Oak Street could be 'feeder' street

Landowners see area as potential development for

building lots

By RON LARSEN

Journal Staff Writer

NEW ULM -- Will Oak Street, now only a gravel road that dead-ends into a farm yard, serve as a "feeder" street, carrying traffic down off the hill from North Highland Avenue like Fifth North Street does now?

"I can see Oak Street joining Fifth North and 16th North as feeder streets to the lower part of the city," Community Development Director Dave Schnobrich said.

That was just one of the questions debated during the City Council's informational meeting on proposed alignments of Oak Street Tuesday afternoon.

Right now, Oak Street is a short, gravel road serving two farmsteads off North Garden Street just north of 11th North's intersection with Garden. However, the Catholic Diocese of New Ulm and individuals who own farmsteads and open farm land between Garden and North Highland, all of whom are thinking about future development, wanted a decision now on the street's eventual alignment.

Five proposed alignments were prepared by Bolton & Menk, Inc., consulting engineers with offices in Sleepy Eye.

Through the process of elimination, City Manager Brian Gramentz said, the selections were narrowed to two: Alignment No. 3 which uses a ravine to circumnavigate the hill and Alignment No. 5 which follows the straight-line, platted route over the top of the hill.

Alignment No. 3 starts out from Garden Street following the platted path on a grade approaching 11 percent until it reaches the driveway of the Glen Wech farmstead. Then, it angles off to the left cutting through a corner of the Schneider farmstead and continues to curve around the hill until it is back on the platted route.

As the roadway passes the Wech driveway, grade drops to between 4.98-8.24 percent to the top of the hill. With Alignment No. 5, the grade beyond the Wech driveway ranges from 4.98 percent to 11.99 percent to the top of the hill.

The trade-off in the two alignments is that No. 3 has better street grades but poorer sight lines (for traffic), and No. 5 has poorer street grades but better sight lines, Bolton & Menk's Duane Hansel explained.

However, as Councilor Ruth Ann Webster noted, No. 3 leaves in tact more buildable lots than No. 5 because dirt will have to be moved on the hill to maintain a lower grade.

As Hansel had explained, the cut required in the hillside for No. 5 would have to be "feathered back" a significant amount which would result in a loss of building lots.

Then, there is the estimated cost of each alignment. Hansel said his firm's estimate for Alignment No. 3 was $728,000 which compares with $829,800 for Alignment No. 5.

"While alignment three requires more land to be acquired for rights-of-way (2.15 acres versus 1.65 acres), that probably won't amount to a swing of $10,000 either way so that won't change the difference in costs much," Gramentz told the council.

Councilor Clark Tuttle, who later made the motion to adopt Alignment No. 3 at the City Council's regular meeting Tuesday night, said, "I haven't heard a compelling reason from staff or anybody else here why the city should spend $100,000 more for No. 5 so I'm going to support No. 3."

Glen Wech, one of the landowners involved, said he didn't have a problem with No. 3; he just wanted to know where the street would go when it's built so that he and the others could make development plans.

As to when the Oak Street extension might become a reality, City Engineer Steve Koehler said it would be hard to hazard a guess.

"It could be 5 years, 10 years, 20 or 30 years. I guess it would be recommended when it's needed."