Planning board green lights 102-unit subdivision

The Columbia Falls City County planning board Tuesday approved a 102-unit subdivision off Meadow Lake Boulevard, voting to send it on to the Columbia Falls City Council for final analysis and approval.

Columbia Falls developer Mick Ruis has laid out a planned unit development on a little more than 28 acres, of which about 40%, or 11.42 acres would be preserved as open space as it’s wetlands bisected by Garnier Creek.

The development, called Garnier Heights, would have a variety of housing in clusters. It includes 48 fourplexes and 28 duplexes as well as 26 single family detached homes.

The development would span a parcel of land from Meadow Lake Boulevard to North Hilltop Road. It’s just south of the viaduct.

The single family lots would be on the west side of the property — some will face North Hilltop Road. Most of the land to the south, north and east of the property is owned by Weyerhaeuser.

It’s one of the largest subdivisions in years in Columbia Falls. The city will annex the property and serve it with sewer and water.

A sewer main already runs by the property as it serves Meadow Lake Resort. The city recently put in a third well, so water won’t be a problem, city staff noted.

The planning board spent about 21/2 hours going over the application and tweaking the conditions to assure that it had an adequate bus stop, playground equipment and other amenities.

The greater debate wasn’t so much about the subdivision itself, but access to it. There was concern that there’s no sidewalks along Meadow Lake Boulevard and North Hilltop Road.

One resident said that he was concerned about homes that faced North Hilltop Road, because people come up and over a hill near them at a high rate of speed, even though the posted speed limit is 25 mph.

Another North Hilltop neighbor was worried that the fourplexes would abut her backyard, but it turned out the plan calls for a single family home adjacent to her property. In that case, she asked for a fence or some other barrier.

On the traffic side of things, the planning board added a condition that Ruis consult with the Montana Department of Transportation on adding a left-hand turn signal at both Hilltop and Meadow Lake Boulevard.

The signals currently only have a yellow flashing light, not a dedicated green light.

Planning board member Sam Kavanagh suggested that when the water lines go in, perhaps a bike/pedestrian path on Meadow Lake Boulevard could go in at the same time.

The problem is both North Hilltop and Meadow Lake Boulevard are county roads and currently the county has placed a moratorium on bike paths unless they’re fully funded by another entity and they have a maintenance plan as well. The city can’t require Ruis to put in paths outside the subdivision, noted city planner Eric Mulcahy,

The city council takes up the subdivision at its July 6 meeting at 7 p.m. Interested members of the public can weigh in another public hearing at that time.

If the plan is approved, work on the subdivision could begin next year and it will take two to three years to completely build out, Bruce Lutz, a landscape architect with the WGM Group told council.

WGM is doing the planning and engineering for the development.