Minutes - Council Work Session - 12/11/2012

Home

Representative Abeler stated Highway 22 would be a State highway until north of St. Francis. He noted the County has more freedom with its roads. Councilmember Elvig stated a dozen years ago Ramsey went through the rebuild of Highway 47 to add lanes and hard channeling, which worked for a while. Since that time, Ramsey has doubled in size. Another improvement doubled the lanes over the rail track, added a bypass around the wrecking yard, and turn lane onto McKinley. Councilmember Elvig noted the City has been making improvements to Highway 47 in incremental bites and is now working on County Road 116 and Highway 47 to widen lanes but may need additional leverage to get that to happen. He pointed out that during evening and morning rush hours, all have to cross that intersection to cross the River and get to Anoka. That point of roadway is the problem. Representative Abeler explained that in terms of process, he has found State traffic engineers to be rigid. He reviewed roadway locations and configurations that he had worked on with State traffic engineers to improve the design, some of which required a year of effort. Representative Abeler stated if the City has a plan, he will help negotiate with Mn/DOT. Mayor Ramsey stated the City has already been told it cannot do what it wants with a study on Highway 47 and Bunker to open an access in a concrete median to gain access to SuperAmerica. This roadway was funded by the Thurston project and included federal money so Anoka County will not support that median change since it may impact its federal funding. Mayor Ramsey noted Ramsey has already been threatened that it may lose the turn/median cut at 142" at Highway 47 so he is concerned that by ordering the study, the State will decide to remove that access which will kill SuperAmerica and the strip mall businesses. Mayor Ramsey stated he spoke up about this concern at the Public Works Committee meeting. Interim Engineer Nelson agreed it is a concern and when dealing with Mn/DOT and Anoka County, both only see the engineering side and do not hear from the business owners and residents. He stated there was a Mn/DOT engineer who indicated he would support a left turn from Highway 47, going north, into the old Snyder's and that would help Anoka. Mayor Ramsey stated he did not want Ramsey to lose the median cut on 142 " Representative Abeler stated he thinks they would approve a turn off Bunker Lake Boulevard instead of 142 " Interim Engineer Nelson stated the Thurston project received safety money because it closed access points so it would be extremely challenging to get a new access point approved. Councilmember Elvig stated the idea of the study is to engineer around those problems and determine what is feasible, maybe running two lanes up to 142 " He stated he does not think the State would have the legs to shut off that intersection. In addition, the study would engineer the intersections and with two lanes, it could accommodate traffic stacking. Mayor Ramsey stated he does not support doing the study and will remove that item from tonight's Consent Agenda. He believed it would be prudent to wait and look into it more. City Council Work Session / December 11, 2012 Page 10 of 12