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CC Minutes 2001 05 14CHANHASSEN CITY COUNCIL REGULAR MEETING MAY 14, 2001 Mayor Jansen called the City Council meeting to order at 7:00 p.m. The meeting was opened with the Pledge to the Flag. COUNCILMEMBERS PRESENT: Mayor Jansen, Councilman Labatt and Councilman Peterson COUNCILMEMBERS ABSENT: Councilman Ayotte and Councilman Kroskin STAFF PRESENT: Scott Botcher, Todd Gerhardt, Roger Knutson, Bruce DeJong, Kate Aanenson, and Matt Saam PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENTS: None. CONSENT AGENDA: Mayor Jansen~ Are there any council people who have items on the agenda that they would like to have pulled for discussion or any changes to the agenda? The consent agenda. Councilman Peterson~ Madam Mayor, I'd move that we remove l(i) on the consent agenda. Mayor Jansen~ We're tabling l(i). And then we did get a request to pull for comments and discussion l(f). So if' I could have a motion to approve the consent agenda please. Councilman Peterson moved, Councilman Labatt seconded to approve the following Consent Agenda items pursuant to the City Manager's recommendations: a. Approve Proclamation Declaring the week of' May 20-26, 2001 as National Resolution #2001-21: Public Works Week. Resolution #2001-22: 01-02. Resolution #2001-23: Receive Feasibility Report; Call Public Hearing for Quinn Road, Project Receive Feasibility Report Amendment; Call Public Hearing for Extension of Utilities to Dogwood Road, Project 00-01-1. Resolution #2001-24: Receive Addendum to Feasibility Study for Century Boulevard; Call for Public Hearing, Project 97-1C. Resolution #2001-25: Approve Plans & Specifications for Century Boulevard Street & Utility Improvements; Authorize Advertisement for Bids, Project 97-1C. Approve Revision to Consultant Services Contract for the Wellhead Protection Plan, PW379. Approve Consultant Agreements for Construction Inspection Services, PW135. City Council Meeting - May 14, 2001 Arboretum Villages, Pulte Homes: 1) Approval of Final Plat 2) Approval of Development Contract/PUD Agreement 3) Approval of Supplemental Agreement for Extension of West 78th Street k. Approval of Bills. Approval of Minutes: - City Council Work Session Minutes dated April 23,2001 - City Council Minutes dated April 23,2001 -Board of Review and Equalization dated April 23,2001 - City Council Minutes dated May 3,2001 Receive Commission Minutes: - Planning Commission Minutes dated April 17, 2001 m. Approval of Contract for Architect's Services with MS&R, Library Project. n. Approval of Employee Incentive Program. o. Resolution #2001-26: Approval of Fee Schedule for Misdemeanor Offenses. Resolution #2001-27: Approval of Amendment to Resolution Authorizing Condemnation of Easements, BC 7 & BC 8 Project. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously 3 to 0. Fo AWARD OF BIDS FOR BC-7 & BC-8 UTILITY IMPROVEMENTS; PROJECT 00-01 (CONTINGENT UPON APPROVAL OF ITEM 1J). Mayor Jansen: We have Mike Anderson here from Lundgren Brothers who would like to speak to this issue. Mark Anderson: Thank you Honorable Mayor, members of the council. It's Mark Anderson and I'm with Lundgren Brothers. We're talking about the sanitary sewer easement that runs through an Outlot K of Longacres. It's a piece of property that Lundgren owns. We have been in discussions with the staff regarding the alignment of this easement for many, many months, going back into January where we wrote our written objection to the current alignment. We also attended the open house. We've had a number of meetings with staff and so forth. The problem is at this point that we're under the opinion that the alignment that you have is probably the most costly alignment to the city and also that which is the slowest in terms of getting the result. It seems as though the city wants to build this project right away. Have it bid and have it start. Unfortunately, you can't build on it until you have an easement and at this point I do not have approval from corporate to grant that easement. So you want to proceed but you can't proceed and I would like to see if we can't try to hammer out some sort of compromise. The problem that we have is that the current alignment has a component to it that hurts the usability of the land. And with that there, there are compensation awards associated with that because we're in condemnation mode here. You people have served us with a condemnation on this. It has another 60 days to run. Until that 60 days is up you can't use, you can't come onto the land. You know we'd like to settle this matter very quickly. Come to an City Council Meeting - May 14, 2001 agreement on the alignment and just move forward with it, but at this point we've not been able to do that with staff. Every attempt that we've made, we've hired our engineer. We've done alternative alignments. Every suggestion that we have made has been rejected. We thought we had an approval before this matter was approved by this body for the condemnation. I was here that night. I had faxed a letter to your engineer who assured me that everything was okay and so I did not make a comment that night and then it turns out that there were a number of objections made to our letter and we ended up back in the same place, which is a point of disagreement so. I would expect that you'd want to move ahead and keep your process moving with bids but I would ask that, if this body could keep the negotiations going with us so we can see if we can't resolve this amicably for both the city as well as Lundgren. Thank you. Mayor Jansen: Thank you. At this point Mr. Botcher I had faxed or e-mailed to you some of these questions and if appropriate, having maybe staff give a little bit of background for council, though Steve is no longer sitting here. Scott Botcher: He got paged from work so he stepped out. Mayor Jansen: Oh okay. Scott Botcher: I've shared those with Matt and Kate. I guess they're willing to address what they can off the list. Matt Saam: Sure. Mayor, council members. First off I should say Teresa Burgess, the City Engineer who's on maternity leave has worked intimately with this project. I've picked it