Stage set for another Newport Road development debate

IOWA CITY — The surveyor representing the applicants of a controversial Newport Road rezoning request predicts county supervisors will overturn the planning and zoning committee's vote to deny the request.

At its latest meeting, the Johnson County Planning and Zoning Commission voted 4-1 to deny an application for rezoning at 2620 Newport Road.

In the draft minutes from the March 9 meeting, which will not be finalized until the committee's April 13 meeting, the four commission members who voted against the rezoning cited a desire to see more current traffic count information.

However, Shoemaker and Haaland's survey department manager Tom Anthony, who is representing rezoning applicants Jeff and Judith Stevens, said that vote should have never taken place if the commission felt it had inadequate data.

'They punished my client because they didn't have the information,' Anthony said.

Commission member Robert Conrad said his vote to deny rezoning was based on a number of concerns, with the added traffic that accompanies residential development a key factor.

'Honestly, we look at the facts in front of us ... A big concern for me was safety, among other reasons,' Conrad said.

The rezoning would change roughly 15 acres of land at 2620 Newport Road from agricultural to residential. Conceptual designs in the application detail a four-lot subdivision on the site.

The Johnson County Board of Supervisors will take up the matter at its April 9 meeting. Staff have recommended approval of the rezoning, stating that it meets requirements for the county Land Use Plan and North Corridor Development Area.

Preliminary traffic count information for Newport Road became available soon after the commission's vote and should compel the board to overrule the commission's vote, Anthony said.

Preliminary traffic counts by the Iowa Department of Transportation for the stretch of Newport Road between its intersections with Prairie du Chien and Sugar Bottom roads — compiled July 29-31 last year — place the road's Annual Average Daily Traffic at 994 to 1,047 vehicles. Newport Road's traffic count in 2010 was 1,030 AADT.

County assistant planner Josh Busard said the general rule for planning and zoning matters is eight additional vehicle trips per new lot, meaning the conceptual plans for the Newport Road development would add roughly 32 daily vehicle trips to the road.

Once traffic surpasses the 2,000 AADT threshold, established in the county's road performance standards ordinance, development cannot take place until the road is added to the county's five-year road improvement plan.

Traditionally, official traffic counts take place during the platting process, which comes after a rezoning and before development.

A nthony said it is extremely unlikely that any development on the Stevens property would generate the roughly 900 daily vehicle trips to bring Newport Road near that 2,000 AADT threshold

'In this situation there's no way that it's going to even touch 2,000,' Anthony said. 'The Board of Supervisors are going to see that, they'll see the real number is under the threshold ... They may even scold the commission for their denial.'

Terry Dahms, chair of the planning and zoning commission and the only member to vote in favor of the rezoning, said he felt the application met all requirements established by county rule.

'I hesitate to criticize my fellow commissioners, but their justifications for denial still elude me,' Dahms said, adding that the board's vote could have much bigger implications than just on the Newport Road rezoning. 'I think it's very clear that if the supervisors would also turn this down and deny it, then what that does is put a whole Land Use Plan up in the air.'

In the end, that decision is up to the board.

'Ultimately, (the supervisors) have the say, and honestly they can make either decision they want,' Conrad said. 'I kind of look forward to hear what they say.'