A series of four public workshops began Wednesday, Oct. 19 and continue through Saturday, Oct. 22. The final workshop is scheduled for 10 a.m. to noon today (Saturday) at the New Ulm Community Center. This last workshop is intended as an overview of all the planning and will include draft concepts for all study areas.

The idea of the comprehensive plan is to take an all-encompassing view of the city and what it wants to do 10 years or even 20 years from now.

The workshops were designed to bring in the public by focusing on four key areas of development in New Ulm. The four areas discussed over the last three days were downtown New Ulm, Upper Cottonwood, Northwest New Ulm/Milford and the East Airport Area.

On Thursday, Oct. 20 the public was invited in the morning to take a tour of downtown New Ulm and Upper Cottonwood areas with staff and consultants to discuss possible development.

Below, city staff and comp plan consultants took tours of sites mostly likely to see development, Friday. The tour was part of the Rapid Planning Workshops held this week. The industrial park located behind Walmart was consider a prime location for industrial development. L to R: New Ulm City Planner John Knisley, SEH consultant Mark Nolan, Community Deisgn Group consultant, Adrian Diez, New Ulm Community Development Planner David Schnobrich and Director of Community Design Group Antonio Rosell.

These four sites were chosen for rapid planning because the city currently sees them as the areas of most development.

Friday, Oct. 20 the second series of tours were taken to northwest New Ulm and the East Airport area.

Following the tours on Thursday and Friday, the consultants with SEH and Community Design Group took the suggestions from the public and began developing concepts and plans. During the afternoon the public was allowed to visit the consultants on the first floor of the Community Center to provide input.

At 5:30 p.m. Thursday and Friday, presentations and initial concepts were presented to the groups after which the public was able to provide further comments.

The consultants received the most feedback on Thursday concerning downtown New Ulm. The most popular development idea for downtown was the addition of housing. Mixed-use buildings were suggested as a method of incorporating commercial business on the ground floor and apartments on the second floor.

There was an interest in maintaining business and filling up empty storefronts. The focus was to keep retail businesses downtown alongside restaurants.

Other commenters were concerned about the downtown vehicle traffic. Many felt it was walkable and pedestrian friendly and for this reason, vehicle traffic should be reduced. Parking in the alley was considered an alternative.

One commenter said if downtown was built for residents, tourists would likely follow.

In the Upper Cottonwood area, the focus was on residential development and infrastructure needs. New housing continues to expand in Upper Cottonwood. The city is already considering a water tower in this area.

This area is also underserved by neighborhood parks. Several young families live in this area and the city has received park requests for years, but there has been no consensus on where to locate the park.

Access to the neighborhood was another concern. The Cottonwood Bridge is the quickest way to reach Upper Cottonwood, but the street leading to the bridge frequently floods in the spring. There was some discussion of creating an alternative access point, possibly a foot or bicycle bridge across the Cottonwood River in the direction of Schell’s Brewery.

Friday, the public feedback focused on the East Aiport area and Northwest/Milford Area. Both of these areas faced development restrictions based on location at the airport. Based on runway approaches, some areas were restricted from any construction.

The two most favored ideas for East Airport were trails and parkways as well as lodging and hotels. A bike trail follows Highland Avenue, but some residents wanted a more connected system. Colleen Broderson, a new resident living near Pfaender Park, suggested shorter bike paths in the area around the school. Broderson also favored a safe roundabout intersection at Highland and Highway 14. She believed with the construction of the Dreamville housing development along Highland and Maple, safe crossing would be more important.

The Northwest/Milford development zone was adjacent to the Airport area. Several members of the public agreed that the Highland/Highway 14 intersection needed improvements for safety. Others saw a need for a possible hotel and restaurants as the north end of New Ulm was underserved by lodging and dining.

The Northwest/Milford area is currently zoned for light industrial use. It is believed this area could see increases in industrial activity. The railroad does follow through this area and could benefit new industrial expansion.

New housing is also a possibility in this area. Mix use of apartments, single-family houses and townhouses already exist in this area with potential for further development.

Community Design Group Director Antonio Rosell is serving as a consultant on the comp planning. After three days of working with the public, he was asked if there was a consensus on community needs. Rosell said housing was on everyone’s minds. Each of the four areas being discussed this week focused on residential housing to some degree.

Earlier in the presentation, Rosell provided demographic information on New Ulm. Currently, New Ulm has around 10,000 jobs in it. Around 4,000 of these jobs were filled by people living in New Ulm. The other 6,000 were filled by people commuting to the city.

“Presumably some of these 6,000 want to live in New Ulm, what is preventing them?” he asked.

Housing was viewed as the major obstacle. New Ulm has a housing vacancy rate of 1%. Rosell said this was too low. It prevented people from having a choice of where they lived and it increased the costs of the available housing. For this reason, housing was a vital consideration for the comp plan.

Rosell said there was a common concern about transportation. Providing safe crossings and traffic calming measures was a popular request with the public, as well as creating greater access to key locations.

The Rapid Planning Workshops will hold a final session from 10 a.m. to noon Saturday, Oct. 22 the workshop will serve as an overview, covering all four development areas discussed this week.

Further information on the Rapid Planning Design and comprehensive plan can be found on the New Ulm city website. Information on the public survey, including a summary of comments received, is available at https://www.newulmmn.gov/555/Survey-Results-Miro-Summaries.

A second community survey on the comp plan is expected to be available next week.