Minutes: Public Works: May 2006

Public Works Committee Meeting Minutes
Regular Meeting
Monday, May 22, 2006, 6:00 p.m.
City Hall, 31 S. Madison St., Evansville, WI

1. Call the meeting to order @ 6:00 PM.
2. Roll Call: Ald. Hammann (Chair) & Ald. Sornson , Ald. Juergens. Staff: Dave Wartenweiler, Public Works Director, Dave Sauer, City Engineer & Bruce Woods, Street Architect. Quorum attained.
3. Minutes of April meeting unanimously approved on a Hammann-Sornson motion.
4. Citizen appearances - NA
5. Lake Leota Restoration
Discussed methods to dry out the lake.
Discussed environmental impact study. Foth & Van Dyke will determine how much a study will cost and how long it will take for completion.
Discussed location to place test-dredging sediment.
6. Main Street Reconstruction Public Hearing
• Discussion of Main St. & Sidewalk design in front of Evansville bowl.
Foth & Van Dyke surveyed the property line on both sides of Main Street east of Maple Street to the Allen Creek Bridge. The city engineer found that Evansville's Bowl storefront is located outside of city property.

The current Main St. & Sidewalk design has 4’ wide sidewalk in front of Evansville bowl. ADA requires a 5’ wide sidewalk. The city engineer suggests we design the sidewalk to meet the ADA requirement.
Open public hearing @ 6:22 p.m.
Discussed the design options for the sidewalk in front of Evansville Bowl. We have two options:
1. Change the road design by adding a bump out in front of Evansville Bowl. This would require 3 – 4 stalls to be compact only parking.
2. Redevelop Evansville Bowl storefront façade to eliminate the need for a bump out.

Roger Berg will discuss options with Evansville Bowl management.
Closed public hearing @ 6:34 p.m.
• Review Allen creek bridge design – The city engineer has not completed the bridge design.

• Discussion and possible motion to approve Main Street amenities (trees, benches, etc.).
Open public hearing @ 6:40 p.m.
Trees
Discussed tree grate designs – currently using 3’ x 3’ or 4’ x 4’ grates. City Street Architect Bruce Woods, suggests we used 4’ x 6’ grates
Discussed tree guard designs.
Discussed tree types. Currently have Honey Locus trees. Oaks & Maple trees are bad choices for Main St. trees.
Jeff Farnsworth (125 Garfield) not in favor of trees. Trees are not historically accurate. Would rather spend money on lighting.
Dick Wolfe suggests that trees are important for a quality Main St. even if they are not historically accurate.
Ald. Hammann identified the current location of trees are locations of additional trees in the current design.
Trash Receptacles
Match to bench design. Place trash receptacles near bench locations. Move old trash receptacles to city parks.

Bench
Discussed several historical & modern bench designs. Mayor Decker will approach Baker manufacturing about making historically accurate metal benches & trash receptacles.

Discussed the following bench locations in front of the following businesses: State Farm Insurance, Grange building, Old Ace Hardware, near real coffee, Library & near bridge.

Bike Rack
Discussed several historical & modern bike rack & hitching post designs. Baker Manufacturing may also want to make bike racks.

Discussed the following bike rack locations: Five to Ten additional bike racks in front of the Library, Both sides of Madison street, Maple street, near Real Coffee, and Allen creek bridge.

Other Main Street amenities
Drinking fountains near Madison-Main St. intersection. May cost around $5,000, and has the potential to be vandalized.

