Marion council considers feedback to downtown plan

The Marion City Council will take the next two weeks to digest comments from two dozen residents who spoke at a public hearing last night both for and against the proposed redevelopment of the town's central corridor.

A crowd of more than 100 spilled out of the council chambers into the hallway for the two-hour session. The council took no action last night, and Mayor Paul Rehn said it will be discussed at the next regular council meeting Nov. 19.

Nearly equal numbers of proponents and opponents of the long-range plan attended, including interested residents and those with business interests along the existing Seventh Avenue corridor and the proposed Sixth Avenue roadway.

Among those praising the project were former longtime city engineers Terry Chew and John Bender, both of whom said the plan would greatly improve traffic flow through the downtown and provide a vision for future commercial development.

Uptown businessman Craig Campbell, who with wife Priscilla has owned the Campbell Steele Gallery since 1991, said he had been involved in numerous planning sessions over the past nine months and feels the proposed concept incorporates dozens of ideas from hundreds of residents.

Representing a coalition of about 50 business owners of the Marion Corridor Association, Marion Brush Manufacturing Co. owner Gary Bolden presented two petitions with more than 4,000 names of residents against the plan.

Many, he said, feel a roundabout east of the downtown area will cut off the traffic flow for businesses located on Seventh Avenue all the way to 31st Street.

“If you drop the roundabout,” Bolden said, “we'd all be onboard.”

-- Tom Fruehling, news correspondent