Forevergreen Road Corridor Preservation

Posted on: February 27, 2013

This is information that was presented during a public open house Feb. 6, 2013 at Van Allen Elementary School in North Liberty.

This is not a design or a construction project. It is a long-range plan to identify where the Forevergreen Road corridor from 12th Avenue to Dubuque Street shall be located. Each city (North Liberty and Coralville) has agreed on future city growth areas. We are planning for these future growth areas. We do not anticipate construction of this road to occur in the near future. Oakdale Blvd took approximately 22 years for construction.
There is no public money reserved for road construction. Typically all the roads within a new subdivision (development) – including arterial roads – are paid for by, or partially by, the developer.
This geographic area is lacking east-west streets from Dubuque Street to Hwy 965. It is approximately 4.4 miles from Zeller Street to Oakdale Blvd with no eastwest street in between these. Extension of Forevergreen Road from 12th Avenue to Dubuque Street will cut this distance between east-west streets in half. The current lack of east-west routes results in increased travel times/distances, increased emergency response times, limited transit & school bus route options and bussing times, more fuel consumption, pollution, and fuel costs for the traveling public.
Development of this area will eventually occur. It may be 2 years, 10 years, or 50 years; but eventually the area will develop. Without a Forevergreen Road extension the only access for the developments would be the existing north-south corridors (Dubuque Street, 1st Avenue/NL Road).
The cities of North Liberty and Coralville need to plan for the location of this future Forevergreen Road extension corridor. Without a plan for this corridor, the developers (and school district) will submit annexation and development plans without a comprehensive eastwest corridor plan. The cities need to require that the developers plan for and include the Forevergreen Road extension corridor with their development plans rather than as an afterthought. The cities need to plan for this corridor rather than leave this to a developer.
The study approach will consider environmentally sensitive areas, roadway alignment design criteria (minimum radii, slopes, site distances, etc.), and properties in the area. The information gathered from the previous study will be utilized, but this new study will also
consider upfront public comments and comments from directly affected property owners as the study is conducted.
The new study will consider all modes of transportation including pedestrians, transit, and bicycles. The new study will also consider a larger study area, especially to the north.
We are listening and care about the impacts to the properties in this area. Where possible, we will do our best to include everyone’s comments for the proposed corridor preservation. However, we know that there are numerous property owners within the corridor area and some will have competing interests. We expect that there will be some unavoidable interest conflicts but will attempt to minimize these conflicts.