up in her absence so I'm not in tune on all the issues like Kate is but I would say that the proposed alignment that is shown, Teresa has worked on and we believe it is in the best interest of the city. I'll touch on just a few of the issues Mark brought up. Cost. In the e-mail you had mentioned something about moving the road alignment, or excuse me, moving the sewer alignment up to be in line with their proposed road for their plat. If we would do that the sewer would need to be deeper. Typically speaking deeper sewers cost more and right now the sewer alignment which goes through their property is approximately 10 to 18 feet deep. If we would move it up by their road, I'm sure it would be 20 to 30 feet deep. Significant cost savings is shown by the current alignment. And then also the construction time that Mark touched on. If we would move the alignment up into the road, the sewer would have to be deeper, as I said. That would lead to a longer construction time. Obviously it takes longer to dig deeper. There's other issues. Bigger trenches, that sort of thing so those are a couple of the reasons that I see for the proposed alignment being in the best interest of the city. Mayor Jansen: Okay. Council, I don't know if you have any additional questions or information that you would need at this point. I'm confident that staff has worked diligently with Lundgren's representatives and I would feel comfortable moving this forward and again if there's any negotiating that still needs to occur, I'm confident that staff will work closely with Lundgren to get that accomplished. Any additional comments from council? Councilman Peterson: No, I would agree. Mayor Jansen: Okay. If I could have a motion then to approve this agenda item. Councilman Labatt: Move approval. Mayor Jansen: And a second? City Council Meeting - May 14, 2001 Councilman Peterson: Second. Resolution #2001-28: Councilman Labatt moved, Councilman Peterson seconded to award the bids for BC-7 & BC-8 Utility Improvements; Project 00-01 per staff's recommendations. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously 3 to 0. VISITOR PRESENTATIONS: Mayor Jansen: Moving on on the agenda, we are at visitor presentations. Council time allows for residents at this time to bring motions or issues forward for council consideration, though no discussion would occur on those issues this evening. If there is anyone present who would like to speak to the council, they can approach the podium. I am going to assume that there is some interest in the current status of our council member Kroskin and that announcement was in fact in the paper last week that we have been, we have received a letter of a temporary leave of absence as he works through some issues and I am currently actively working on bringing this situation to as quick a resolution as we can accomplish so that the city moves forward with our business. And I'm seeing a great deal of cooperation in that regard and should have some updates as we move forward. But with that, if you could state your name and address for the record. Steven Berquist: My name is Steven Berquist. I live at 7207 Frontier Trail and it's indicated here that you need a reason for my coming to speak before you tonight. The topic that I'm going to speak on is honesty and integrity. My speaking before you this evening will be one of the most heart wrenching things I've ever done. I come before you to put into the public record my concern for this community and my concerns for the integrity of this city council. Mayor Jansen: If you'll excuse me for one. Steven Berquist: In last week's Lakeshore News and Chanhassen Villager a letter written by Councilman Labatt. Mayor Jansen: Excuse me Mr. Berquist if. Excuse me. Steven Berquist: In it he asked for Mark Kroskin's resignation. Mayor Jansen: Could you cut the microphone please. Mayor Jansen asked that the council take a short recess at this point in the meeting. Mayor Jansen: If there is anyone else who would like to speak under visitor presentations on a separate topic, you can come to the podium and state your name and address for the record. Seeing no one, moving along. APPOINTMENTS TO THE PARK & RECREATION COMMISSION AND PLANNING COMMISSION. Mayor Jansen: Do I have a motion council? City Council Meeting - May 14, 2001 Councilman Peterson: Steve, you're better at pronouncing the name than I am. Mayor Jansen: We have one Planning Commission appointment and two Park and Rec Commission appointments. Councilman Labatt: Well I'll take the Planning Commission first. I move that we appoint Bruce Feik to the Planning Commission. Councilman Peterson: Second. Councilman Labatt moved, Councilman Peterson seconded to appoint Bruce Feik to the Planning Commission. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously 3 to 0. Mayor Jansen: Can I have a motion for the two Park and Rec Commission appointments please. Councilman Labatt: Just preface with a quick statement. While I was in the minority at the work session discussion about this, I was in favor of earlier stability and not make any changes but was in a minority since I can only pronounce one guy's name I'll say it. So I move that we approve Jack Spizale and Thomas Kelly. Councilman Peterson: Second. Councilman Labatt moved, Councilman Peterson seconded to appoint Jack Spizale and Thomas Kelly to the Park and Recreation Commission. