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HomeMy WebLinkAbout07-28-14-WSAddress: Mayor: 1245 W Highway 96 David Grant Arden Hills MN 55112 Councilmembers: Phone: Brenda Holden 651-792-7800 Fran Holmes Special City Council Dave McClung : Website Work Session Agenda Ed Werner www.cityofardenhills.org July 28, 2014 5:30 p.m. City Hall City Vision Arden Hills is a strong community that values its unique environmental setting, strong residential neighborhoods, vital business community, well-maintained infrastructure, fiscal soundness, and our long-standing tradition as a desirable City in which to live, work, and play. CALL TO ORDER 1.AGENDA ITEMS 1.A.B2 District Improvements B2 District Improvements West County Road E Trail 1203 County Road E West Terry Maurer, Public Works Director Patrick Klaers, City Administrator Documents:MEMO.PDF,MEMO- 1A(A).PDF, ATTACHMENTS.PDF,MEMO- 1A(B).PDF,ATTACHMENT A.PDF 2.COUNCIL/STAFF COMMENTS ADJOURN AGENDA ITEM 1A MEMORANDUM DATE: July 28,2014 TO: Honorable Mayor and City Councilmembers Patrick Klaers, City Administrator FROM: Terry Maurer, Public Works Director SUBJECT: County Road E Improvement Update Background/Discussion On March 31, 2014, the Council adopted Resolution 2014-019 Receiving the Feasibility Report and Authorizing Preparation of Plans and Specifications. This action was taken by the Council after several meetings reviewing the draft feasibility and directing changes; most notable was reducing the street lighting cost to reflect Xcel Energy installed lighting. Bolton and Menk have been working on the plans and specifications since this action and are approximately 90% done with the plans. Just as a reminder the major components of the project are: County Road E will be milled and overlaid (this is a change as previously the County had planned to just sealcoat the road). All medians will be reconstructed. The restriped road will narrow the center left turn lane and provide more space (approximately 5 feet) near the curb for bicyclists. The intersection at Lexington Avenue will be expanded to provide dual left turn lanes from eastbound County Road E to northbound Lexington. The existing signal system at Pine Tree Drive will be modified to add new ADA pedestrian crossing facilities and repainted. The signal system at Connelly/TH 51 will be newly constructed by the MnDOT Bridge project. Deteriorated curb and gutter will be replaced (Ramsey County will help to identify these segments). Deteriorated driveway aprons will be repaired. Deteriorated sidewalk will be repaired. 13 Page of Where no sidewalk exists on County Road E new sidewalk will be constructed. In front of Staples the existing sidewalk will be lowered to meet ADA standards for crossing County Road E. A new sidewalk will be constructed on the west side of Pine Tree Drive from County Road E to approximately 900 feet south. Boulevard trees will be added to County Road E. The existing lighting system will be removed and replaced with an Xcel Energy lighting system (style of light poles and fixtures still to be determined). There are a few issues that the Council should be aware of and/or comment on before the plans are completed. These issues are as follows: The feasibility report included some work to define driveway access on Connelly Avenue -o-Gold. Mr. Flaherty has stated that only a striping of the curve is necessary and he did not feel the improvements discussed in the feasibility report should be constructed. That curve has now been striped and at this time we have told the engineers to not proceed with the design of the curb and gutter and driveway improvements. Discussion of the assessment method and amounts are detailed further in the City Furniture property, relative to the inability to continue the sidewalk across the front of the property due to lack of appropriate easements. We could pursue the necessary easements but because it would take away parking, which is very limited on the site, it would likely be viewed by a court as a substantial (large dollars amount) taking. Staff would recommend continuing the trees and lighting across the small green space within the existing right of way a future date. of this project. A couple of staff recommendations out of these discussions would be that first, the Public Hearing and the Assessment Hearing could be held the same night. There has been a significant public involvement process with this project already. By the time the hearings are held the plans will be very close to 100% done and all of the adjacent properties will have had a chance to view them. Second, because of the nature of the assessment (street scaping vs. typical street reconstruction) it may be appropriate to have the Assessment Hearing before the project is bid. The largest part of the assessment is for street lighting and staff will have a firm price from Xcel Energy by the Hearing date. estimate should be accurate enough for assessment purposes. This way, if there are a number of potential assessment appeals the Council could decide to not proceed to bidding the project. Staff would recommend adding colored pavers to the new medians. This was not discussed in the feasibility report but would add a nice feature to a relatively large blacktop road. The incremental cost to add pavers from standard concrete for the medians is estimated at $30,000-45,000 for the entire project. 