Correspondence14
CORRESPONDENCE DISCUSSION
• Joint City Council /Planning Commission Meeting Reminder Memo from Kate Aanenson
dated May 6, 2014
• Star Tribune Article: "Growth Forecast Sprouts Conflict as Cities Vie for Development
Dollars" — April 22, 2014
Open House Notice for Highways 101/61 Southwest Reconnection Project & Highway
61 Future Development and Utility Study scheduled May 22, 2014 from 4 -6 pm
CITY OF
CHANHASSEN
7700 Market Boulevard
PO Box 147
Chanhassen, MN 55317
Administration
Phone: 952.227.1100
Fax: 952.227.1110
Building Inspections
Phone: 952.227.1180
Fax: 952.227.1190
Engineering
Phone: 952.227.1160
Fax: 952.227.1170
Finance
Phone: 952.227.1140
Fax: 952.227.1110
Park & Recreation
Phone: 952.227.1120
Fax: 952.227.1110
Recreation Center
2310 Coulter Boulevard
Phone: 952.227.1400
Fax: 952.227.1404
Planning &
Natural Resources
Phone: 952.227.1130
Fax: 952.227.1110
Public Works
7901 Park Place
Phone: 952.227.1300
Fax: 952.227.1310
Senior Center
Phone: 952.227.1125
Fax: 952.227.1110
Web Site
www.d.chanhassen.nnn.us
MEMORANDUM
TO: Planning Commission
FROM: Kate Aanenson, AICP, Community Development Director
DATE: May 6, 2014
SUBJ: Joint City Council - Planning Commission Meeting
May 12, 2014
This is just a reminder that you will be having a joint meeting with City Council on
Monday, May 12, 2014 at 5:30 p.m. in the Fountain Conference room. Dinner will be
provided.
This meeting provides you with an opportunity to discuss any issues or questions that
you have for City Council. Please consider any items that you would like to discuss
with City Council so that you can have a productive meeting.
TENTATIVE AGENDA
CHANHASSEN CITY COUNCIL
MONDAY, MAY 12, 2014
CHANHASSEN CITY HALL, 7700 MARKET BOULEVARD
A. 5:15 P.M. - CITY COUNCIL WORK SESSION, FOUNTAIN
CONFERENCE ROOM Note: If the City Council does not complete the
work session items in the time allotted, the remaining items will be
considered after the regular agenda.
Introduction of Steve Ferraro, Engineering Tech IV /Construction
Manager (verbal).
2. 5:15 p.m. — Interview Applicant(s) for the Planning Commission
5:30 p.m. — Joint Meeting with the Planning Commission
4. Comprehensive Plan Update.
5. Update on CSAH 61 Corridor and Utility Study.
g: \plan \planning commission \joint meetings \pc pmioint meeting memo 2014.doc
Chanhassen is a Community for Life - Providing for Today and PlanningforTomorrow
Growth forecast sprouts conflict as cities vie for development dollars
Article by: ERIC ROPER, Star Tribune
Updated: April 22, 2014 - 10:35 PM
The Met Council plan envisions growth on edges of the metro area, but Minneapolis
officials disagree.
Millions of dollars in regional funding are at stake in a battle that boils down to where
people will live and work in the next 30 years.
Minneapolis officials and homebuilders are at odds over a draft Metropolitan Council
plan that predicts a ring of land -rich outer suburbs like Prior Lake and Chanhassen will
see more population growth than other parts of the seven - county region. Minneapolis
and St. Paul would also see significant gains but simultaneously make up a smaller
share of a metro area forecast to grow by 824,000 residents.
The forecast — which will be fine- tuned over the next year — shows just how tricky and
contentious population projections can be. But they are crucial, shaping how the council
guides transportation, sewer and regional park resources in the seven - county metro
region for years to come, as well as local comprehensive plans in communities across
the area.
The report riled Minneapolis City Council President Barb Johnson, who said the city
pays for sprawl by having to subsidize underused sewers and losing valuable
transportation dollars.
