After weeks of resident opposition, the Rhinelander Common Council voted last week to leave sidewalks off most of the interior streets in the Spruce Area reconstruction project. The council did agree to widen several of those streets to improve emergency vehicle access.
The alderpersons went street by street during their Oct. 12 meeting, settling the design for every street in the project except Hemlock Street. That decision was tabled until the council’s Oct. 26 meeting.
The council’s choices:
Maple Street: stays at its current width, with sidewalks on both sides.
Davenport Street: made a uniform 36 feet wide, with sidewalk on the north side, facing West Side Park, extended to roughly Hemlock Street. Existing sidewalk on the south side will be replaced but not extended.
Phillip Street: sidewalk will be added on the north side to close the gap between existing sidewalks along the park to Hemlock, if the budget allows.
Balsam Street: restored as is, at 36 feet with sidewalk on the north side.
Sanns Street: widened from 35 to 36 feet, no sidewalk.
Birch Street: stays at 36 feet, no sidewalk.
Spruce Street: widened from 30 to 34 feet, no sidewalk.
Town & Country Engineering and city staff had originally recommended building every street in the project area to 36 feet, centered in its 60-foot right-of-way, with sidewalk on one side. According to an Oct. 7 memo to the council from engineer Mark Barden, that design follows city ordinance 3.01.12. The ordinance sets a 36-foot minimum width for residential streets with right-of-way wider than 55 feet. It calls for sidewalks on both sides unless the Board of Public Works, on the public works director’s recommendation, finds that impractical.
Residents raised objections at a Sept. 24 public information meeting and again at the council’s Sept. 28 meeting. They said sidewalks and wider streets would cost them mature trees, yard space and the neighborhood’s character, and would add snow-shoveling burdens. The council then asked for alternative designs, including 34-foot streets with no sidewalks and 30-foot streets with sidewalk on one side.
Spruce Street
Spruce Street drew the most debate, apart from Hemlock. Barden recommended 36 feet with sidewalk on the west side. He warned council members that whatever width they chose would last until the street is rebuilt again.
“If you go 30 feet wide, you are stuck with it forever,” Barden said. He added that if the council didn’t want sidewalks, driveways could be graded so sidewalks could be added later, as was done on the Messer Street project.
Barden said a 36-foot street allows parking on both sides with two 10-foot driving lanes. It also leaves the 28 feet of clearance the fire department needs to set a fire truck’s outriggers when a car is parked on one side.
“If you have 34 feet wide, and you have one car parked there, you cannot get a fire truck in,” Barden said. He recommended banning parking on one side of any street narrower than 36 feet.
Alderman Bob Lueder asked whether some homeowners on Spruce would still be able to park a full-size pickup in their driveways if a sidewalk were added. He pointed to the Messer Street project, where the city skipped sidewalks in some areas for that reason. Alderman Luke Kramer proposed a compromise: a 36-foot street with sidewalk on the west side from Balsam to Birch, crossing to the east side from Birch to Phillip. That would avoid the short driveways. Mayor Kris Hanus said the zigzag layout would be harder for visually impaired pedestrians and said he would veto the motion if it passed.
Alderwoman Linnaea Newman said that as someone with a mobility issue, she would rather see sidewalks kept to one side. Kramer’s motion failed 1-7, with only Alderman Gerald Anderson voting in favor. Council President Carrie Mikalauski then moved to make Spruce 34 feet wide with no sidewalk, saying “that’s what the constituents have asked me to” propose. Lueder seconded. The motion passed.
Connecting to the park
Jopek said he was willing to go without sidewalks on streets like Sanns and Birch, which don’t lead directly to West Side Park. He wanted a north-south pedestrian route through the neighborhood instead, most likely on Hemlock.
“Governance is often a dance, and it’s not always pretty,” Jopek said. “Sometimes you step on each other’s toes. And in this case, one of the partners is not totally loving it, and I’m trying to step on the toes a little bit less.”
Kramer said he was “dead set that there has to be a north-south connection” and agreed to skip sidewalks on Sanns and Spruce if Hemlock provides it.
Anderson argued for sidewalks wherever possible. He cited a letter Kramer read into the record from a Pelham Street resident who urged the council to enforce the sidewalk ordinance.
“As I walk around town, I can see so many problems that have been caused by past administrations and past councils … deviating from having sidewalks,” Anderson said. “I think if we have an opportunity to put a sidewalk in, that we ought to put it in.”
Anderson moved to put a sidewalk on the north side of Birch Street, but the motion died for lack of a second. The council then approved Jopek’s motion, seconded by Mikalauski, for a 36-foot Birch Street with no sidewalk. On Phillip Street, Kramer asked for curb cuts at Spruce Street in case a crosswalk is added to the park. Barden said he would not recommend a crosswalk that leads onto a street without a sidewalk. He said a crosswalk could be added farther east, where the 700 block of Phillip has sidewalks on both sides. Hanus said the Phillip sidewalk, like other add-on work, depends on how bids come in.
Hemlock Street
According to Barden’s memo, Hemlock currently varies from 23 to 36 feet wide and is not centered in its right-of-way. Anderson moved to make it 36 feet, centered, with sidewalk on the west side. Jopek seconded.
Barden advised against shifting the street off center. He said doing so would conflict with the ordinance, complicate the sewer and water connections and rule out a future sidewalk on the east side. Narrowing the grass terrace would push plowed snow onto the sidewalk, he said. He also said one property has a small garage whose driveway couldn’t be accommodated “no matter how much we shifted it.”
Lueder floated painting a 4-foot bike and walking lane on the street instead of building a sidewalk. Hanus and Barden said that would offer less protection from traffic and would be buried by snow in winter. Hanus also suggested the council could consider making Hemlock one-way.
Jopek then moved to amend the motion to a 30-foot street with parking on one side, keeping the west-side sidewalk. That amendment passed on a voice vote but the debate came to an end when Mikalauski made a motion to table, noting that she did not know how to vote on the newly proposed scenarios. After Barden confirmed that delaying the Hemlock decision would not hurt the design timeline, the council voted to hold the Hemlock decision until the next meeting.
“You have to make a decision tonight that’s going to last for 50 years,” Tom Jerow told the council during public comment. Jerow is a former member of the city’s bicycle and pedestrian committee who pushed for the city’s Complete Streets resolution. Jerow said he would leave the sidewalk decision to the council. He urged members to keep future generations in mind and said the answer to poorly shoveled sidewalks is enforcing the city’s shoveling ordinance.
Spruce Street resident Paul Mueller asked supporters of a neighborhood petition to stand. He said opinion in the neighborhood is “at worst, … a 90-10 with 90% in favor of the status quo.” He proposed a bike lane on Hemlock, finishing the sidewalk along Phillip by the park, and crosswalks at Phillip’s intersections with Hemlock and Spruce.
John Santy, a Spruce Street resident and Crescent Elementary teacher with two children, said his family has walked and biked to West Side Park safely for five years. “We didn’t really feel the need for sidewalks,” he said.
Westwind Drive resident Mike Hendricks reminded the council of a promised path connecting the West Hill area to the rest of the city. “It’s already been four years,” he said.
According to the city’s finance department report in the packet, the city has applied for a Clean Water Fund loan for the Spruce Street project.
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