you you you good evening and welcome to the October 7 2009 teen parks and national resource Commission meeting first item on the agenda this evening is we're gonna adopt the agenda commissioners staff do you have any changes or additions one change madam chair commissioners unfortunately the minutes from our last meeting in June were not attached and did not make it into the packet earlier so if we could move that to the November meeting that would be really appreciated okay Thank You commissioners any changes or additions no changes motion to approve with the amendment oh can I get a first second motion second okay thank you okay now we'll move on to citizens comments are there any comments from citizens B no one's in there we'll go on to the next item which is a review of a wetland application and replacement plan to Kelliher Park and Gerald Jacobson won't be giving us the presentation thank you madam chair commissioners so I'm thinking you maybe have seen some of this project has been going on for a few years in the works we're looking at making a Greenway Trail from Sunset pond up through Kelleher Park in in next to Murphy Hanrahan and into savage and this project is in coordination with Dakota County tonight we're going to be focusing on the portion of the trail that goes through Kelleher Park and there will be a large boardwalk being constructed that goes across the wetland complex there and so with that I'll turn it over to Laura we're from WSB WSB has been helping with all stage of this project and Laura has been working on the several environmental permits that we need for this good evening commissioners a zero said I'm here to provide you with an overview of the wetland permit that you have in front of you for your so the figure on your left shows the entire trail corridor as Darrell said this is a regional multi-use trail from Murphy Hanahan Park to Sunset Pond Park it the corridor is 2.4 miles long it's proposed for year-round use and construction is planned for 2020 and 2021 it's being completed in coordination with Dakota County so zooming in to the part of the project with the that requires a wetland permit so we have Keller Park which is the area is roughly shown in the red box on the figure on your left within the park the trail starts as a bituminous trail until it reaches the color park wetland where it becomes a boardwalk to cross most of the wetland and then it returns to a bituminous trail to the east some things to note about the color park wetland is that it's a DNR public waters wetland and it has calcareous fen zones calcareous fends are protected protected type of wetland in the state of minnesota so for the boardwalk the proposed boardwalk is a 12 foot wide approximately a hundred one thousand and a hundred feet long it's to be composed of timber on your slides you can see on the left this is the typical section of the boardwalk and then on the right is a detail of the railing that's being shown the surface of the boardwalk will be timber as well the railings and the boardwalk is supported by helical piers the boardwalk will be about eight to ten feet above the ground this elevation was determined based on the flood levels of the wetland as well as protecting the wetland from shade by the port walk and this boardwalk is an example of one that looks similar but not exactly like the proposed boardwalk as you can see the picture has metal railings and the proposed one has wood supports for the railings and then there's the bituminous trail the bituminous trail area is shown in the red box on the figure on your right so this is where the trail is crossing a wetland in that spot but wetlands about 105 feet wide in this area the soils would support a bituminous trail so for cost efficiency it was chosen to do a bituminous trail in this location it is about ten feet wide and and about 105 feet long this section of bituminous trail is providing the majority of the well and impact that this project has so because the project crosses a wetland there are a number of different wetland permits that are required by the project we have the wetland conservation act permit which is the permit in front of you today that is to be approved by the city of Burnsville there's also the work in public waters permit that's approved by the DNR that's because of islands of public waters wetland there's the calcareous fen management plan which is a specific plan that was authored by W by WS B in coordination with the city to protect the fan the fen and that was approved by the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources then there's also the Army Corps of Engineers permit which is the federal wetland approval the yellow permits are the ones that have already been received by the agencies the red one is the one that you're reviewing as part of the permit review the permit goes before the technical evaluation panel that meeting was held on September 26th and the technical evaluation panel reviewed the plan for the trail also the purpose in need of why the trail is going and where it's going in the are in support of the project so to zoom in on the wetland conservation Act permit the what's the wetland conservation Act requires first to avoid wetlands and then to minimize wetland impacts and finally to mitigate wetland impacts that can't be avoided or minimized so we start with avoidance and minimization ways that wetlands were avoided and minimized minimized impacts to wetlands for this project were the alignment of the boardwalk to avoid the