"They're building all these fancy schmancy park- and -rides on the edge at $20 million a
crack," she said. "And we're still sitting here in Minneapolis, where the bulk of the transit
riders are, having our people wait for buses sitting on recycling boxes."
The projections run counter to census data showing an urban population boom driving
regional growth in the past several years, as well as widely reported national trends
toward city living. They are based on a complicated model with a 200 - plus -page
methodology that takes into account a range of factors from the value of development in
the region to where people are moving.
Opting for suburban life
Council representatives said public comments have been taken into consideration as
well, which has modified forecasts. For example, after seeing early population forecasts
for the report, the Builders Association of the Twin Cities fought for increased population
at the "emerging suburban edge."
The group's president, Shawn Nelson, said while there is an uptick in urban
development, millennials will eventually opt for the suburban life.
"It's a fun place to live, obviously," he said of Minneapolis "But we still think what's going
to drive a lot of decisions as they get older, as they get married, have kids, things like
that, will be much more of those traditional issues of schools and yards and locations
like that ... It certainly will be much less in the urban core at that point."
Minneapolis' long -range planner, Kjersti Monson, noted in draft comments that the city
alone issued 30 percent of the region's residential unit permits in 2012 and 2013 —just
over its annual average dating back to 2009. Rather than a "blip," she described it as
possibly the new normal.
"We see the projections as basically a grow -in -place model," she said of the Met
Council report. "It's kind of taking what has happened for 30 years and just projecting
that it will continue to happen."
The council's report predicts the urban center, which includes Minneapolis, St. Paul and
inner -ring suburbs like Richfield and Hopkins, will add about 161,000 new residents. By
comparison, "suburban edge" communities like Blaine, Chaska and Woodbury would
add 166,000 new residents, and the "emerging suburban edge" would add 228,000 new
residents. Job gains are estimated to be most heavily peppered in suburban and
suburban edge communities — particularly along highways.
The steepest increases would be seen in towns like Carver, projected to more than
triple in population to 14,200, and Lake Elmo, which would grow from about 8,000
people to 21,000 people, according to the Thrive MSP 2040 report.
"We're forecasting growth because that's where the land is," Libby Starling, the
Metropolitan Council's manager of regional policy and research, said of emerging
suburban edge communities.
Public comment is being accepted through Monday on the 130 -page report, which will
eventually influence separate guiding documents regarding transportation, housing,
parks and water resources. Local communities will then be required to develop
comprehensive plans that are consistent with its findings.
More accessible development
Despite its predictions about growth in the outer edge of the metro, the report says
development in the next 30 years will increasingly be infill in the older, more accessible
parts of the region. Highly mobile young professionals want to live where there's a
diverse population, strong arts and entertainment, recreation and even transit systems
that allow them to get around without a car, the report said.
Significantly, the report does not anticipate extending the farthest reaches of the sewer
system — which enables development in new territories — beyond an earlier 2030 plan,
and says that highways must largely be maintained after more than 50 years of
expansion. "While some gaps remain, the region's highway network is essentially
complete and must now be rebuilt," the report says.
The new focus is on fixed -route transitways like light rail, the report says, which it
recommends enhancing with development of local bicycle and pedestrian systems.
The city of St. Paul's comments on the report urge the Met Council to take a more
proactive economic development approach and push for higher density goals outside
the city. "There is little guidance or direction to these communities to prevent
continuation of the same pattern of single - family residential subdivisions where
residents must use a car to get to virtually any destination for work, shopping,
recreational or cultural activities," the city said in draft comments, which must still be
approved by the mayor.
Minneapolis leaders are largely supportive of the plan's policy themes but believe the
city can accommodate much more growth than projected. Johnson pointed out that the
city, particularly the North Side, is awash with vacant land ripe for development. But she
is also skeptical of Mayor Betsy Hodges' goal of adding 100,000 new people — a bar
she believes is unrealistic. While the city once housed more than 500,000 people, she
said, many of them were packed tighter into single - family homes.
