Iron Horse 'welcome center' approved

The Iron Horse neighborhood has received approval to construct a “welcome center” at the entrance to the subdivision.

The Iron Horse Homeowners Association is proposing to remove the guardhouse on the south side of Iron Drive and replace it with a new building in the middle of a landscaped median. The building would serve as an information booth and be staffed part-time by a security person.

City Council split 3-3 on the request, with Mayor John Muhlfeld breaking the tie by voting in favor of the proposal. Councilors Andy Feury, Frank Sweeney and Jen Frandsen voted in favor. Councilors Richard Hildner, Sarah Fitzgerald and Pam Barberis voted against.

Approval included a requirement that the welcome center include a sign saying, “open to the public.”

Councilor Sarah Fitzgerald said the center appears to be a guardhouse deterring cars from entering the neighborhood.

“If it looks like a gate and works like a gate, then it quacks like a gate,” she said. “Why would we use this — it goes against what we’re trying to do as a community.”

Councilor Frank Sweeney disagreed saying that the redesigned welcome center met its goal of traffic calming.

“The first iteration of this project did quack like a duck. This one clearly does not,” he said. “This creates a more welcoming appearance.”

The project includes consolidating two roads on the south side of Iron Horse Drive into one road to the east of the welcome center and provides a golf cart crossing with bulb-outs to the east of the building.

Council previously voted to table the request and asked the homeowners to reconfigure its design.

Hildner said the redesign wasn’t enough to change his opinion.

“I think what you designed is great, but I still can’t get my head around the building being in the center of the median,” he said.

Feury said the redesign worked.

“I was fully prepared to come in here guns blazing against this,” he said. “There was already a building there and this is going to be just as much of a deterrent as that was, but they’ve minimized it with the proper screening.”

Council’s previous concerns were that the building would be viewed as prohibiting the public from entering the neighborhood and also about how the design would make traffic and pedestrian travel safer.

In response, the homeowners association redesigned the project. Previously, parking for the welcome center was on the opposite side of the travel lane, but has now been moved to the center of the landscaped island next to the building. Driving lanes have been narrowed to encourage slower rates of speed and chicanes, which require drivers to reduce speed in order to make a slight turn while driving, have been added to the median.

In addition, the welcome center building includes a front porch instead of a drive-up window as previously proposed.

Despite the changes, city planning staff still recommended council deny the request.

“We support better traffic calming, but we have concern with the impression that it’s a guardhouse and drivers have to stop there,” city planner Wendy Compton-Ring said.