Municipal Services Committee Recommends Approval Of Trout Museum Loading Zone To Be Reviewed After A 6-Month Trial Period

The Municipal Services Committee met 04/07/2025. The item that took up the bulk of the meeting was the request to turn two on-street parking stalls on College Avenue into a loading zone for the Trout Museum of Art/Lawrence University building. This item had previously been discussed and held at the 03/24/2025 committee meeting.

The installation of the loading zone was opposed by two nearby business owners, one who feared it would result in fewer customers patronizing her shop and the other who was concerned it would result in more people inappropriately parking in his private off street parking lot.

It was noted by city staff that while the Trout building has been under construction, there have only been two parking stalls available along that side of the street on that block of College Avenue but when construction was completed there would be a total of 8 stalls available, two of which would be used for the loading zone, resulting in 6 regular parking stalls.

The committee ended up voting 4-0 to recommend the loading zone be approved provisionally for a 6-month trial period.

I’ve prepared a transcript of the discussion for download:

Christina Turner the Executive Director of the Trout spoke in favor of creating the loading zone, indicating that the building had intentionally been designed with a loading zone in that area in mind. It was similar to the two loading zone that are in front of the current Trout Museum building by Houdini Plaza. They had brought the loading zone up in planning discussions with the city and had been told by city staff that the loading zone was not supposed to be included with the building plan but rather brought forward at a later time. The Trout was following those direction and bringing the request forward now when they had been told to.

She indicated the loading zone access was essential for dropping students off for classes and programs and for seniors and other individuals with mobility issues and that not having a loading zone would negatively impact traffic flow and be a safety hazard.

The Trout did not think that using Kimball Alley as an alternative loading zone location was appropriate because there was no public entrance on that side of the building nor was there a sidewalk from the alley to the entrance.

Sara Rabideau the owner of Casting On told the committee that Jason Druxman the owner of Avenue Jewelers was concerned that the permanent loss of the two parking stalls would increase the overuse of his business’ private parking lot. For her own business she was concerned that it would negatively impact her patrons. She herself had been using Kimball Alley as a loading zone without issues or complications for 6 years so thought the Trout could do so as well. She also indicated she had heard Brokaw Hall might be removed which would provide additional parking spaces. She asked about the possibility of shortening the right lane on College Avenue turning onto Drew Street so that only one parking stall would need to be removed instead of two.

City Traffic Engineer Eric Lom had taken time to review parking availability on the 300 block of E College Avenue and the 100 block of S Durkee Street. On a Thursday with nice weather he checked the parking availability every 15 minutes from 9am to 8pm and determined that over the course of that day there was not one 15-minute interval where there no parking stalls available. There were at least 1 or 2 and at time as many as 20. Essentially, if people were willing to walk one block or less then there was always a parking stall available, but if they wanted something less than that such as 50-100 feet, then there were many times when that was not available.

He also noted that right now the south side of College Avenue on that block only had 2 parking stalls available, but when construction was over there would be 8. If two were turned into a loading zone then there would still be 6 remaining.

Regarding the suggestion that the right lane turning onto Drew Street be shortened he said that it was not just a turn lane but also a through lane. As traffic volumes increased as you moved away from the center of downtown, so while only 12,000 cars a day crossed Appleton Street that was closer to 14,000 to 15,000 near Drew Street. Because of that, an additional lane was needed to handle that increased volume. He believed that shortening the right lane would negatively impact traffic flow.

Alderperson Sheri Hartzheim (District 13) asked about the timing of the loading zone request, saying that it felt like a last-minute thing. She wondered why nothing had been said about it earlier in the Trout planning and construction process.

Engineer Lom said that generally speaking in the planning process for a development there are discussions about what might need to happen on the street adjacent to a site plan and usually, when those discussions happen, city staff tell the developers that they will work that out later and bring it to the committee in the months prior to the completion of the site. City staff was, however, now having internal discussions about whether, for larger developments, if they should bring these types of requests forward with the site plan instead of waiting until later because one the city decided to allow a building to be constructed they were not left with a lot of options for these sorts of street changes.

In this situation, he did not think that bringing the request forward earlier would have changed the recommendation. The only way to mitigate the need for a loading zone would have been to build a much smaller building or change the footprint in some way. As it was, it was a large, very high-use, multi-use building with 46 apartments in it. It would need a place for drop offs and pickups. While the alley could be used for freight deliveries, most drop offs would need to come through the main entrance past the receptionist.

The committee ended up voting 4-0 to recommend the loading zone be approved with the caveat that it be done so initially as a 6 month trial so that the impact on parking could be studied and analyzed.

View full meeting details and video here: https://cityofappleton.legistar.com/MeetingDetail.aspx?ID=1294102&GUID=DB620D0D-7918-45DE-8F21-0ADFCDFBBB45