Loading...
HomeMy WebLinkAbout1988/01/11 - ADMIN - Minutes - City Council - Study Session MINUTES 1111 CITY COUNCIL STUDY SESSION ST LOUIS PARK CITY COUNCIL January 11, 1988 1 . Call to Order The meeting was called to order at 7: 10 p.m. 2. Roll Call The following members were present at roll call : Bruce Battaglia, Tom Duffy, Allen Friedman, Keith Meland, Larry Mitchell , David Strand, Lyle Hanks. Also present were the Manager and Assistant City Manager. 3. Meeting with the Cable TV Commission City Council met with members of the Cable TV Advisory Commission to discuss the renewal process and identify priorities for franchise negotiations. The following members of the Cable Commission were present: Marty Elstrom, Gerry Quilling, Frank Abramson, Art Summerfield, Bruce Browning and Harold Haskovitz. Sandy Beach representing Park Cable Works was also present. The City's attorney for cable matters, Gary Matz, was also present. Mayor Hanks asked if a timeframe had been established for beginning franchise negotiations. The Assistant City Manager replied that negotiations could begin within the next month. At the request of Councilmember Strand, Gary Matz reviewed the process set forth in the Cable Communications Policy Act that guides the renewal process. Councilmembers and members of the Cable TV Commission discussed the summary of Nortel 's proposal and shared their priorities for franchise negotiations. They requested that Nortel make a presentation before the Cable TV Commission at its January 28, 1988 meeting and that a presentation be made for City Council at the Feb. 1 , 1988 meeting. 4. Sign ordinance amendment re billboards Mike Cronin of Naegele Outdoor Advertising was present to explain the company' s billboard proposal . Mr. Cronin described some of the problems and ordinance limitations that prevented Naegele from improving individual billboards. He said that Naegele was presenting a package approach to the City Council because it would provide an opportunity to make a number of changes to existing billboards that could not be done on a piecemeal basis. He indicated that Naegele would need to have certain ordinance provisions relaxed, among them the requirement that billboards could not be removed and then replaced in a different location at a later point in time. Mr. Cronin also asked III Council for its reaction to the billboard proposal . Councilmember Mitchell asked why the proposal included expanding billboards onto Louisiana Ave. Mr. Cronin replied that Naegele believed that locations on Louisiana Ave. south of Hwy. 7 would be preferable to trying to find additional locations on Excelsior Blvd. Council study session minutes 2. Jan. 11 , 1988 Mr. Cronin told the City Council that Naegele had many good billboard locations41111 in St. Louis Park. He said that Naegele tried to find some bad locations that would have allowed a reduction in the total number of faces. However, Mr. Cronin said that Naegele's staff believed that all of the sign locations in St. Louis Park were good and that the number of existing sign faces should be retained. He also commented that the proposal currently does not account for two sign faces that Naegele would want to retain within St. Louis Park. Mr. Cronin said that the proposal provided several benefits to the City, among them that billboards would be of a smaller size, would be removed off of rooftops and would be located further from residential properties. Councilmember Strand asked if staff had done any research on the proposed St. Paul billboard ordinance. The Assistant City Manager replied that the St. Paul situation was very different from St. Louis Park and did not apply to our circumstances. She noted that in many instances billboards are within 50 feet of residential properties and that they are very closely spaced together. She said that the St. Louis Park ordinance already achieves further spacing from residential properties and further spacing between billboards in addition to limiting areas of the City where billboards can be constructed. Councilmember Mitchell noted that the billboard ordinance adopted in 1983 was in essence negotiated between the City and Naegele. He said that the same strategy is being used again and that the more we negotiate, the worse the situation with billboards will become. 41111 Councilmember Mitchell said that he does not favor paying Naegele for the billboards to be removed. Therefore, he said that he favored making billboards a non-conforming use so that whenever they come down, they stay down. Councilmember Friedman asked if there were any other sign companies in St. Louis Park and questioned in which areas billboards could be relocated. Staff replied that the only billboard company in the City is Naegele and indicated the zoning districts and streets upon which billboards could be located. Councilmember Mitchell said that in 1983 Naegele had requested incentives in the billboard ordinance to aid the company in improving billboards, especially those along Excelsior Blvd. He noted that the incentives did not stimulate any significant improvements along Excelsior Blvd. Councilmembers requested that consideration of the sign ordinance amendment be placed on the January 19, 1988 agenda. 5. Appointment of Council liaison to boards/commissions Council discussed the role that boards and commissions play in the governance process. They questioned the need to assign Council liaisons to serve on the various boards and commissions. Council members agreed that this question should be studied more thoroughly by the Governance committee. City Council study session minutes 3. Jan. 11 , 1988 1111 6. Legislative liaison Council reviewed proposals for providing legislative services to the City. Councilmembers requested that this item be placed on the January 19, 1988 agenda. 7. Hwy. 7/Minnetonka Blvd. The City Manager presented a history of the proposed improvement plans for Hwy. 7/Minnetonka Blvd. The first plan for upgrading this area was contained within the Park Hill study. He noted that it was not significantly different from the most recent MnDOT proposal . Councilmembers questioned why a state plan has been developed for this area. The City Manager said that the rationale for the plan included safety concerns, upgrading the temporary signals to permanent signals, improving the esthetics and instituting a pedestrian actuated system of signals. Councilmembers indicated that they did not wish to proceed with plans for Hwy. 7/Minnetonka Blvd. at this time. 8. Ottawa Ave. The City Manager presented an outline for studying traffic and parking controls for Ottawa Ave. from Minnetonka Blvd. to Hwy. 7. II 9. Action plan for I-394 frontage roads The City Manager distributed the draft of an action plan for addressing the design of frontage roads for 1-394. After reviewing the action plan, Council asked staff to begin reviewing future traffic levels and to evaluate the I-394 study with respect to the impact on frontage roads. 10. Joint powers agreement regarding I-394 60, 54N-4,) The City Manager explained that the I-394 Task Force was interested in investigating the possibility of creating a traffic management organization that would operate independently. Members would be appointed by the cities and would be charged with developing traffic management standards for development along the 1-394 corridor. The City Manager said that Minnetonka and Golden Valley were also discussing their interest in establishing a traffic management organization. He noted that if a traffic management organization is established through a joint powers agreement, the task force would be giving up much of its authority in this area. Therefore, he explained that the parameters for establishing the traffic management organization must be clearly defined. Councilmembers indicated that they supported a system-wide approach to traffic management on I-394. They did not feel a piecemeal approach would be effective. 11 . Adjournment, - The meeting adjourned at 10: 15 p.m. Wisc.ii aron G �u .. , Recording Secretary