds wonderful but what power will MnDOT have? I’m looking for some comfort. What is directing this policy will help us? What might work for the City of Minneapolis might not work for us. Are we going to have the flexibility in this process that we don’t get with larger organizations?” Replied City Engineer Cara Geheren, “Engineers have been actively working with MnDOT and I’m comfortable moving forward with this.”
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Sue’s Album A symphony of photos and fewer than a thousand words at www.VictoriaGazette.com |
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February 2010 |