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously 3 to 0. LIBRARY BUILDING REPORT, BARRY PETTIT, MS&R. Mayor Jansen: I think I saw Barry Pettit. Yep, there we go. We have the representatives from MS&R with us this evening. Hello. Barry Pettit: Hi. We've got an interesting presentation. We haven't a clue what we're doing. This is really shooting from the hip and so I'm not sure. Councilman Peterson: This is non-billable time then? Barry Pettit: We're just here for the heck of it, you know. And the reason I bring this up, or start the presentation, whatever it's going to be in this fashion, is we actually, we don't have a lot to show but we want to give you an update and we're actually excited about what we have to show, although there's not much here. But to get to where we are actually is a lot more effort than you can imagine. It's more about internal dialogue and conflicts and design, and it's kind of the way we work as an office, but I do think what has jelled out of what you're going to see is important. We were going to draw on it but we won't now. What we have is we have two site plans, and actually they're really quite similar. One to the other. They may not look that way but we're excited about where they are. About how they break down. How they work on the site and this is where we're going to go forward from these. We've got a building committee meeting tomorrow to go through this in more detail but we thought that we'd give you an overview of how the building is strategically going to sit on the site. It's a big deal obviously when you figure that out because it begins to inform so much more of the work that comes together. So having said City Council Meeting - May 14, 2001 that, we don't have another clear thing we can put over this? The last time that we were together with the council, I think the big issue was the fact that the building was going to try to come out and engage the street and the idea that that is so much about the planning that Chanhassen is about. Trying to get the character of the buildings come out to the street as opposed to sit back and create either great front yards or parking lots. And so we're trying to create the same idea. I think some of the key strategies here, first of all as you can see we've gained an extra 87 parking spaces which is exactly what we need with this building size right now. So it's 87 more than are on the site. Where we've gained that is we've extended the slight parking deck. This dashed line right here really represents the edge of the parking on the upper lot right now. We've extended the parking deck over that and then there's parking underneath. What that does is it forms, if you will, sort of an architectural edge to the site. Sort of a gateway in from Kerber. We've got primary handicap parking underneath here. It will be covered. It gets us into the building which is here. And then we have a, down from the deck is a stairway that comes down to this courtyard and basically drops you off at the logia, covered logia that takes you into the building. City Hall is here. We define an internal courtyard if you will here with a drop off. Giving opportunities also, I think one of the pluses with this is the opportunities it gives for city hall to change over time as well. If it expands. I know there was a conversation one time that city hall had some plans to actually reorganize internally with a new entry that would come in in the center of the building and the stair would ascend up into the main body of the building. Those kind of opportunities. Again then the extension of a mm around in the parking along there. The way this building breaks down it's, one of the other things that is really critical is that it's sort of, the large sort of collection area is very high ceiling, very open simple space. Great light coming in. Both daylight. Then also the lighting, the natural lighting. The way that works. This is basically the children's area off on this wing. Children reading room. Children's reading room that sits out on this flint if you will. Bearing in mind that the elevation difference from the front door, which is about here, to probably down here is as much as 7 or 8 feet. So the building does kind of just come out on this level as the grade drops away. So that at this comer this outdoor area that we're contemplating actually sits up on this flint. It can be an outdoor reading area with a railing around it. The kids can get out on that and read and have story times and so forth. This also is an internal story room can be a special piece that architecturally different in terms of it's form but also in terms of maybe a little bit more playful with respect to color and so forth. The other parts of the building is a lower elevations. Building heights along the sides so that we, that we are a little bit more compatible with the scale issue. Human scale issues on this side. Higher building and then breaking this faCade up so it's low as well. And I'll just show you real quick, how the building breaks up on the interior. And both these plans are very similar in this way, and these are just very general breakdowns on how they work. Again the meeting room is out in this area so it becomes one of the key, the first sort of design piece as you see. The meeting room can be used on off hours when the library is closed or when the library is open it can be used by a lot of different folks so it becomes a much more of a public area than just use for the library. And so the idea that that would be out at the front door because it's use is beyond just a normal library use. Staff area is back in this area. Service comes off of here. Children's is off to this edge with a children's story time room and the basic collection is off on this part of the building so you have lounges and periodicals and reading and so forth along the perimeter of the building. Coffee shop is on the inside. Teen area for young adults and so forth would be a little bit, would be put back in a comer. Still very visible from the interior but it always works nice if they feel like they've got their own space. That's the way that breaks down. Again, this is the patio. There's probably about a plus 7 feet above the sidewalk there. Councilman Labatt: Barry, can you give me a scale of that hallway leading to the circular reading room. The corridor. Barry Pettit: It's 12 feet wide. City Council Meeting - May 14, 2001 Councilman Labatt: 12 foot. And why 12 foot and why not a little bit wider so you could have a little bit more? Barry Pettit: We chose a module that was going off some skylights and some bay extensions. It certainly can be wider than that. Given the use of the room, it's not a lot of people constantly flowing in. It's either a lot of kids trailing in or a lot of kids trailing out. We may even study making it narrower and lower so that it comes down to a kid's scale. It may only be a 7 foot ceiling. It may be very narrow