CC Minutes - 11/26/01 Meeting - Laserfiche WebLink

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Councilor Rayor asked if the public interest would be prejudiced if the council had no reason other than a strong gut feeling the council needed the alley. City Attorney Glenn Klein responded it depended on the basis for the feeling. He somewhat disagreed with PeaceHealth's argument regarding the public interest, saying he believed the council had discretion to make that determination on the basis of the traffic using the alley. Councilor Nathanson suggested that traffic patterns in the area were complicated by the fact that area streets were one-way streets. She believed the council needed the discretion to determine what was in the public interest, and when she looked at the distance pedestrian traffic would be diverted, it was not a long distance. She did not think pedestrians or bicyclists would have to go more than one-half block. She asked about the bus stop on Hilyard, saying it did not appear the alley was fundamental to the use of that stop. Mr. Reinhard agreed. He added that staff was concerned about the uses displaced from the alley, such as vehicle loading and unloading, access to parking, etc. He disagreed with the contention that those trips were solely the hospital's problem; he thought the extent to which they impacted the public street system should have a bearing on the issue. Councilor Nathanson asked what would be the substantive difference between approving the vacation request now and approving the request after a site plan was submitted. She asked if City staff would be involved in the development, review, and approval of the site plan. Mr. Reinhard said yes, staff expected to be involved. Speaking to the first question, Mr. Reinhard said that the staff recommendation regarding this vacation was not typical, but he pointed out that once vacated, it was possible that the redevelopment plan would not come to fruition. He did not expect that to occur, but it was the basis of the staffs concern. Jerry Jacobson of the Planning and Development Department suggested the issue was what should happen first, the planning or the vacation. Generally, there were development plans in place to demonstrate the vacation was warranted. Given the need to consider the public interest, staff believed it was in the public interest to have certainty that the vacation was warranted. Councilor Nathanson asked if staff would have the authority to influence the master site plan in terms of such elements as the location of loading docks, driveways, etc., if the council determined the vacation was warranted now because of its interest in increasing density downtown and interest in maintaining medical services downtown. Mr. Jacobson said yes. Councilor Nathanson asked what was the loss to the applicant as opposed to the gain to the public if the council denied the alley vacation. Mr. Jacobson said that he did not know. He said that development was costly, and time was money. He said that the City generally had more certainty as to what would happen in the future to demonstrate the need for the vacation. Mr. Terrett agreed it would be nice if the City had more certainty, but the hospital's resources had been stretched by its planning on the new Springfield campus. He said that PeaceHealth's work had progressed to the general concepts level; he anticipated the Hilyard campus would be an outpatient center, but the precise distribution of services had not been determined. Mr. Terrett MINUTES--Eugene City Council November 26, 2001 Page 10 Regular Meeting