Roads, traffic lights for new mall debated

Two proposed traffic lights dominated a Monday public hearing on how a 485-acre mall-and-housing project should be set up.

Little else was discussed at the Kalispell City Council meeting.

"For you, the crux of the matter is how to handle traffic on [U.S.] 93," Kalispell Planning Board chairman Bryan Schutt told the council.

At a yet-to-be-set date, the council will begin discussing whether to annex Glacier Town Center north of West Reserve Drive and east of U.S. 93, plus how the project should be laid out.

About 60 people showed up at Monday's hearing.

Twenty-six spoke. They included five Wolford Development Montana representatives, two Citizens For A Better Flathead speakers, and one official each from the Kalispell Planning Board, Kalispell Area Chamber of Commerce and the Flathead Business and Industrial Association.

No one opposed the mall or most of Glacier Town Center's preliminary plans. Many praised the overall project. Some called for slower deliberations on some aspects.

The biggest dispute focuses on three access roads that would connect U.S. 93 with the proposed mall to the east.

Wolford Development wants to install traffic lights on two of the three proposed intersections.

One would be at Rose Crossing after it is extended west from Whitefish Stage Road. The other would be on the southernmost of the three access roads.

However, some people want to keep traffic lights off that stretch of U.S. 93, arguing for a non-stop, high-speed highway between West Reserve Drive and Whitefish.

At the hearing, two people besides Wolford Development's representatives spoke in favor of installing the two lights.

Eight people ? including two Citizens For A Better Flathead representatives and Schutt ? opposed installing the lights. Although they support most of the Wolford project, planning board members are leery about installing traffic lights on U.S. 93, but could not agree on a Plan B.

The Chamber of Commerce and business association took no positions on the lights. Several other people spoke about traffic concerns, but also took no clear positions on the lights.

Schutt cited Spokane, Coeur d' Alene and Missoula as cities where commercial areas ended up snarling traffic on major arterial highways.

"Once we give up the free-flowing character of the highway, we'll never get it back … If we don't set the line here, what are we going to say to the next developer who wants traffic lights?" Schutt said.

Rod McKeever said U.S. 93 "is supposed to move people," arguing that shoppers should use side roads to get to the mall.

Brian Beck countered: "Stop lights aren't going to kill anybody. … So what if we have to slow down a little bit?"

Schutt said Kalispell's long-range growth plans call for U.S. 93 to be a limited access, high-speed highway between Whitefish and West Reserve Drive.

Ken Kalvig, an attorney for Wolford Development, argued that the growth plans don't specifically forbid traffic lights on U.S. 93 north of West Reserve Drive.

The developer's traffic engineer, Kathleen Krager, said several side roads intersect U.S. 93 between Kalispell and Whitefish ? meaning it currently is not a limited access highway.

Wolford Development Montana has nursed Glacier Town Center for years.

The centerpiece is to be a 577,000-square-foot outdoors shopping complex, anchored by three stores of roughly 100,000 square feet each.

The project also calls for 632 new homes. Wolford Development also is hunting for a grocery store that could be built in three or four years ? a grocery store that would become the only one in Kalispell north of Idaho Street.

If annexed, Glacier Town Center would be at the core of the part of Kalispell that is growing north of West Reserve Drive.

For more on this story, read Wednesday's Daily Inter Lake.