06-26-17-SWS - Laserfiche WebLink

Home Browse Search

_________________________________________________________________________________________ Page 10 of 26 HIGHER EDUCATION ZONING IN OTHER COMMUNITIES The cities included in this evaluation are as follows: • Minneapolis • St. Paul • Bloomington • Roseville • Shoreview • New Brighton • Mounds View • White Bear Lake • Brooklyn Park • Inver Grove Heights • Rosemount • Eden Prairie • Anoka • Coon Rapids • St. Cloud • Mankato • St. Peter • New Ulm • Northfield • Winona Within each City, each zoning district was reviewed to determine where higher education uses are a permitted or conditional use. From there, the specific districts were generalized (commercial, industrial, residential, etc.) to allow for comparison across cities. The spreadsheet of this comparison is provided in Appendix D. This evaluation revealed that there is no apparent pattern regarding how cities in Minnesota allow for higher education uses. However, several cities separate higher education uses out into two categories: college or university, campus; and college or university, office-based. This is beneficial to these cities because the intensity of use between these two categories can be vastly different. Colleges with campuses often include students living on campuses in residence halls, athletic facilities for sport, theatres for performing arts and cafeterias or other types of food service in addition to their classrooms, laboratories, libraries and other educational spaces. College campuses are often lively places 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. In comparison, traditional colleges are opening office-based colleges that have been dominated by the Globe or Rasmussen Business Colleges in the past. The University of St. Thomas campus in Downtown Minneapolis and the Hamline University facility in the West End of St. Louis Park are two examples of traditional colleges that have office-based campuses away from their main campuses. These office-based campuses are often occupied by graduate students or adults participating in continuing education courses and the activity at them is often limited to weeknights or Saturdays. In concerning this two-type higher education regulation, the office-based definition should include language that the office building be used, constructed and operated similar to other office buildings. This is meant to allow classrooms with lab courses such as biology or medical that may draw blood but which would not require special air handling HVAC equipment, the storage of large volumes of chemicals or generating hazardous wastes that can be common with hard science labs for chemistry or physics courses. The final step in evaluating higher education in other communities was to look at specific institutions of higher education and evaluate whether or not they are located in a district where higher education is a permitted or conditional use. The spreadsheet of this evaluation is provided in Appendix E. Of the 38 institutions evaluated, seven of them were located in a zoning district Dr a f t 06 \ 2 1 \ 2 0 1 7