Wisconsin Avenue plan details future of key Whitefish road
A plan for how the primary highway north of the railroad tracks in Whitefish should develop over the next two decades will be unveiled at a meeting on Wednesday, Aug. 23.
The city will present the public review draft of the Wisconsin Avenue Corridor Plan at an open house from 5 to 7 p.m. at City Hall, 418 E. Second St. in Whitefish. The open house provides an opportunity for public input as the Wisconsin Avenue Steering Committee finishes up the draft for eventual review by the Planning Board and City Council.
Although Wisconsin Avenue is a state highway, it is a two-lane road lined with primarily low-rise buildings that give the corridor a small-town feel and a pedestrian-friendly environment, the draft notes. The corridor has experienced significant growth in investment, with an increase in seasonal rental housing and commercial development, a trend that is expected to continue.
Close to 600,000 additional square feet of residential, resort and limited commercial could occur along the Wisconsin Avenue corridor under the current zoning.
With growth in mind, the plan makes recommendations for land use and key development areas with an emphasis on protecting water quality, according to Kate McMahon, lead planning consultant with Applied Communications of Whitefish, which drafted the plan in conjunction with Robert Peccia and Associates, GSBS Richman Consulting, the steering committee and Planning Office.
The corridor plan includes the area of Wisconsin Avenue from Edgewood Drive just north of the railroad viaduct to the intersection of Big Mountain Road. It lays out 14 action items, such as reviewing land-use regulations to provide for future right-of-way acquisition, identifying traffic-calming solutions for Colorado Avenue, expanding transit and park-and-ride lots and evaluating options for road widening, turn lanes and intersection improvements.
Other proposed action items are conducting an engineering study to address storm-water management issues around Viking Creek, amending the city’s architectural review standards to expand design districts to include all key development areas, and revising zoning to include a mix of uses for neighborhood transition.
The plan identifies several areas along Wisconsin Avenue that have development potential, such as a former trailer park on Edgewood Drive that is zoned commercial, the redevelopment of single-family lots along Wisconsin, a reclaimed gravel pit on the west side of the road across from Alpine Market, and the Denver Street and Colorado Avenue areas that are zoned for multifamily residential housing.
The Big Mountain Road intersection is another area where development is likely in the coming years because large vacant tracts are situated at the northwest and northeast corner of the high-profile junction that leads to Whitefish Mountain Resort. The owner has expressed an interest in a unified development of those parcels, according to the draft plan.
Features editor Lynnette Hintze may be reached at 758-4421 or lhintze@dailyinterlake.com.