and that's the idea of almost this sort of special passageway that brings them to a story room. So it's still up in the air in terms of what it really becomes. Does it become a room or does it become in essence almost a secret passage? But the point of it is, it all leads to that room out on the point. Let's see, what else? The idea too that with the stairways here we're sort of excited about the potential of that. The stairways coming off the deck has really almost a sculpted kind of piece and so that when we see that, the railing design, the stair itself, the orientation of it is slightly rotated and the way that the lighting would work along that and again the intricate detailing, ornate detailing of the railing that the stair becomes a special object in the space itself. And then into the building through the logia. And the critical issue is being able to see the idea of entry from either side. So that works out pretty well there. Now the other. Scott Botcher: Barry, can I ask a quick question? Barry Pettit: Sure. Scott Botcher: The tan stuff is all concrete, correct? Barry Pettit: Right now it's just generally showing surface but that's what it means. Scott Botcher: Okay. How much green space is left with that plan? Barry Pettit: This is, you know I think the calculation, maybe going back to this, I think this calculation is still about 40, it probably works out to be just about an acre in this area. But I think it's a good point. I forgot to mention is that basically what we've done then is concentrated the green space out here. It also gives us an opportunity to extrude this building out in the future it needs to do that, and that's a very easy transition structurally and economically. But that's a good question about the tan being concrete. The tan stuff right now represents not necessarily concrete but away from the lawn. At the last public meeting a lot of examples of some of the possibilities of what this tan stuff could be other than concrete were brought up and were reacted to pretty well. And you can see things that began to erode out of here that, whether they become planters in here or just trees in a grid within this area and so the whole level of development that needs to come in on this. Now one of the hybrids of this, and actually it could be a cool idea. You've got to bear with us on this, is the kids reading room. Now this is our abstracted maple leaf and we're sort of fascinated by it. It's sort of a, the idea would be that there's a series of, you get a series of solid planes connected by glazing. So the form actually would become some abstracted maple leaf, which is you know the symbol of the town, and then the views out would be sort of scenes or cracks in the wall if you will. Again it's an idea that we just started playing around with and it needs more. We either retreat from it or try to refine it. But it's part of the, whether or not it's the maple leaf or whatever form it ends of taking, it's this piece out here is kind of a little jewel out on the comer. An identity piece for the library. So it's kind of an interesting opportunity again as we need to play with it and find out how abstract it gets and where it goes. So that was that. Now the other idea that was kind of interesting, it looks a little bit more rigid but I'm kind of excited about this one too. And this is where the building is basically a very simple City Council Meeting - May 14, 2001 rectangle and it's a very high volume. The little blue areas are skylights in it. It's a great open space. Light coming in both in terms of clear story as well as windows on the perimeter. Great natural and great artificial lighting. A very sort of powerful space in terms of it's scale. And what happens along West 78th then is a series of small buildings that project off the light to break the scale of it down and that do a couple things. Number one, the way the green space starts to work weaving in and out of the building. Then again the idea that the scale at West 78th is almost, it almost becomes village like. A series of smaller buildings as it moves along the street. Again the same idea that we would do a little outdoor patio. Again about 7 feet above the comer. Bring that out to the edge. Railing around it. People being able to come out there and read on nice days. In this case, let's see. We'll just jump to this one. This shows the way it breaks down. In terms of a meeting room, entry. Coming off the deck in about the same way throughout the area. So that's your very highly active public area. Staff works in behind, children's story room, reference area and reference on line with entry. Collection. Young adult back in here. Quite study. Periodical. And then we don't know what that is but it's a pretty cool idea. So we've got no problem with that. It's an opportunity for something. But I think the idea is that we're fascinated by the idea of almost a villagescape if you will that's along the street. A series of smaller objects that are extended off the main body of the building. Again, as we said, the diagrams are very, very similar. One from the other. There's just a difference in sort of if you will some of the perimeter expressions and how we scale the building down and how we break it up into smaller pieces. And that's kind of where we sit right now. This is what we're going to spend time with the building committee tomorrow. Focusing on this. The problem we have internally is we're...puts us a little bit behind in schedule. It's not uncommon for us to run into points along the way where internally we struggle with it. We need to come to grips with that and I think we'll figure that out soon and then pick up the pace. But we're excited about both schemes. It's a big building and I think it's interesting to note that as you can see, it's basically probably 2 ½ times the scale of city hall and it's all on one level. And the critical thing with that is how do you break that down so it's not just target score. How do you break it down in parts that also function well as a library so that there's efficiencies with the staffing and so on and so forth and security issues, and then the idea of the