Discussed several street clock designs.
Closed public hearing @ 7:40 p.m.
• Bike Path design considerations
Bike paths are 5’ wide stripe on the traffic side of the street with bike only lane markers. If street is wide enough, the bike path would be located next to parking lane on the street. If the street is not wide enough for 2 lanes of traffic, then bike path located on one side of the road eliminating a parking lane.
7. 2006 Public Works Smart Growth Plan Action Items
• Public hearing, discussion and possible motion to approve placing the sidewalk on the west side of 2nd St.
Fair St. (2nd - 3rd) & 2nd St. (Highland - Fair St.) - Municipal code requires the sidewalk on the East Side of 2nd Street. The school board & citizens have requested to place the sidewalk on the west side of 2nd St. to improve safety by eliminating the crossing the road at the Fair St. & 2nd St. uncontrolled intersection. The missing sidewalk connection on the West Side of 2nd St. will be filled in according to its priority at a latter date.
Open public hearing @ 7:50 p.m.
Dean Arnold 140 N. 3rd St. noted that 50% of the kids cross 2nd at Fair Street and therefore a sidewalk on West Side of 2nd St. is not required. Also suggested a 3-way stop sign at Fair St. & 2nd St. uncontrolled intersection.
Wally Fellows 202 Fair St. has concerns regarding grade and sidewalk location.
Tammy Pomplun showed a slide show power point presentation of both sides of 2nd street suggesting that West Side of 2nd St. is the better location for the sidewalk. She also presented a letter with 15 signatures from residents located on both sides of 2nd street.
Closed public hearing @ 8:10 p.m.
Ald. Sornson wants sidewalks on both sides of all streets in the city of Evansville.
Ald. Juergens suggests West Side of 2nd St. is better location for the sidewalk.
Ald. Hammann would like to place a 3-way stop sign at Fair St. & 2nd St. intersection.
• Move sidewalk close to the road along Fair St. unanimously approved on a Hammann-Juergens motion.
• Place sidewalk on West Side of 2nd St. unanimously approved on a Juergens-Sornson motion.
• Transportation #1.2 – Review Transportation Network Map
Because of Evansville’s natural and man-made geography, there are few corridors for moving traffic from certain sectors of the City to other sectors of the City. For example, a new street around the north end of Lake Leota connecting USH 14 near the City's northern limit with CTH C near the City's northwestern limit would alleviate traffic congestion at the intersections of Main and Madison Streets and Madison and Union Streets. In addition, completing 6th Street so that it is continuous from Croft Road in the south to CTH C in the north would aid traffic flow on the developing West Side.

Evansville is a community that is bisected by state and interstate highway corridors and a railroad corridor. Lake Leota and wetlands also present development limitations. This situation results in issues of connectivity throughout the community. Of particular concern, is the fact that the road network essentially directs traffic from west-side subdivisions onto Main Street and from there onto area highways. This situation is creating a “bottleneck” of traffic downtown. If this pattern of development continues, Evansville will become a linear community (stretching east-west with little growth to the north or south). There is a need to loop roads and develop internal connectivity to take pressures off the highways and Main Street. Development and connecting roads on the north side of Evansville will be important in this effort.

City Engineer, Dave Sauer discussed drawing a future northwest collector street on the Every and Gildner properties. Discussed the best location to place a future collector where the wetland around Allen Creek is narrowest to make the crossing.

Union Town chairman, Kendall Schneider, noted that Allen creek crossing & connection to Hwy. 14 are critical. He would also like to see a 45-MPH speed limit on the future northwest Collector Street.
• Directed the city engineer to draw up proposal for location of future northwest by-pass Collector Street unanimously approved on a Hammann-Juergens motion.
• Utilities & Community Facilities #2 – Intergovernmental cooperation opportunities with Union township
Discussion on intergovernmental cooperation exploring ideas generated at the recent Evansville-Union Township smart growth implementation committee.
Plowing – Union Township wants either buy plows or contract the city to plow rural residential subdivisions (10 - 15 centerline miles). Evansville would be required to hire an additional employee and purchase another plow. This would not be a good fit to save taxpayer money, but Union may use Evansville’s fleet number when purchasing a new plow.
Share sand/salt purchases – Evansville purchases sand/salt directly from Rock county.
Share slurry seal & asphalt purchases – both communities currently purchases in large enough quantities to get a good price.
Renting space in new city garage to store Union Township vehicles - This would be a good fit to save taxpayer money. Evansville needs to determine the appropriate rental charge for Union Township vehicles.
Use new PW garage office area as Union Town Hall – A possibility, but Evansville currently has not plans for a large meeting room to make the garage ADA accessible.
Mowing – Union contracts mowing series twice a year (2nd week of June & 2nd week of September). Evansville does not have the proper equipment, but extra mowing personnel. Union has the proper equipment, but not the personnel.
Shared building inspector – currently share some duties. When Evansville’s existing PW director/building inspector retires, this maybe a great option.

