Minutes - Public Works Committee - 02/17/2009

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City Engineer Jankowski stated that the staff recommendations are based somewhat on the fact that there won't be a consensus from the neighbors and go with the least impact items. He stated that their recommendation is prohibiting left turns for the peak hours and do a follow up on traffic counts and accident history and present that back to the Public Works Committee in October of2009. Chair Elvig stated that rerouting TH 47 to a different area has been a concept for years and that would take a majority of traffic off of there and it could be signalized. He stated that this would help several of the neighborhoods in the area. Public Works Director Olson stated that he thinks the permanent solution and the reason for most people cutting through is the congestion they are finding on 5, 116 and 47, so to get more capacity on 47 would alleviate the need to cut through. He stated that obviously that is the long-term plan to have TH 47 be upgraded and realigned. He noted that there was some support for a signal at the intersection, but the signal wouldn't do anything for cut through traffic. Chair Elvig stated that he would like to see if there is a straw poll or a vote that we could take to see what those present would like to see done after he opens it up for comments. Councilmember McGlone stated that he is in the construction and demolition business and is familiar with the neighborhoods and the issues with getting trucks in and out of there. He stated that when he started looking at traffic numbers, he thought about the fact that for everyone dumpster he put in the neighborhood, he took 4 trips through. He stated that he also thought about the hailstorm that happened and asked the City to print all the permits for roofing and siding that happened in the neighborhood, which he feels coincides with the traffic study information. He discovered that for every siding job in that time period, it generated 33,240 trips in and out of the neighborhood and the roofing generated 9,972 trips. He stated that if he added 100 more jobs, it would add 15,600 trips in and out of the neighborhood. He stated that there are many other issues related to this type of work such as mortgage inspections, insurance inspections, storm chasers; and gutter installers, for example. He stated that even though the numbers may seem shocking, there may be some good reasons why they happened. He stated that he has copies of this information available if any residents would like to see it. Public Works Director Olson stated that he reviewed the permits and there were 29 permits in the time frame that the traffic counts were taken. Councilmember McGlone stated that some of the letters included in the packet represent both sides of the fence. He stated that the belief was that there was connection to the hard channelization to the present day issues, so he took a two year look at the permit data for hail storms over that time period. He stated that he was looking at traffic, in general, not just the time period where the traffic study was completed. Chair Elvig stated that he spoke with a business owner about the closure and her response is that she cuts through the neighborhood too and noted that one of her friends does the same thing and actually hit a kid cutting through. She stated that this business owner didn't believe the traffic Public Works Committee / February 17, 2009 Page 3 of 19