intimacy of it. Interesting balance for that. So that's kind of where we are. Scott Botcher: One of the things that I thought we were looking for was some direction from the council prior to tomorrow's meeting with the building committee to get a sense of, you know is either one of these appropriate or acceptable to you. If so, which one? And if they're both dogs, then you say that as well. Mayor Jansen: Actually I've got a couple of questions. And I had a meeting conflict for the last building committee meeting so maybe I missed something as this left council and went back to the public hearing and has reached this point. But I thought where we were going in the meeting two meetings ago in the building committee was bringing together some of the key components that council had commented on appreciating, and I'm not seeing them here. This seems to be straying towards aligning the building along West 78th Street. It's taking more of the green space. It's adding more asphalt than I had expected. And maybe to come at it from what I had expected was that the feedback had been to take the building and align it closer to city hall but along the Kerber Boulevard position so it would have been tucked up closer to city hall so we had more of a connectedness between the two buildings instead of just two completely removed, looking like scattered buildings on the site. And instead of asphalt, going to the one plan where we had more that center court, and I think it was Mr. Peterson, Councilman Peterson that had liked that center court feeling between the two buildings, and I know public comment also had centered around that court and how do we make that a functional component. The other feedback had been looking for the street alignment and the pedestrian friendly feeling and that was Councilman Labatt's concern. Aligning it to Kerber Boulevard so that we would have that feeling of that pedestrian look that we're encouraging our private developers to come forward with. I'm seeing this having moved away from all of those components City Council Meeting - May 14, 2001 that we had spoken about including in a final plan, and I see a few building committee members kind of nodding their heads. So I'm not sure if I missed something. Barry Pettit: Okay. Well to answer a couple of those, and Pat you can jump in as well. One of the issues was that we had a building that was a little tighter to West 78th and one of the issues was to retreat a bit from that so that we've got a fair amount of green in the front. And that's what both these plans recognize. Is pulling back a little bit, not significantly but I think it was more of a incremental retreat if you will. And as opposed to getting right on, I think this is the setback here. So not going right up that setback line but again a little bit more green. So that was number one. The issue was, the issue on Kerber was a little bit the same as to retreat a little bit back from that and not get right up to the setback. And what we've done along this, along Kerber is a lot of transparency with the building in terms of a reading area out at the edge of the building and obviously openings back in the staff area and again, in this scheme and then obviously the object formed by the story room. So there's a lot of variety and a lot of interest along Kerber as well. So it's not, I'm not sure ifI read you right but it sounded like you were concerned that that might be too hard of an edge. Mayor Jansen: Not that it's too hard of an edge, but that now the building is extending into the green space instead of being more aligned perpendicular to Kerber. It's now more aligned perpendicular to West 78th. So now it's extending into the green space. We've lost some green space. It's not as close to city hall as we had originally discussed so there really isn't that connectedness between the two which I, you know prior building committee meeting had been to maintain some sort of a connectedness to those two buildings and the adjacency versus having it out on the comer. I didn't hear any sort of an appeal from the public that that was something that they definitely wanted to see, and council if anything was trying to move it closer to city hall. Maintain the green space and have your alignment to Kerber. Anybody who wants to jump in, if I'm off base to what you were expecting to see. Councilman Peterson: No, you've articulated most of my position. If you augment your summary with, you know I think having that common area in the middle of the two buildings somehow is I think in my eyes very valuable. Barry Pettit: The big covered area? Councilman Peterson: Not the covered but some kind of a courtyard. I mean I haven't decided what it would be yet but I like when you started talking about it, it got my attention in a positive way. Mayor Jansen: So that it's more of a gathering area between the two buildings versus it being an asphalt mm around. So that there's more green space there versus. Scott Botcher: And that's the trade in this plan. I mean you've traded the courtyard for a cul-de-sac. Barry Pettit: And I think, in terms of, it's sort of peeling these issues away. One of the issues in terms of proximity, when basically in a way sort of have a ground zero at a point like this where we're bringing people down from the ramp. Bringing people into the city hall and then of course the library so there is a distances say from this covered area to the front door of the library. It's probably in the neighborhood of 50 feet. So in giving you a sense of scale, it's not that huge of a distance and so we're trying to negotiate bringing all these people together but not necessarily physically connecting. The other thing that we struggle with is, we don't have a sense of what happens in the redistribution of real estate inside city hall once the library moves out. Who winds up moving into that? Where does the new front door to some of City Council Meeting - May 14, 2001 those people become? Do the seniors still enter from the same place if it shifts down to the other side. For example, if this becomes the sort of concentrated entry, then to some extent no matter how we handle this, it's