Decision comes after 4-3 vote by the City council

The Albert Lea City Council voted 4-3 Monday to move forward with changing a portion of South Broadway from a four-lane to a three-lane highway.

The work comes as the Minnesota Department of Transportation is slated to mill and overlay the road this summer from Main Street south to near Interstate 35. The three-lane portion will be from Seventh Street to Main Street.

The road will have two regular driving lanes and a center turn lane, along with bike lanes that could also act as buffer zones on both sides of the street and parallel parking. The bike lanes would be used primarily by people going to and from work and would not be promoted for families with children to use.

Making the switch to a three-lane road will cost an additional $40,000 — $15,000 of which will be paid for with a Statewide Health Improvement Project grant. This covers the additional cost for striping the road and some sign replacements.

Albert Lea Mayor Vern Rasmussen said though the project has both pros and cons, he could not deny having three engineers who said that going to a three-lane road would improve safety.

“This is a project that will see more fruit than problems,” Rasmussen said, noting that similar changes are taking place all over the state.

Rasmussen and councilors John Schulte V, Larry Baker and Larry Anderson voted in favor of the changes, while councilors George Marin, Reid Olson and Al “Minnow” Brooks voted against.

The vote came after at least a dozen people voiced opinions of the project.

Anderson said for him the vote came down to getting improved safety for people in front of the Freeborn County Courthouse.

Baker talked about visiting Lanesboro and seeing how successfully the motorists, bicyclists and pedestrians appear to get along well in that community.

He said though he had gone back and forth on a decision for the project, he looks at it as an opportunity to calm traffic on South Broadway.

Marin said he could not vote in favor of the project because of what he had heard from constituents. He said what stuck out to him was that none of the proponents who spoke out at the meeting lived or operated businesses on South Broadway. On the other hand, none of the business owners on South Broadway who voiced their opinion were in favor of the changes.

“That weighs heavily with me in my decision,” he said.

Engineers have said reducing the roadway to three lanes would decrease speeds and reduce traffic crashes by an average of 29 percent.

Nancy Klema, MnDOT district traffic operations engineer, said Broadway presently has the least safe design in a four-lane, non-divided roadway. She said if MnDOT were looking at expanding a road to a four-lane road today, there would need to be a daily volume of 14,000 vehicles on that road, unless there are other operational issues. South Broadway from Main Street to Seventh Street has a volume of much less, she said.

“You’ve got four lanes that you don’t need,” Klema said. “It’s more capacity than you need.”

She talked of several conversions from four lanes to three lanes in other parts of the state, including in Ramsey County where some roads even had a daily volume of about 15,000 vehicles.

City Manager Chad Adams said the council has identified South Broadway as a redevelopment corridor.

He said he and city staff view this project as a compliment to the downtown reconstruction completed in the last few years. Many of the same design elements from North Broadway will be included down the street up to Front Street.

He pointed out how the new infrastructure on North Broadway is helping to revitalize that area and how the South Broadway project would encourage multiple forms of transportation and support a younger generation.

Albert Lea Convention and Visitors Bureau Executive Director Susie Petersen talked about the concerns people had with the improvements on North Broadway before that project was completed but now how people want to be downtown.

“It has been so exciting,” Petersen said.

Randy Kehr said the South Broadway project is an economic development opportunity and a chance to make Albert Lea more attractive to young people.

“Change is difficult,” he said. “Change is always difficult, but change can be good.”

He said Albert Lea needs to make a choice from being a community that doesn’t attract jobs or grow to being a community where others want to move here.

Albert Lea resident John Schulz and his wife, Sheila, who are avid bikers, talked about the opportunity Albert Lea has in the South Broadway project. He said having the bike lanes on the road is attractive to the entire biking community.

“This is a critical part of our development and the direction we’re headed,” Schulz said.

Opponents to the change said they were worried about traffic congestion on the stretch and said they did not think the change was warranted.

Business owner Tom Hestness said he has lived and worked on Broadway for 26 years and does not feel the data and traffic counts that were used in the engineer’s review of the project were adequate, as the counts were taken from about 4:15 to 5:45 p.m., when the busy part of the day on the road is from 3:15 to 4 p.m.

He said he thinks traffic is more dangerous on East Main Street near the truck stops.

He questioned the narrowing from four lanes to three lanes near Seventh Street when there are exits from Hardee’s and Martin’s Cycling & Fitness and whether response time for emergency response vehicles would be affected with the change. He asked the council to consider delaying their vote to get more questions answered.

Tom Ferleman, who owns 1109 S. Broadway, said he is concerned that the flooding problem on South Broadway will not be fixed before the overlay is in place. He said he thought putting the $40,000 aside and saving it for the repairs for the water problem would be a better use of the money.

Jeff Nielsen, owner of Broadway Automotive, said he thinks the changes will be confusing to drivers and said he didn’t think the lane reduction could handle any time there is a detour off of Interstate 35 through town.