By Dennis Box-The Courier-Herald
The twists and turns of the proposed Lowe's home improvement store in Bonney Lake are scheduled to go before the city's hearing examiner June 4 at City Hall.
The store is planned for the corner of South Prairie Road and state Route 410, across from the Albertsons complex.
The traffic mitigation proposal submitted by the developer was accepted by the city and a mitigation determination of non significance or MDNS was issued by the Planning Department.
The plan calls for an entrance into Lowe's from South Prairie Road between state Route 410 and 200th Avenue and a second access on 200th Avenue Court East.
The gum in the gears came over the access road into Lowe's from 200th Avenue Court East. The road would cross an R-1, or residentially zoned, property. According to city's legal department, a commercial access road cannot cross over R-1 zoning.
The city's planning department issued a revised MDNS without the road.
The Planning Department's revised MDNS drew three appeals - one from the Cascadia Development Corporation, a second from the Brookwater Home Owners' Association and a third from Jeff Oliphant, the Lowe's project developer.
Cascadia is building a 6,500 home subdivision on 195th Avenue East, south of the Lowe's site.
Oliphant said he has asked for an interpretation of the city's code concerning the access road from interim Director of Planning and Community Development Marvin Vialle and is also maintaining his right to get an interpretation of the code from the hearing examiner.
If the interpretation of the code does not allow for the road, Oliphant said he will request a rezone of the property, which would have to be approved by the City Council.
Another tack for Oliphant is to build the road and donate it to the city, which the city staff said is possible. The City Council would have to approve the donation.
“There are four separate ways to do this,” Oliphant said. “We are looking forward to working with the city and all interested parties to develop this property.”
Oliphant said the road on 200th is essential for traffic control and emergency services.
According to staff, Cascadia has appealed seeking more time to review the traffic congestion issues at SR 410 and South Prairie Road.
The Homeowners Association is disputing the access road and traffic congestion in the neighborhood.
Oliphant said he is working to have all the issues in the appeals satisfied before the June 4 hearing.
City staff had requested the developer consider building a frontage road between the Market at Lake Tapps shopping center where Wal-Mart is located and Office Depot and the Lowe's site.
Oliphant said the frontage road “is in our best interests, but because of the elevation between the properties, we cannot see how it can be done. If this worked a lot of our problems would go away, but it won't.”
Dennis Box can be reached at dbox@courierherald.com.
