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Wal-Mart variance passed
BY FRANK ZUFALL
Spooner Advocate
Last Updated: Wednesday, July 12th, 2006 09:21:32 AM
The city of Spooner’s Board of Appeals on Wednesday, July 5, approved
two variance requests for the Wal-Mart Supercenter store project at the
intersection of Cty. Hwy. H and Hwy. 53.
Wal-Mart’s engineering firm, McClure Engineering of Rockford,
Ill., asked for 9.5-foot-wide angled parking stalls, smaller than the
city’s ordinance prescribes (12 feet wide) and requested an access road
closer than the 1,500 feet from a “freeway intersection” delineated in
the city’s ordinance.
Both Chairman Mike Spafford and member Darren Vik said the board
had dealt with several parking variance requests and suggested the
city’s parking ordinance is antiquated and should be modified to
reflect current practice for smaller parking lots.
Wal-Mart’s attorney, Susan Steinwall, said the request for smaller parking stalls is based on “common industry standards.”
Dave Cooper of Spooner said more stalls would mean more traffic,
and he questioned whether any assessment had been made to consider the
impact to local ecology.
Steinway said the smaller parking stalls would make the total
parking lot smaller, mitigating some environmental concerns for the
site.
Most public concern was over granting an access to the site only 1,100
feet west of the Cty. Hwy. H and Hwy. 53 intersection, 400 feet shorter
than the 1,500 prescribed in the city’s ordinances.
Spooner City Administrator Bill Marx noted that existing accesses
and one platted road are to the south of the development on Cty. Hwy. H
but those accesses were in place before the city annexed the area.
He also said the Washburn County Highway Department Shop’s access
north of Cty. Hwy. H also was not in compliance with the ordinance.
Marx said for the Wal-Mart access to be fully in compliance, the lot would need to be 40 acres versus the 36 acres it is.
Attorney Glen Stoddard, representing Washburn County First, a
grassroots organization opposing the Wal-Mart development, said
Wal-Mart knew the lot was too small when it proposed a plat for the
site and the fact that the most feasible access was still not within
the city’s ordinance was a “self-created hardship.” He said going from
1,500 feet to 1,100 feet was a “pretty big reduction.”
He said for the board to consider the existing accesses within the
1, 500 feet range as precedent for allowing Wal-Mart’s variance was
“backwards.”
Several Washburn County First members pointed out that McClure’s
traffic analysis predicted up to 7,000 vehicles a day using the access.
They said with that intense amount of traffic the city should consider
safety first and follow the existing ordinance and deny the request.
Roger Charron of Spooner, a member of Washburn County First, said
the project is too big for the site and the developer and Wal-Mart are
trying to make it fit at the cost of public safety.
Washburn County First Chair Steve Carlson said the board had to be
concerned with safety and should consider a second opinion before
making a decision. He encouraged the board to wait until McClure had
obtained all traffic analysis information requested by the Wisconsin
Department of Transportation.
Don Posh of Casey Township said by approving the access variance,
the city would be setting a precedent and therefore should not grant
it.
Steinwall said Wal-Mart is putting the access as far west as
possible on the site to be as compliant as it can be with the city’s
ordinance, and she said to deny access to the property places a
hardship on the seller (Washburn County), making the property
“non-sellable.” |
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