City Beat: Council approves code change to manage driveways

A revision to city code that passed by a 7-2 vote at the Jan. 12 Springfield City Council meeting changed regulations for driveways within the city limits, but not before a council member who is also a civil engineer raised concerns.

Councilmember Derek Lee offered an amendment to the legislation, but the amendment failed by a 5-4 vote, despite support from Lee, Mayor Jeff Schrag, Heather Hardinger and Callie Carroll. Schrag and Lee cast the two no votes for the bill itself.

The code revision offers what the legislation calls a performance-based framework for managing driveways, access points and intersections. The written explanation of the bill states that the updates reflect national best practices for access management and that they are intended to improve safety, maintain traffic flow, reduce conflict points and protect the city’s infrastructure investment.

Lee’s chief objection, however, was that the code revision limited the ability of business owners to appeal city decisions on driveway access.

He said the code puts limits on driveways and access points without taking into account individual situations that may require a different approach. He added that his amendment would not change any of the actual criteria for driveways.

Lee said his intent was to allow a hearing so small business owners and others can express why they need a driveway, and P&Z can then decide.

Lee said the new code includes fewer opportunities for appeal than the code it was replacing.

“The city of Springfield will literally take a business’ last driveway and require them to take access from a neighbor,” he said. He added that this is different than how the Missouri Department of Transportation approaches its policy decisions.

Chad Zickefoose, city traffic engineer, said driveway location and spacing affect crash risk, especially along heavily traveled arterials, expressways and busy intersections.

Zickefoose said the proposed legislation would protect the function and safety of major corridors and encourage shared and cross-access easements, in keeping with the city’s Forward SGF comprehensive plan.

“It also matches the goals of reducing piecemeal access decisions that degrade corridor performance and economic vitality and ensures that the access decisions consider the long-term network impacts and adjacent properties and just not individual parcels,” he said.

He said Lee’s proposed amendment would make city staff’s job more challenging and added that appeals would continue to be permitted for lower-classification roadways, like collectors and locals.

“It puts limitations on the appeals on those high-volume, high-impact roadways,” he said of the new code. “We feel that those decisions should be based on engineering reviews.”

In voicing his support for the measure, Councilmember Brandon Jenson stressed safety.

“We also recently published the 2024 crash report that indicates we are the 13th least-safe city for driving in the entire country,” he said.

He cited the Federal Highway Administration’s recommendation to reduce the density of access points through driveway closure, consolidation and relocation – the intent of the legislation.

“Federal guidance appears to tell us that we should adopt the text as staff has presented it, but that may not mean that it makes sense for our community,” he said.

Jenson noted, however, that Forward SGF identifies consolidating driveway placement and property access to improve safety.

“While I understand the desire to have an appeals process, I’m not sure that relying on the appeals process within our current code – which has resulted in the dangerous mess of access points that we currently have – is the best strategy for moving our city forward,” Jenson said.

Lee responded that nothing in his amendment changes any criteria.

“The only thing this does is allow a board to consider all of those issues along with a unique site and say, ‘Hey, in this situation, that doesn’t make sense – this business is worth saving,’” he said. “I literally do this, so there’s been a number of occasions where the fact that we denied a driveway made it less safe.”

Master planning funds
Council unanimously approved an allocation of $1 million from the Spring Forward SGF half-cent sales tax to support the development of neighborhood plans and individual park master plans.

The allocation was recommended by the Citizens’ Advisory Board at its Nov. 19 meeting.

The funds within CAB’s purview come from a half-cent portion of a three-quarter-cent sales tax approved by voters in November 2024. The other quarter-cent of the tax funds public safety, including a police and fire pension fund obligation.

According to past Springfield Business Journal reporting, the CAB voted unanimously to recommend that council invest $500,000 for the creation of neighborhood plans for 24 neighborhoods that do not have such initiatives in place and to invest another $500,000 toward a parks master plan. The parks master plan expenditure would cover Fassnight Park, Grant Beach Park, Nathanael Greene/Close Memorial Park, Sequiota Park and Silver Springs Park.

City officials say master plans serve as road maps for future investments.

Other action items

• Five zoning measures were approved by council. They are the rezoning of 2 acres near the intersection of North Lyon Avenue and West Calhoun Street to center city district with conditional overlay from single-family residential and planned development at the request of Central Assembly of God Church; 1 acre at the intersection of East Calhoun Street and North Benton Avenue to office district with conditional overlay from single-family residential and Midtown urban conservation district, at the request of Drury University; 14.5 acres at the 3900 block of South York Avenue and the 4000 block of South Jonathan Avenue to residential townhouse district from county designations at the request of Wire Road Development and the Boehm Family Trust, with a separate action to accept a preliminary plat of The Dell Phase 2; 5 acres at 4001 W. Chestnut Expressway to low-density multifamily residential district with conditional overlay from general manufacturing and highway commercial at the request of Chestnut Self Storage LLC; and a conditional use permit to allow an automobile service garage within a general retail district at 4545 S. Lyon Ave. at the request of TKG-RKS Joint Venture LLC.
• Grants were accepted from the Missouri Highways and Transportation Commission to fund the resurfacing of arterial and collector streets in the amount of $2.4 million; from MHTC for quality of place and aesthetic improvements at and near the interchange of Interstate 44 and Missouri Highway 13, $408,000; from MHTC for street, pedestrian and stormwater improvements on a section of Campbell Avenue, $360,000; and from the federal Department of Health and Human Services for use by the Springfield Greene County Health Department to implement cardiopulmonary resuscitation and first aid certifications and renewals, $81,000.
• Council adopted the 2024 edition of the International Fire Code and approved multiple revisions to the city’s land development code.
• An allocation of $3.1 million of level property tax reserves was approved for the Historic City Hall rehabilitation project.