pretty difficult to find an appropriate way to weave both the buildings together. Mayor Jansen: Well and I guess I'm not looking to weave them together as much as have them closer in proximity to each other instead of this one out on the comer. Having it closer to city hall versus spreading out into the green space and have. Barry Pettit: Okay, I see. The issue is, okay a couple things. One of the issues with a green space like this is it becomes just that. Green area. It's not like it's a usable green area simply because of the nature of the dimension of it. Mayor Jansen: Well it would be park space. I mean it will end up being planted. I'm not referring to it as necessarily a flat field. Barry Pettit: Right. So but you know what I'm saying. It doesn't become really, this isn't like where we're going to have any kind of an activity up in this kind of area, unless it grows dramatically. But we were, I guess one of the things we're saying is, we were quite certain that our marching orders were to get this out to 78th more. Councilman Peterson: Away from 78th. Barry Pettit: No, out to 78th. Again leave. Mayor Jansen: No. Actually not. It wasn't to bring it out to 78th. It was to align it to Kerber and our discussion about stepping it back a little was to step it back a little from Kerber so that you'd have a little planting area to soften that pedestrian area. That's where we were talking about increasing that setback a little bit. It wasn't that we were trying to reach out to the comer. We were trying to push it back to city hall. The whole conversation was around, I don't have. Barry Pettit: Per our recollection or our walking away from the last council meeting it seemed, or the last council presentation there was kind of 3 or 4 different opinions all the way around which is kind of a cross section of kind of the public forum and all the other kind of forces that play here. The scheme that, this actually, the bulk of the building has retreated from West 78th further. This is, as far as what we'll call the southwest scheme as far as all the schemes that had the library down in this comer. This is about the furthest back from West 78th Boulevard. The bulk of the building. What we have done is, and again it kind of pops back up to mark this with a differentiated or a unique piece. What you're saying though is just the entire building would move out making it much more... Mayor Jansen: What we had actually talked about when we got back to the building committee was that we had one council person that would like the building sitting here with the courtyard. We had another council person that liked it aligned on Kerber. You didn't have anyone voice wanting it smack dap in the comer, so the building committee we talked about taking this building. Swinging it around and we could get that courtyard feel that council was liking and the community was liking, and also align it closer to Kerber so that we're also getting that pedestrian feel because the diagram that I'm recalling from the building committee had this right up in here. Closer in proximity and in fact you were at that point drawing something of a tower. City Council Meeting - May 14, 2001 Barry Pettit: With a possible like, right which. Mayor Jansen: And one and a half stories instead of all on one. And I don't know why we got just this little extension instead of having the building sitting up here. See what I mean? The building shifted down. It sounds like we lost something then in the translation about what we were trying to align to but I don't remember any conversations wanting to bring it out to West 78th Street. Barry Pettit: My concern is that we wind up getting in kind of a position where we sort of, we neither have really very much that is usable here other than just simply green. So it's a visual green. It's not a usable green. And then we've closed this down and it sort of becomes less but it's not really very usable either. Sort of, in other words we've diluted both ideas. Scott Botcher: I don't know if you can say that. To me it depends on what goes in there. If you go in there with Craig's idea of a courtyard, it can be very, very functional and I think one of the difficulties here, and I think you guys have, I think you're right. There's been an attempt to strike a balance between having the downtown West 78th attributes, which is, it's got validity. And the usability of the space to have that commonality between the buildings and the entire campus and you know I think you've made a decent attempt with the children's, it looks like a lady bug to me but that children's thing there, and then whatever design you like. And you've got the 4 pods that stick out of the other one. I think that's what you're really trying to do and I think you've made a good effort at that. I think maybe what it does to me, and I'll just keep going back to it, and I'll admit it's been a sand burr in my saddle since I saw it is that cul-de-sac's a divider and you talked about well, is that going to be the entrance to city hall on the southeast comer? I mean you might as well just put a street through there because that cul-de-sac is simply asphalt dividing. It's not drawing anything together. It's not commonality. It's simply there for a single purpose and I'm not sure that's a good trade. I tend to agree with Craig. Barry Pettit: One of the issues that, and everybody sort of backing up for a second. One of the issues that we, and one could take, eliminate a cul-de-sac and somehow make it loop around here. One of the issues that we talked about early on is the inherent difficulty in the site in getting to the front door. And the difficulties are topographical and you have parking on both sides at both levels. So you basically have 4 different parking lots for what really is not that big of complex per se. And so the question comes back to, maybe, the ultimate question is how critical is it to get a car near the front door. Drop people off. Whether it's bad weather. Whatever the deal is and if you say that's not a big deal for us, then we revisit. Then it may be just as simple as saying the mm around kind of retreats back into here and just