Agenda - Council - 06/06/1990 - Special Joint with Airport Commission

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If, however, the City Council is indicating that they have no interest in simply preparing additional studies but are interested in proceeding with a project, that would be another matter entirely. "How long before siting of site P and will it be in the best interest of the City to retain airport in "as is" status, until this is done with no further studies or expense?" The site selection authority is now meeting and has scheduled meetings through November. Thus, a site should be selected by the end of the year if the County makes a selection. The County could elect not to choose a site and Metropolitan Council would then be responsible for site selection. This would be done the first quarter of 1991 under the current schedule. It would be better to take no action at the current time than to abandon the project if there is a possibility that it may yet go forward. If there is no possibility that the project would proceed, then the City should remove this concern from its argument against the candidate landfill site. Attached is the technical document from the landfill siting EIS which clearly indicates that the airport/landfill issue is significant. It is, in fact, one of the few issues that cannot be addressed through mitigation, engineered around, dismissed or ignored. The best interest of the City vis a vis airport/landfill issues would be to proceed with the airport project and have the State be a partner with a vested interest. Under an "as is" scenario, the age old argument that the airport may not continue to exist and therefore would not be a conflict is valid. "If the master plan has been approved, why is there a need for more study?" At our last two meetings with Mn/DOT, they expressed an interest in development of a crosswind runway if the Mississippi bridge crossing was being planned. During the Master Plan Study, this crossing was not contemplated and any crosswind would have required the closure of County 56. This idea was rejected since it is a major arterial. With a new crossing and associated roadway, the possibility does present itself that a portion of Co. 56 could be abandoned and allow for a crosswind to be developed. This is the concept which Mn/DOT asked the City to look at.