23 Page of Staff would recommend adding the trail/sidewalk on the south side of County Road E between the new bridge and Old Snelling Avenue to this project. The easiest time to build this segment would be when the bridge is closed and there could be some economies of scale to add this similar type of work to the County Road E project. Staff has asked Bolton and Menk to prepare a cost estimate for just the initial analysis to determine if it is possible to have this work added to the bid package for County Road E (if we need temporary construction easements it may not be possible to get done in time). The added cost would be $14,680 for a topographic survey, property/right-of-way research and preliminary design at which time a decision would be made whether or not this work could catch up to the rest of the project. If not, the work done by Bolton and Menk would not be wasted; it would be useable work for the continuation of the project at a later time. The proposed project schedule moving forward would be: Completion of the plans and review by City, Ramsey County, MnDOT office of State Aid in the next 60-90 days Walk tlate summer Public Hearing/Assessment Hearing early November Project bidding in November, early December Consider awarded of the contract in January Start construction in Spring of 2015 33 Page of AGENDA ITEM 1A(a) MEMORANDUM DATE: July 28, 2014 TO:Honorable Mayor and City Council Members FROM: Patrick Klaers, City Administrator SUBJECT: County Road E Improvement Update Background /Discussion The purpose of the memo is to discuss some of the County Road E improvement project financial and assessment issues. Not all of the figures are available at this time and the figures are still preliminary. Nonetheless, it is appropriate for the Council to discuss some ideas for funding and assessing various components of the project. Attached is page 20 of the Feasibility Report that the City Council approved on March 31, 2014 (Attachment A). This page shows the total cost of each project component and these costs being split 50/50 between the City and the benefitted property owners. What this page does not show is the estimated $930,076 contribution into the project from Mn/DOT and from Ramsey County. The total City (and property owner) cost for this project is shown as $674,556.22 with the City and the property owners each paying half or $337,278.11. In reviewing the items listed on page 20, staff would like to discuss with the Council: Removing the Connelly Street improvement from the project. Having the City fund the basic Xcel street lighting proposal and then assessing the balance of the street lighting expenses on a 50/50 basis. Having the City fund the trees. Adding pavers in the median areas. There are pros and cons for each of these issues and they need to be reviewed and discussed by the Council at the work session. It should be noted that removing the Connelly Street improvements from the project is th consistent with the February 11 email request from Dan Flaherty. This email is attached for your reference (Attachment C). Two project related issues to note are as follows. First, early in the project, during the one-on-one meetings with the property owners, numerous comments were made that they wanted to see the City committed to the project by way of a substantial financial participation into this vital community corridor. Second, our Attorney for this project has advised staff that the assessment for these types of combination street improvement and streetscape pro improvement project. If the Council decides to make the four changes to the project as noted above, then the revised financial and assessment totals are shown in Attachment B. Some of the financial changes from Attachment A to Attachment B include: the total project (excluding funding from Mn/DOT and Ramsey County) goes from $674,556 to $684,012; the City share of the total goes up from $337,278 to $406,512; and the assessments to property owners go down from $337,278 to $277,500. The recommended financing plan for the project includes the City paying the $684,012 with MSA funds (approximately $600,000) and with PIR funds (estimated at $84,012). When the assessment payments are received by the City (about $277,500 plus interest over 7 years), the money would then go into the PIR fund. Using $600,000 in MSA funds for part of the CR E project will require the City to obtain an interest free advance from our MSA account. Additional project items to note and discuss at the work session include: the project does not include a sidewalk in front the project does not include the closing of the western most access into the former the exact assessment amount to each property will need to be adjusted slightly as the development agreement for the e street flats project calls for the developer to pay 100% for the sidewalk along their property (similar to the requirement but they chose to install their sidewalk when they developed). Attachments A - Project cost/assessment chart (page 20) from the March 31, 2014 feasibility report B Proposed July 28, 2014 project cost/assessment chart C Connelly Street email AGENDA ITEM 1A(b) MEMORANDUM DATE: July 28, 2014 TO:Honorable Mayor and City Council Members FROM: Patrick Klaers, City Administrator SUBJECT: 1203 County Road E West Background/Discussion The City Council has discussed ork th sessions over the past year or so. The most recent discussion took place at the May 12 work session. Attached for your information are those work session minutes. th There is not much that is new regarding the status of this property since the May 12 discussion. The City has had a few preliminary conversations with potential users of the building and site but nothing has formally come forward for a Council work session agenda item. Also, nothing has changed regarding the position of the bank as it relates to needing a formal offer from the City before any environmental work can be undertaken. Both the bank representative and the local broker know that the City is interested in the property under the right circumstances but there has been no contact from the bank or the broker recently. Staff is trying to contact the broker for an update.