is what it is. Scott Botcher: I would argue that most of the parking spaces you have there, even with the cul-de-sac are going to be about the same distance to the front door if the courtyard is there. Barry Pettit: What the cul-de-sac does, if we cul-de-sac it, does incorporate parking around here. Scott Botcher: Is that a good thing? Barry Pettit: Well it's sized for... Scott Botcher: I'm just, for the council. Then we've got a parking lot inbetween the two buildings. That's a worse thing. Mayor Jansen: Yeah, exactly. Yeah. City Council Meeting - May 14, 2001 Barry Pettit: Well you know again, I guess the concern is that if you know that you've got 4 different places to go find the lot, a place to park, is that just an acceptable part of this ensemble and there's no place to say hey look at. I'm going to go drop you off because I'm going to go look for parking. That kind of thinking. That doesn't matter to us at all. Mayor Jansen: Or can you incorporate it into the other side so that that's becoming a drop off on the west side instead of just leading right in. Scott Botcher: Along with the drop box. Pat Mackey: There is a drop off aisle here. There are two comments which are kind of relate together. We've been talking about the courtyard and a lot of the massing, the orientation of the building this way is in just that effort to define a courtyard here. If you have a building aligned this way, you don't really have, you don't have two things and this gets at my second point. You don't really have a defined court. You've got a comer and you also don't have a single front door, which has really been a struggle here. We've been trying to get a singular point of entry roughly on whichever plans we've been going with, about in this area. Roughly equally accessible from 3 different parking lots and that's been kind of the trick. To put the building anywhere north of there you're knocking all the parking which you've just heard, so it is certainly your comments and the comments that we've heard here are, can be incorporated in but it's just, it's part of, we're trying to keep a definition to the courtyard and the singular... Scott Botcher: Now does this site plan include the appropriate number of parking spaces or is it build short? Barry Pettit: No this one, the 87 are new spaces in addition to whatever the count is right now. Plus 87. Scott Botcher: Okay is that what you guys are recommending based upon? Barry Pettit: Right. Scott Botcher: So if we wanted to go short, as we've talked about in some of the building committee meetings, we could actually lose some of the spaces. Barry Pettit: Sure. That's what you do. If you want to go short, you lose some spaces. And it was talked about in the future that possibly a deck could make that. Move off the upper lot here and go over the top of that. Mayor Jansen: And have more of a proof of parking for a later date if we need additional. Scott Botcher: Part of what we have now, and the library for what it is, I mean I would expect this library to be far more attractive to all sorts of people than our current library is just because it's the stadium issue. You know if they build it they will come but we've spent a lot of money on trails and multi modal transportation facilities and the density of our community is north of 5 and sort of up from here and around and part of the theory is that if you're a scoot short of parking, you make it just a little bit tight, we can maybe encourage people, especially in the summer time and certainly not in the winter time, to use these trails. To use these things. City Council Meeting - May 14, 2001 Councilman Peterson: And particularly if there's a courtyard where you can sit and gather. Scott Botcher: Absolutely. Hang out and have.., with the kids. Absolutely. Barry Pettit: And that has been your point and I personally agree with you but what I've found. Scott Botcher: Cool. Pat Mackey: But what we've also talked on in the building committee meeting and in the, to some extent in the public meetings but mostly in the building committee would be if the capacity of the library and the visitorship of the library increases as it's projected to, as we suspect it will, how much of a risk do we want to take at being short of parking lots 6 months after opening? Scott Botcher: No question. Mayor Jansen: Right. Let's do this. Since we're trying to just give you input from a council level. We are going to be losing Councilman Labatt. He has been paged into work so why don't we maybe share our comments with you and I'm hearing some rather major concerns with these two layouts. So it may take some effort on behalf of the building committee working with you tomorrow to maybe incorporate the comments from the council this evening and hammer out the details there. So you know Craig, I don't know if you want to just maybe recap your key points. Councilman Peterson: The only thing that I'd add to it, and you asked the question how important is parking to the door. You'd think that I'd say it's real important. Well I'm not because I don't think it is. I'm thinking the integrity and the integration of the building to the site is more important than the parking to the door. Because that, if you have a building that's inviting and a parking lot that is integrated, you're more willing to take a walk. So I don't think you should design the building with that as a significant focus. And I can be swayed, and already am kind of swayed towards moving the building from the center as I was a month ago to the side. I think if we still maintain the integrity of the courtyard, pull away the cul-de-sac from being the center point, you know I think you'll go a long ways to saying, getting me to say wow and that's where I want you to get me. Barry Pettit: Okay, fair enough. Councilman Labatt: Could you go back to your interior layout real quick, showing the. Barry Pettit: Either one of them or both? Councilman Labatt: Preferably this one. Mayor Jansen: And in that you've missed some of the discussion, we're basically completely shifting where the building is so as to the intricacies of the interior, that will change as they're moving the