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<br />new north/south streets to provide access to future development sites, including <br />Mount Ridge Road and Arthur Street. A major finding of the study was the need for <br />a new east/west street to be named "Twin Lakes Parkway" to provide an alternative <br />to County Road C and County Road C2. The proposed new road was to provide <br />direct connection to 35W on the west and Snelling Avenue on the east. The <br />proposed alignment of this roadway would follow the existing alignment of Terrace <br />Drive, between Snelling Avenue and Fairview Avenue. The portion between <br />Fairview Avenue and Cleveland Avenue would be new roadway which would curve <br />south from the.FairviewfTerrace Drive intersection, south of Langton Lake and <br />connect to Cleveland Avenue, through the existing lona Lane right-of-way, just to <br />the south of the former Midwest Motor Express site. The plan also anticipated that <br />the 35W interchange at County Road C would be relocated to line up with the new <br />Twin Lakes Parkway. A full intersection at Snelling Avenue on the east end was <br />also called for in the plan. <br /> <br />3.3 It has been almost 10 years since much of the study work was completed. The <br />industrial business park market has changed and the Twin Lakes Business Park <br />area has seen at least 5 new office/office showroom buildings (with 320,000 s.f.) <br />built in the past four years. There have also been changes to the State/Federal laws <br />which would apply to wetlands and interchange locations which make it nearly <br />impossible to construct Twin Lakes Parkway at the location called for in the original <br />plan. In the spring of 1996, the consultant firm of BRW was hired by the City to <br />review the 1988 plan and make recommendations concerning the appropriate <br />roadway alignment, excess right-of-way that should be vacated, and the design of <br />Twin Lakes Parkway, and to resolve associated utility issues. <br /> <br />3.4 The BRW report recommends that the location of Twin Lakes Parkway, west of <br />Fairview Avenue, be changed to line up with the existing 35W ramps. These <br />recommendations follow numerous discussions with the Minnesota Department of <br />Transportation, the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources, the Rice Creek <br />Watershed District, and others concerning the ability of the City to relocate the <br />existing interchange further north through the existing DNR protected wetland. <br />Based on those discussions, BRW and City staff determined that the ability to move <br />the interchange to line up with the proposed location of Twin Lakes Parkway would <br />be nearly impossible because of new State wetland protection laws. <br /> <br />3.5 The new alignment would require either private redevelopment and subdivision with <br />public road dedications or City purchase of the Cummins Diesel and Metro <br />Paper/Weyerhauser site, and portions of the Extra Leasing, Indianhead, Hyman <br />Freightway, and Twin Lakes Corporate Center land. <br /> <br />3.6 The city strategy is to use City TIF, State Aid road funds and road improvement <br />assessments to acquire and improve the Industrial Business Park roads and <br />property access rather than donating funds to MnDOT to correct their interstate road <br /> <br />PF#2867 - RCA (09/22/97) - Page 3 of 5 <br />