Starling said an earlier forecast projected more growth in the urban core. But
homebuilders pushed back, as did both outer suburbs and those in the inner ring.
Starling noted that they are forecasting significant growth in Minneapolis — more than
the city has seen over several decades — but available land and market demands limit
those numbers. While there has been a lot of recent demand to live in Minneapolis, she
added that several years of growth do not necessarily translate into a 30 -year spurt.
The homebuilders, meanwhile, are applying opposite pressure. "We've had a lot of
conversations with them where they said, `But we're building so many homes in ...
Lakeville, we're building so many homes in Shakopee, Chanhassen, Victoria.' If you
take the number of homes that we've built over the last year, multiply that out by 30, you
get much higher growth than what these forecasts are indicating," Starling said.
Myron Orfield, a regional planning expert at the University of Minnesota, said Thrive
MSP 2040 was a "do- nothing" plan that envisions more of the same rather than trying to
guide the area's growth. "This document is unimportant because there's nothing to it,"
he said. "But potentially ... more than any governmental document it could shape our
future in a positive way
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Graphic: INTERACTIVE: Planning ahead for 30 years of growth
Tuesday April 22, 2014
The Metropolitan Council projects that the emerging suburban edge will see the
most significant population...
Projections by area
Projections by area
Urban Center (Minneapolis, St. Paul, Richfield, Hopkins, etc.) — 161,000 new
residents, 141,000 new jobs
Urban Area (Anoka, Osseo, Roseville, Fridley, etc.) — 59,000 new residents,
93,000 new jobs
Suburban (Apple Valley, Mendota Heights, Wayzata, White Bear Lake, etc.) —
152,000 new residents, 160,000 new jobs
Suburban Edge (Blaine, Chaska, Woodbury, Maple Grove, etc.) — 166,000 new
residents, 160,000 new jobs
Emerging Suburban Edge (Chanhassen, Hastings, Rosemount, Waconia, etc.)
— 228,000 new residents, 59,000 new jobs
Source: Metropolitan Council
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Open House
Highways 101 / 61
Southwest Reconnection Project &
Highway 61 Future Development and Utility Study
May 22, 2014, 4:00 PM - 6:00 PM
Chanhassen Public Library
7711 Kerber Boulevard, Chanhassen
Please join us at an open house for the upcoming reconstruction project affecting
the Highway 101 River Crossing, the County Road 61 /Flying Cloud Drive corridor,
and the study of land uses and potential City services in the corridor. Attendees
will be able to learn about the Reconnection project, view project timelines and
construction staging, and ask questions about the project. The event will be
hosted by the following partner agencies: the Minnesota Department of
Transportation (MnDOT), Carver County, Scott County, and the Cities of
Chanhassen and Shakopee.
Highway 101 / County Road 61 Flood Mitigation Project
The project will construct a new four -lane Highway 101 spanning the floodplain
between the existing Highway 101 Minnesota River Bridge in Shakopee and
County Road 61 /Flying Cloud Drive in Chanhassen. The goal is to minimize
transportation disruptions caused by seasonal flooding of the Minnesota River.
Additionally, the Highway 101 /County Road 61 "Y" intersection will be
reconstructed as a roundabout to accommodate the new Highway 101 Bridge and
future traffic growth.
Flood Mitigation Project Current Status
Construction is anticipated to begin mid -May and will last through the Fall of 2015.
The project will be constructed in stages to maintain traffic, although temporary
closures will occur. Representatives from MnDOT and Carver County will be
present to discuss the traffic staging plan and detours.
Corridor Study
The City of Chanhassen is working on a Highway 61 Corridor study for potential
future development. The City intends to prepare for the anticipated development
interest in the area by creating a more comprehensive plan for the Highway 61
Corridor. The study includes a utility analysis to determine if it is cost effective to
extend municipal sewer and water services to the study area. If municipal
services are determined not cost effective to service the area, the scope of the
study may change to review alternative land use and development plans. City
staff will be present to review the scope of the report, give an update on the status
and answer any questions.
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Project Area Map