Biersdorf & Associates Project #- 3425.011 and 3425.012

Condemning Authority- City of Minnetonka, Hennepin County and State of Minnesota

Minnetonka gives OK to Shady Oak Road widening

By LAURIE BLAKE, Star Tribune

December 19, 2007

Finding no choice but to approve the widening of Shady Oak Road despite higher costs, the Minnetonka City Council has cleared the project to begin next year.

By 2010, the road will be widened from Excelsior Boulevard to Bren Road, a distance of about 1.7 miles, at a cost of $30 million. The design calls for two lanes in each direction, with left and right turn lanes, a median and a trail flanking the road.

To lessen the city’s financial burden and encourage Minnetonka to pursue the project, Hennepin County has reduced the city’s $6.5 million share of costs by $355,000. The county also will allow the city to pay for the project over four years instead of two. That means the city can use four years of state aid to make its payments instead of having to borrow to make the payments in two years.

After learning this month that construction costs had more than tripled from the $8.6 million projected in 2004, the council delayed final action to consider financing options, ways to cut the cost and the pros and cons of delaying the work. On Monday night, it decided to proceed.

City Engineer Lee Gustafson reported that $5.5 million in federal funding could be lost if the project were delayed. He said that there was no way to eliminate the project’s expensive retaining walls and that replacing decorative walls with plain ones would save only about $800,000. And he said $658,000 already has been spent on the needed right of way.

Council members said they felt painted into a corner.

“We asked the staff to look at options,” said Council Member Dick Allendorf. “What we got back was ‘you’ve got no options.’ ”

All this leaves the city having to widen one segment of Shady Oak without knowing how to pay to widen the next segment north of the project, from Excelsior Boulevard to Hwy. 7. But four lanes along the southern segment will put more pressure on the two lanes north of Excelsior, Allendorf said.

That next segment of Shady Oak, as well as rebuilding two more segments of Hwy. 101, are among several high-priority road projects for the city. City staffers have said one way to pay for those roads would be through bonding, but several council members oppose that.

“We need to get this road done, but we need to take a much closer look at how we are going to do these in the future,” said Council Member Terry Schneider.

Said Council Member Brad Wiersum: “We don’t have enough money for all the roads we need.”

The council voted on the Shady Oak project after midnight at a meeting that started Monday, when it also devoted a lot of discussion to a proposed Opus Northwest office complex off Interstate 394 at Hopkins Crossroads.

Neighbors near that site had objected to a view of new parking ramps and the traffic that the development would bring. In a split vote, the City Council rejected the project.

Laurie Blake • 612-673-1711

The purpose of these two projects is to widen Shady Oak Road from North of Bren Road to South of Excelsior Blvd and from North of Excelsior Blvd to Hwy 7 in Minnetonka and Hopkins.

For Excelsior Blvd to Hwy 7 sections construction will begin in 2009 and property acquisition will begin in October 2007 and construction is anticipated to begin in May 2008.

For Bren Road to Excelsior Blvd, construction is scheduled to begin in Spring ‘07 and property acquisition is almost complete.

For further information on these two projects, call our office at 612.339.7242, or visit the following 2 websites:

Excelsior Blvd to Hwy 7:
http://www.hopkinsmn.com/publicworks/construction/shadyoak.html
Bren Road to Excelsior:
http://www.eminnetonka.com/news_events/show_project.cfm?link_id=Shady_Oak_Reconstruction_Bren_to_3&cat_link_id=Street&sub_cat_link_id=Road_Reconstruction

For all business and property owners NOT west of Shady Oak Road between Excelsior Blvd and Oak Drive Lane, a limited amount of funds are available at this time.  Additional funding for property acquisition would need to be provided after the approval of the Preliminary Layout.  These funds are for total acquisition, relocation and easement compensation as part of the road construction project.