There’s a new twist in the effort to extend Conley Road from the Walmart shopping center through the Columbia Country Club to Business Loop 70. The Transportation Development District set up to fund the road extension project looks like it’s trying to get out of that obligation.
The Walmart property owners, known as TKG Conley Road Investments in this case, submitted a request in November 2009 to rezone an old Missouri Department of Transportation site on Conley Road that they own. They withdrew it this week after vehement opposition by the country club and questions from city staff about the traffic study for the area.
The rezoning request by the Walmart property owners (companies and investors affiliated with property mogul Stan Kroenke) has been contentious from the beginning. There’s still no agreement with the adjacent Columbia Country Club for right of way to extend Conley Road to Business Loop 70, despite years of negotiations. That’s why TKG set up a Transportation Development District in the shopping center, to extend Conley road, though now they say they aren’t required to do it.
Basically, the Country Club owners thought they were getting some of the former MoDOT land to accommodate a redesign of its course if it gave the up the Conley right of way. They also want more money than the TDD is willing to pay. The club was surprised that TKG went forward with a rezoning request before the right-of-way/redesign matter was resolved.
But the traffic study submitted as part of the rezoning request is the interesting part here. The latest one submitted by TKG, done by Crawford, Bunte Brammeier, concludes that the extension of Conley Road is not warranted. That conflicts with a 2005 traffic study by the same firm on the same area that recommended pursuing the extension.
City staff disagreed with the latest traffic study, and does not support the rezoning without the Conley Road extension.
The Public Works Department and the Planning Department both disagree with the study’s future traffic flow assertions and have questions about its methodology.
Conley was supposed to be extended using Transportation Development District funds, levied with a half-percent sales tax on stores in the Conley Road shopping center. The TDD’s attorney, Craig Van Matre has said the court order establishing the TDD doesn’t require them to build the road.
But the city maintains that the intergovernmental agreement requires the TDD to facilitate the Conley Road construction. Indeed, the agreement entered into between the TDD and the city says the TDD “shall” construct or cause to be constructed the transportation projects.
The district and the country club are still at odds over compensation and redesign. “Until that issue is resolved, no one should be going forward with the rezoning,” the club’s president, Jean Leonatti, said.
TKG’s attorney, Robert Hollis said he expects to refile a rezoning application once he and his client sort out with the city whether Conley Road needs to be extended or not. And if the TDD and the country club can’t work out a price the TDD is willing to pay for the right of way… “You can’t get blood out of a turnip,” Hollis said. “If the TDD d0esn’t have the funds to build the road, you can’t do that.”
The planner who reviewed the project, Matt Lepke, said he thought it was interesting that the latest traffic study found the road would be at capacity by 2017 even if Conley is extended. At the rate negotiations are going, that would mean construction would be finished very close to 2017.
If the TDD is trying to get out of its obligation to extend that road, “I wouldn’t be surprised if they hang their hat on that,” Lepke said.
It seems like the TDD is tired of trying to work something out with the club, and got a traffic study to question the necessity of the road. The club owners are trying to get as much as it can out of the TDD, knowing that public sentiment is against them. And the city doesn’t want to pay for the road, which is on all kinds of infrastructure planning documents.
But if the city is going to force the district to build the road, and it can’t reach an agreement, it can always use eminent domain authority.
Here’s some background on the dispute:
Country Club, Kroenke squabble over road extension
Conley Road extension on shaky ground
Categories: City Politics.