• Land Use #3.1 – Expand identification, directional, and historic street signage
Discussed implementation of directional Wayfinding Signage. No plans to replace historic street signs due to their tendency to blow off the post.
8. Communications from City Engineer
• Discussion and possible motion to approve Madison Street & Main Street storm water sewer & sanitary sewer installation and design.
Bids are due on June 22. Contract awards at next public works meeting.
Construction will probably occur in fall after completion of WisDOT Madison Street railroad crossing replacement.
9. Communications of Public Works Director
Current Public Works projects include:
• Dry walling the former Farnsworth Ceramic Shop
• Sign Replacing
• 70% completed building new bathrooms in Leota Park.
• Completed installing solar panels onto Veterans Memorial pool roof.
• Mowing at cemetery & city parks.
• Cutting down storm damaged trees.
• Completed planting of municipal trees.
• Street sweeping.
• Brush pickup 1st week of each month.
10. New Business
A. Ordinance #2006-12, amending stop sign locations
4-way stop signs located at 5th & Badger; 5th & Porter; 5th & West Main as recommended by city engineer in his West Side traffic safety report.
• Send to Evansville common council Ordinance #2006-12, amending stop sign locations unanimously approved on a Hammann-Juergens motion.
B. Ordinance #2006-13, amending stop sign locations
4-way stop signs located at Higgins & Badger as recommended by citizens in that neighborhood during recent public hearing on road repair at that intersection.
• Send to Evansville common council Ordinance #2006-13, amending stop sign locations unanimously approved on a Hammann-Juergens motion.
C. Ordinance #2006-14, amending stop sign locations
4-way stop signs located at 5th & Vision Dr., and 6th & Vision Dr. Part of 5th & Vision Dr. intersection is located in Union township. 6th & Vision Dr. intersection currently has a sotrm water flume.
• Amend Ordinance #2006-14, to eliminate a stop sign on the southwest side of 5th & Vision Dr. intersection (located in Union township) unanimously approved on a Hammann-Juergens motion.

• Send to Evansville common council Ordinance #2006-14, amending stop sign locations as ammended by Public Works unanimously approved on a Hammann-Juergens motion.
D. Ordinance #2006-15, amending stop sign locations
3-way stop signs located at Brown School road & J. Lindemann Drive. Traffic has significantly increase since Ace hardware opened. Recommended by citizens in that neighborhood during recent public hearing at Planning Commission.
• Send to Evansville common council Ordinance #2006-15, amending stop sign locations unanimously approved on a Hammann-Juergens motion.
E. Ordinance #2006-__, amending Municipal Code relative to speed limits
Discussed reducing speed limit on county road M to 35 MPH within city limits.
We need to extend the city connecting highway limits on CTH M to the city limits before we have the authority to change speed limits on CTH M.
• Table Ordinance #2006-__, amending Municipal Code relative to speed limits unanimously approved on a Hammann-Sornson motion.
F. Discussion on extending the city connecting highway limits on CTH M from USH 14 to city limits (north & south)
City limits now starts at Countryside Drive in the north to newly annex property south of USH 14. The city would be responsible for road maintenance for this section of road.
The city plans to widen CTH M and construct curb & gutter south of USH 14 as part of the new industrial park. North of USH 14, the city is planning a sidewalk and possibly a bike lane along CTH M.
• Recommend to Evansville common council extending the city connecting highway limits on CTH M from USH 14 to city limits unanimously approved on a Hammann-Sornson motion.
G. Discussion regarding the possibility of establishing a public road between CTH M and Brown School Road through the Piggly Wiggly’s access drive (parcel 6-27-959.A1), the one-way alley north of Brighter Beginnings Day Care Center (parcel 6-27-959.A2), and part of Lot 1 of Grand Orchard Estates Subdivision with financing from potential Tax Incremental District No. 6
The proposal is constructing a boulevard with ultility power lines down the middle connecting Brownschool road with CTH M through the northside of Piggly Wiggly’s parking lot.
A septic field located under the north road would need to be replaced, potential issue with access off CTH M, and city would purchase additional land.
No action taken.
11. Meeting adjourned @ 9:50 p.m. on a Hammann-Juergens motion
Next Meeting: Monday, June 26 at 6:00 p.m.
July’s meeting moved to Thursday, July 20 at 6:00 p.m. (vacation conflict)

Bill Hammann Chair, Public Works Committee