calcareous fen so within Keller Park their zones of calcareous fen but it's not entirely calcareous fen so the boardwalk went through some of the lower quality wetlands the boardwalk was also placed 8 to 10 feet above the wetland to avoid shading the wetland and also affecting the hydrology of the water flowing through the system Construction is proposed to take place in the winter to avoid reading up and disturbing vegetation within the wetland and there will also be winter maintenance restrictions within the trail as it goes through the wetland and those include that no salt or sand will be placed on the trail so that those pollutants don't enter the wetland so ultimately after avoidance and minimization we ended up with 0.1 acres of permanent fill to the Calvert Park wetland those impacts are proposed to be mitigated at a two to one ratio as required by the wetland conservation act through the use of wetland bank credits that are being provided by Dakota County and Dakota County's wetland bank for anyone interested is in Credit River Township so it's just south of us in the same County so with that I ask you if you have any questions this is in Credit River Township or is in Credit River we know with which [Music] weight which watershed district isn't it which watershed district it is in a different major watershed so it's in the Mississippi major watershed where the wetland bank is this one is in the Minnesota major watershed but it does fit there's sequencing requirements for where you buy wetland credits that you have to start closer and then you can move further out if there aren't any available and the first sequencing question is County so they are in Dakota County commissioners any other question so just had a question on the application it mentioned it mentions that there is almost point eight acres that we're moving the vegetation for I'm assuming part of that is mitigated by that's just removing it so that were able to put in the trail and then allowing it to get regrow is that correct yes correct it's identified as a temporary so in terms of the ubiquitous trail it's not going to be a large clearing around that particular trail it will it's not like we're expanding like the shoulders so to say outside of the trail it's just the initial kind of set up of that is that what I'm understanding so my colleague DJ is here and he is the project engineer and I believe he could answer that question commissioners yeah we're just maintaining that same footprint doesn't we have no so we're not trying to expand that marginal okay so what's what's the height of the trails that goes through the wetland is it is there gonna be like penetration or is it uh is the poorest light surface the height of the trail will be as more a dimensions can be eight to ten feet above the ground when the ground is low it's not defined for excessive wetland but we modeled it based on the 50-year event so if that trail does love what it does rise up to the your event you still have a five-foot wait no sorry FIFA clearance between the bottom of the the trail and the I want that will be true on the boardwalk as well double are gone yes okay great so you'll get a lot of light penetration you'll have actual vegetation growing successfully underneath yes what are the ongoing maintenance requirements of this so there's the winter maintenance maintenance requirement because the trail because it's a regional trail is intended to be used year-round so that will just be plowing because the sand and salt are specifically restricted as part of the fund management plan DJ do you want to speak to other maintenance yeah poor I turned the winter I think they're still gonna use equipment to brush off those snow on the trail like what Laura said it's gonna be year on use they're gonna use a small equipment to just brush out the snow and you know you're it's it's made of timber so once in every few years that the timber we need to be replaced is there any idea of what that would look like in terms of how that would impact the wetland of our Neath well it's being replaced their discount the work from the top as far as their place and stuff the timber I don't think they need to have access in the bottom you know the tail as far as the Raelians on that it looked like it was gonna be more of a mesh versus just the wire kind of description that you showed us is that true that is correct okay any other questions any other information to share no no okay well then I think tonight we're looking for approval from the commissioners is that correct JJ that's correct commissioners were looking for a recommendation for this to be approved by council to move forward okay so with that do we have a motion to approve the plan discussed tonight Road you have a second okay Ellen fader high knees okay thank you very much our next item on the agenda is we're gonna have JJ talk about miscellaneous station commissioners this is very brief meeting tonight but our next meeting is scheduled for November 18th again we get pushed back later into the month because council schedule changes a little bit with elections and so we get pushed back and we will be meeting on November 18th and at that point in time we have a sustainability update and I'll be giving you an update on the work that we've accomplished or things that are in progress on our Parks and Recreation master plan so you will have a little bit lengthier agenda next month okay thank you and with that we'll conclude our meeting this evening thank you for joining us you