Highway strip no longer rural countryside

The U.S. 93 corridor south of Whitefish was rural countryside for the most part in 1993 when the Blanchard Lake Zoning District was put in place, governing land uses for the area that includes the highway strip.

Some agriculture activity could still be found there in the early ’90s. U.S. 93 was a two-lane highway, and Whitefish city limits were nowhere near the intersection of U.S. 93 and Montana 40.

Since then the highway has been expanded to four lanes that handle more than 20,000 vehicle-trips per day. Planning jurisdiction of the corridor — part of the infamous Whitefish “doughnut” in recent years — has flip-flopped between the city of Whitefish and Flathead County. For about 40 years the city of Whitefish made the planning and zoning decisions for a 1-mile area around the city.

A power struggle that preceded the recent doughnut litigation played out in the early 2000s. By 2005 the city and county forged an interlocal agreement that shrunk Whitefish’s planning jurisdiction from 4.5 miles outside city limits to 2 miles, but gave Whitefish full control of decisions within the 2-mile area.

That interlocal agreement crumbled in 2008 and the stage was set for a six-year battle between the city and county over who would make land-use planning decisions in the 2-mile doughnut, which, of course, included the U.S. 93 South strip. Throughout that process, property owners along the corridor expressed their frustration about being bound by the agricultural and suburban agricultural zoning constraints. Many argued the doughnut lawsuit put them in limbo for years over what they could and couldn’t do with their property.

Now that the Montana Supreme Court has ruled the county has planning jurisdiction of the doughnut, highway corridor property owners are eager to proceed with a plan that will provide them more development options.

“The current zoning appears to no longer reflect much of the land use in the area,” the Flathead County Planning Office staff report acknowledged. Many conditional-use permits have been issued for non-residential uses as business owners have sought to set up shop along the highway.

“The area does not appear particularly suited to encourage rural residential nor agricultural development,” the staff report further stated, adding, “however, the extent of the requested zoning designations that allow many non-residential uses has drawn some major concern from the city of Whitefish.”

A Dec. 5 public hearing held by the Whitefish City Council to provide more public input to the county indicates there’s a groundswell of concern about strip development that could mar the visual appeal of the city’s southern entrance.

Edwin Fields’ comments were echoed by many Whitefish residents: “Our valley has quite enough crappy shopping opportunities on 93 south of Reserve in Kalispell.”

Once the Flathead County Planning Board makes a recommendation about the proposed zoning map and text amendments to allow more commercial growth in the highway corridor, the county commissioners will have the final say.