building. Just FYI. Councilman Labatt: Okay. Briefly, as long as it's going to change, the walls are going to change, where are you going to have the computer center and all that stuff inside? What's your plan for that? Mayor Jansen: I don't think we're at that point yet, are we? City Council Meeting - May 14, 2001 Barry Pettit: Just real quickly. Computer room or data room is as viewed today is usually pretty small. Typically just it will be back in the staff area. Councilman Labatt: Okay, but what about for. Barry Pettit: As far as the user computers? Councilman Labatt: User computers, yeah. Yeah, information center or computer information center. Barry Pettit: Yeah, the only thing usually we try to keep that somewhere closer to the staff area, reference area so there's more control on it, but again that's another level of breakdown that we're not to yet. Pat Mackey: Another thing too is in a new freshly built from zero library, a center is really something that kind of happens to older buildings for computers. Newer buildings are, it's really spread much more equally throughout. They'll have banks here and there. Councilman Labatt: But that's in the plan? Pat Mackey: Absolutely. Barry Pettit: This is really broad brush in terms of breakdown. Mayor Jansen: The direction that we've given currently, in case you want to add to it, is to take the building. Move it back closer to city hall. Align it more with Kerber versus it's current alignment to 78th and reduce the cul-de-sac if not remove it altogether so that there's more of a green gathering space inbetween. Councilman Labatt: What about, now I realize that the parking is being expanded upstairs. Now that whole area up there is pretty much city vehicles right now. What are you taking into consideration on that? Pat Mackey: Part of that for that to work is going to be a policy issue that says if city staff and so forth, in order to make the parking most efficient, the closest parking most efficient for the library would mean that we're going to have to encourage city staff to be here rather than here. And actually city staff wouldn't be misplaced. These lots up here represent existing city staff and given the nature that it's now plowing through what used to be the edge of the parking lot, a few additional spaces. 9 additional spaces before you get to this dotted line and what would be designated library parking. If that was a policy issue. Councilman Labatt: Okay. Mayor Jansen: Are our comments consistent with what you'd like to see have come back? Councilman Labatt: Sure. Mayor Jansen: Okay. I remembered you liked that Kerber alignment. Barry Pettit: I'll give you one little diagram ifI can find a piece of the page that you're on, and this is just FYI. When we did the Ridgedale project, for those of you who are familiar with Ridgedale library. That City Council Meeting - May 14, 2001 was sort of the library side. This was sort of the courts side and then the parking lot was out here. And this was going to be, you know there was a big round tree thing there and so on and so forth and that was going to be the great public plaza. And it was probably almost the sole, one of the key singular driving forces for remodeling that was to get rid of that plaza because it became so inhospitable in most of the times of the year. In terms of all the realities that our weather brings to these areas. So I just offer that out there. There are plenty of great outdoor plaza's that are small. No question about it and this would be one of them. But it's, you just have to be a little bit guarded on romanticizing what it really can be as a reality of sort of where we live. That's what led us away to a lot more formal courtyard defined strictly between two buildings. Scott Botcher: I guess maybe the downside is that we all know what a cul-de-sac can be. Barry Pettit: Pardon? Scott Botcher: We all know what a cul-de-sac can be, and I guess that's probably the down side. Councilman Peterson: Well you know that being said, we should remove the baseball and softball parks and the beaches and everything else. Barry Pettit: Well yeah, and those are those uses for those perfect times and so forth and, but it's. And if the position is to retreat on the cul-de-sac and pull that out of this, that's not a big deal as long as everybody knows, really understands the consequences, then that's not a problem. Mayor Jansen: And just really creating more the drop off space over on the west side as you're working on that. Pat Mackey: What the cul-de-sac is is trying to get back to that parallel parking lot layout that... Mayor Jansen: Understood. Okay. Okay, I think if we've given you clear direction as to where council stands, then appreciate your making the presentation tonight and we'll leave it up to the building committee to maybe pound out some of the details with you so, thank you. Appreciate your time. Barry Pettit: Thank you. Mayor Jansen: We have a situation where we are going to be losing Councilman Labatt tonight because he has been paged into work. I don't know if I should word it as an emergency but he has a work emergency where he does have to leave us and that leaves us without a quorum so, Roger shall I be adjourning the meeting at this point or do I do a continuation for the rest of the agenda? Roger Knutson: I think adjourning the meeting would be appropriate. And I assume the rest of the items on the agenda will be put on your next agenda. They're not going away. Scott Botcher: If there's anything on here that we need to deal with, primarily the financial stuff that was in your packet, Bruce and I might very well get going on some of that stuff. It will still be on your agenda but we may do some prep work between now and then so we're not killing 2 weeks. Mayor Jansen: Okay. And then we're also then moving the, okay. Alright, ifI could have a motion to adjourn please. City Council Meeting - May 14, 2001 Councilman Labatt moved, Councilman Peterson seconded to adjourn the City Council meeting. All voted in favor and the motion carried. The City Council meeting was adjourned at 8:03 p.m. Submitted by Scott Botcher City Manager Prepared by Nann Opheim