Supreme Court upholds Champlain Parkway plan
A final legal challenge to the Champlain Parkway, a long-delayed roadway from Interstate 189 Burlington, was overcome Friday with a decision by the Vermont Supreme Court.
The decision turns aside a landowner's lawsuit that took issue with traffic congestion forecasts in the project's Act 250 permit.
On Friday afternoon, Mayor Miro Weinberger said construction on the complex project might begin in 2018.
Earlier in the day, the mayor hailed the court's decision as "an important milestone" in "designing the road, bike path, and pedestrian infrastructure that promotes safe, efficient, and sustainable mobility in Burlington."
Neither Chuck Bayer, the Detroit-based developer who filed the appeal, nor his legal team, could be reached for comment Friday afternoon.
In April 2012 the the District 4 Environmental Commission approved permits for the parkway, which is proposed to run north from I-189 to Lakeside Avenue, and then doglegging to Pine Street.
Bayer, whose Fortieth Burlington company owns the large Innovation Center on Lakeside Avenue, filed his appeal to the Environmental Court shortly thereafter.
Bayer's argument: The parkway's design would substantially increase waiting times for traffic in the vicinity of his property.
That argument maintains some legitimacy, wrote Associate Justice Marilyn Skoglund in the Supreme Court's unanimous decision. But, she added, traffic projections for the permit relied on forecasts that were "dramatically overstated" in the application process.
Under the terms of the permit, Burlington must monitor the Lakeside intersections and perform traffic studies every six months for the first year of the roadway, and annually for the next two years.
The permit also requires city officials to work "in good faith" with Fortieth Burlington to resolve congestion and safety issues.
If those efforts fail, the permit allows Fortieth to re-open its appeal.
The city remains committed to "resolving conflicts and concerns with City residents and continues to move ahead with designing the road, bike path, and pedestrian infrastructure that promotes safe, efficient, and sustainable mobility," the mayor wrote.
Later in the day he elaborated: The parkway's designers will incorporate every possible safety feature into the blueprints, but the time for further public input is over.
But, Weinberger added, there remain plenty of opportunities for residents to weigh in on proposed development of neighborhoods around the railyard as well as the "South End PlanBTV" plan currently underway for parts of the city adjacent to the parkway.
This story was originally published online on Friday, Aug. 21, 2015.
Contact Joel Banner Baird at 660-1843 or joelbaird@FreePressMedia.com. Follow him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/vtgoingup.
EARLIER: Message in a Bottlneck
Parkway Timeline
Most of the northward progress of the Champlain Parkway has taken place on the drawing board:
• Back in the freer-spending early 1960s, a throughway (the "Burlington Beltline") was proposed along the city's western edge — one that would zip motorists north from Interstate 189 in South Burlington to the Circ Highway (Vermont 289) in Colchester, and loop them back to Interstate 89 at Williston.
• By the early 1970s, economic and environmental constraints result in a scaled-back Southern Connector that would follow Pine Street north from I-189, and then veer west to join the southern end of Battery Street.
• Environmental concerns heighten in the late 1970s with a more detailed appreciation for the pollution of wetlands around the Pine Street Barge Canal. Construction within the new Superfund site is ultimately deemed unsafe.
• Throughout the 1980s, the city considers alternative routes. Lakeside Avenue and Pine Street emerge as the most suitable conduits for traffic heading downtown.
• As planning continued in the 1990s, newer versions of the road, which would travel through residential areas, become known as the "Champlain Parkway."
• At the turn of the 21st century, designs for downtown sections of the Parkway show the number of lanes reduced from four to two.
Burlington's downtown — specifically, Main Street — is designated as the roadway's terminus.
Concerns are raised over the added traffic's impact on the historically significant (and economically precarious) King and Maple streets neighborhood.
• April 27, 2012, the District 4 Environmental Commission grants Act 250 approval to the project, with the exception of stormwater permits. Within a month, four legal challenges had been filed.
Among them:
• Maple Street resident Allen Hunt objected to the impact traffic might have on a historic and largely low-income neighborhood. Upgrades to the plan's pedestrian access resulted;
• Vermont Railway contested some of the parkway's rights-of-way across some of the area's older rail spurs; and
• Charles M. Bayer Jr., a principal at Fortieth Burlington LLC (and owner of the Innovation Center/old GE plant), claims that the plan will create congestion at Lakeside Avenue and Pine Street.
• February 2014: The last unsettled appeal to the parkway's Act 250 permit, is filed by Fortieth Burlington LLC in Vermont Environmental Court.
• July 30, 2014: Judge Thomas Walsh rules that concerns over safety and congestion may not, by law, be grounds for denying a permit.
• Aug. 25, 2014:Act 250 land-use permit issued to the parkway upheld by Vermont's Environmental Court. Soon afterward, Bayer files an appeal to the Vermont Supreme Court.
• August 21, 2015: Vermont Supreme Court upholds the Environmental Court's decision.
• Ongoing: Mayor Weinberger revives plans to connect Pine and Battery streets through the eastern edge of the railyard — with the intent of relieving pressure on the Maple/King historic neighborhoods.
Source: City of Burlington