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Council committees recommend vacating Conway Drive amid debate over future use and value
Summary
Council committees recommended that Conway Drive, a paper right‑of‑way created during earlier roadwork, be vacated to enable potential redevelopment. Council members disagreed about whether the city is effectively giving away valuable land or facilitating redevelopment that would remove maintenance burdens.
The Planning, Community and Economic Development Committee recommended favorably on Ordinance 2024‑12A to vacate Conway Drive, a paper right‑of‑way left over from roundabout construction that planning staff say is no longer a usable roadway.
Chairman Noble opened discussion noting the parcel resulted from prior right‑of‑way work and that Planning Commission and staff support the vacation to allow adjacent owners to maintain and potentially develop the remnant land. Planning staff said the paper street currently ranges from roughly 38 to 60 feet wide and that dividing the right‑of‑way down the center would give adjacent parcels additional area for future development.
Several council members pushed back, arguing the council was effectively transferring value to adjacent private owners. Councilmember Neugebauer estimated the combined parcels could represent several hundred thousand dollars of assessed land value and said vacating might amount to “giving away” over $500,000 in land unless the city pursued a larger, cohesive redevelopment strategy. Councilmembers Miller and Nijabauer expressed concern that the piece, as currently configured, would still leave the developer short of the one acre required by the city’s commercial standards and that granting the vacation now would remove leverage to assemble a larger, higher‑value parcel.
The property applicant, a developer who has operated hundreds of restaurants nationwide and who addressed the committee in person, said vacating the paper street would allow immediate cleanup and maintenance responsibilities to shift away from the city and enable a compact commercial use that otherwise could turn the parcel into an eyesore. The applicant asked council to treat the current action as a plat vacation rather than an endorsement of any specific site plan.
Planning and zoning staff reiterated that Conway Drive had been donated to the city years ago and that Planning Commission had recommended vacating the drive twice, voting unanimously in favor. Members of the committee said that, because legal avenues to consolidate ownership are limited under state law and because the city has limited practical options for the donated remnant, vacating the drive would make the land more usable and allow market forces to determine development outcomes.
After extended debate over valuation, long‑term strategy and process, the committee chair said he would bring a favorable recommendation to the full council for a final vote at the regular meeting. No final development approvals were granted in committee; any site plan, zoning variances, or future property transfers would require separate review by Planning & Zoning or the Board of Zoning Appeals.
The committee concluded with a procedural motion to forward a favorable recommendation to the council.
