HomeMy WebLinkAboutHARMONY VILLAGE PUD ODP - 65 93 - SUBMITTAL DOCUMENTS - ROUND 8 - Responses (3)• Mr. Steve Olt -3- 10/19/93
best follow-up in addressing City concerns on the matter of Harmony
Road access.
cc: Rick Ensdorf'
Matt Baker
Matt Delich
Frank Vaught
D & L Enterprises
Y
Very truly yours,
THE KAPLAN COMPANY, INC.
Lester M. Kaplan, President
+ Mr. Steve Olt -2- 10/19/93
Furthermore, any alternative access into the warehouse property
from Timberline Road would entail at least a 2500-ft. detour to enter
and again to exit westbound. Such a circuitous route may be argued as
unreasonable access by the warehouse site owners, certainly in light of
their contention to me of having an "irrevocable" access deed from the
C.D.O.T. I strongly urge the City to contact the owners,
Charles Lockman and Arlo Deines, with D & L Enterprises (482-6767), re-
garding the nature of their State -approved access into this property
and the City's expectation of eventually eliminating their access and
requiring a 2500-ft, detour to enter the property.
As a result of my meetings with Mr. Lockman and Mr. Deines, I am
proposing a shared access point between the warehouse property and the
Harmony Village commercial corner. This would occur in conjunction
with a deceleration lane being introduced in front of the warehouse
property. This shared access could be moved a bit to the east in order
to reduce the amount of deceleration crossing the railroad tracks, al-
though deceleration (not acceleration) may not be a problem crossing
tracks. This new access point would replace the existing curbcut, a
median and/or striping on Harmony Road would be added, and a decelera-
tion lane installed.
On April 30, 1993, I discussed this very proposal with City Trans-
portation.Director, Rick Ensdorf, who informed me that he believed such
an access point would meet the access control standards of the State
Access Control Statute. I understood these standards to require a mimi-
mum of 420 feet for deceleration and a 350-ft, setback from the signal-
ized intersection. Rick believed that a reasonable argument for State
approval was the substantial improvement in safety to the existing situ-
ation. If you have not already done so, please talk to Rick about his
thoughts on this matter.
While the Harmony Road Corridor Plan does not show a "new" access
point into the.Harmony/Timberline corner, it is significant that the
Plan similarly is silent on the questions of eliminating the public
safety problems associated with the current warehouse access and the
possibility of a shared access point.
I believe that with a thorough understanding of the issues and
flexibility of thought that a solution can be achieved which, although
not ideal, substantially reduces existing traffic dangers along this
portion of Harmony Road. I propose a note on the O.D.P. which acknow-
ledges the need for C.D.O.T, approval of the shared access. Implicit to
this is City approval as well to the design for deceleration, median ,
treatment, etc., associated with the proper traffic engineering.
Please advise me as to what additional information you may require
from Matt Delich, traffic engineer for Harmony Village, and how we can
/continued/
OCT
�5CM IV.
Mr. Steve Olt, Project Planner
Planning Department
City of Fort Collins
281 N. College Avenue
Fort Collins, CO 80522
Re: Harmony Village P.U.D.
overall Development Plan
Harmony Road Access
Dear Steve:
THE KAPLAN COMPANY, INC.
1060 Sailors Reef
Ft. Collins, CO 80525
October 19, 1993
This is an initial response, specifically to the Harmony Road ac-
cess question raised in your October 15, 1993 staff review comments on
the proposed Overall Development Plan for Harmony Village P.U.D.
Both an analysis of the tradeoffs involved to best achieve public
safety considerations and a realistic assessment of how/when the City
might eliminate the existing Harmony Road access into the warehouse use
directly west of the Harmony Village commercial corner must occur. to re-
spond properly to the question of Harmony Road access. I raise several
points here in hopes of advancing the dialogue toward a solution.
City staff has acknowledged that the long-standing, existing access
into the elongated, approximately 4-acre warehouse site contains numerous
safety problems: no deceleration lane exists for automobiles, let alone
the semi -tractors attempting to turn into the property; left turns by
tractors and other vehicles routinely occur from Harmony Road without de-
fined turning lanes or median;sand the driveway into the site is poorly
marked and lacks an acceleration lane. These public safety problems re-
lating to this situation will only worsen as traffic increases along
Harmony Road, particularly with additional school buses.
If the City is waiting for the "redevelopment" of the warehouse
property to obtain the opportunity to remove the danger, that is, make
the warehouse access "go away" as you state, this wait may be unaccep-
tably long, considering this worsening safety problem and, moreover, may
not occur easily. The City may want to consider that this warehouse is
highly successful economically, and is not likely to "redevelop" in the
typical manner of obsolete land uses. Its contiguity to the railroad and
positioning within the Harmony Road corridor virtually assure its long-
term commercial viability.
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