Agenda - Council Work Session - 03/19/2013

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Street standards There has been significant amounts of discussion revolving around the street standards. In 2009, we put together a project that met with our current Municipal State Aid (MSA) standard. This was a 9 ton design with curb and gutter on each side of the road without a sidewalk. Our local street standard is a 7 ton design and includes 4 inches of Class 5 and 3 1/2 inches of bituminous constructed to a width of 32 feet with parking allowed on both sides of the road, 28 feet with parking restricted to one side or 24 feet wide with no parking allowed on the street. Any new subdivision has to abide by these standards. As mentioned on January 24th work session, the removal of concrete curb and gutter from this street standard would decrease the price approximately 15% but would have a significant affect on how long the roadways last. The concrete curb and gutter holds the edge of the pavement and helps to facilitate better drainage. Poor drainage is one of the primary cause of accelerated roadway deterioration. Staff recommends that we stay with the 9 ton design (6 inches of Class 5 base, 4 inches of bituminous) at the street widths mentioned above and without a sidewalk. Obviously, this is a theoretical street section and will vary from street to street depending on the subgrade or the soil underneath this theoretical section. Charter amendment changes Another topic during the work session was the ability to counter petition road projects pursuant to the City Charter. It does create inefficiencies regarding the work that goes into a project but it preserves the property rights of the resident. Currently 35% of adjacent property owners can initiate a project by signing a petition for the creation of a feasibility study and then a project can be stopped if there is a petition that is signed by more than the amount originally signing for the feasibility or 50% whichever is greater. A suggestion was made to approach the Charter Commission to see if they are willing to require that at least 50% of the property owners sign a petition for initiating a project. Staff is recommending that the Charter Commission consider an action that would require at least 50% of the adjacent property owners to sign a petition for a feasibility study to be prepared but the leave the ability to counter petition percentage to remain the same. (Note: this change was approved by the Charter Commission and Council in the fall of 2012) Consideration and Schedule for franchise fee implementation Attached to the case is a schedule to implement the franchise fee for the long term road maintenance initiative. As you can see, it would take until July 2012 to start to receive funds for this program.This is an aggressive schedule and takes into account a small window of time for communication with the individual franchises (Centerpoint, Connexus and Anoka Electric, etc.)The timing of this decision is critical in terms of how it ties into the 2012 Street Maintenance project. A case will be presented at the February Public Works Committee as to what Staff is recommending but generally we feel that the 2012 Street Maintenance program should consist of sealcoating only. As you can imagine, if a resident is faced with an overlay assessment and knowledge that there is a plan to eliminate assessments in the coming years, there will likely be a counter petition. In closing, other cities are facing this very difficult decision. Please refer to the attached Star Tribune article that was written about the City of Edina. They have an assessment policy similar to our "do nothing" option which assesses 100% of the costs of their reconstruction projects. In their case it is even more critical since the City of Edina is almost entirely urban density which means the amount of roadway in front of each house is shorter than the mix of property densities within the City of Ramsey. Staff recommends moving forward with the initiation of the Long Term Road Maintenance initiative as recommended above.