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City of Falcon Heights • Staff Memo To: Planning Commission CC: Heather Worthington; Mayor and City Council From: Deb Jones Date: May 23, 200 Subject: Dino's Restaurant -traffic and other non-variance issues The attached documents are not related to the two variances now before you but are given to you so you will have information on other issues surrounding the proposed restaurant. Notes on the neighborhood informational meeting of May 13. These informal notes show that the residents who came to the meeting were most concerned with traffic on Crawford and Arona, in particular, drivers who cut through to avoid the Snelling/Larpenteur intersection. This is a perceived problem already (and has been for years), and the residents are worried that the new restaurant will make it worse. The City has some good ideas for ways to cut way down on the cut-through traffic going east on Crawford; we'll share those with you next week. • They are particularly anxious about having adrive-through at all, although this is a permitted use in that zone and the City has no legal grounds for forbidding this use, not even public opinion. The drive-through met all provisions of the code. It does not need a variance, and no Planning Commission action is required on it. 2. Log of comment from residents These comments are similar to the concerns heard at the meeting. As of this writing, I have not had time to respond to the last one. The City engineers, H. R. Green, performed a traffic study this week. Heather and I will meet with them Tuesday afternoon to review and discuss the results. You will get a copy -- by email before the meeting, if possible; if not, then just before the meeting. As promised at the May 13 meeting, Heather contacted the City of Shakopee to find out if they have had any complaints about Dino's there, the drive-through, noise, or any other issue. They have not received even one. In a part of the Metro where there is a lot of anxiety about growth, that is significant. At the Planning Commission meeting, Heather will give a brief presentation to address the traffic and non-variance matters before the hearing on variances. •