It wasn’t easy Wednesday for Tonia Johnson to drive through the intersection of 31st and Iowa streets.

Roads there still are clogged by the improvements initiated a year ago to make way for the new Home Depot store that opened last month. The ongoing traffic jam presented a challenge to Johnson, an Ottawa resident running errands.

“It’s a little messy right now,” Johnson said as she put groceries into her car trunk. “Hopefully they’ll get it together.”

Now the Lawrence-Douglas County Planning Commission is considering a change to city rules to prevent future congestion near similar projects. New commercial developments would not be allowed to begin construction until the completion of road improvements and other changes in city infrastructure.

City officials said the 31st and Iowa improvements would not be finished until June. And had the rule been in place a year ago, Home Depot still might be waiting to begin construction.

“To me, this is putting the horse before the cart, the way it should be,” said Planning Commissioner Ron Durflinger, chairman of the subcommittee that is revising the commercial chapter of Horizon 2020, the city-county comprehensive plan.

“This sends the message to developers that they have to plan ahead,” Durflinger said. “And they have to work with the city.”

Dan Watkins, the Lawrence attorney for Home Depot, said his clients had worked with the city. Construction of Home Depot started at the same time as the road improvements.

“I don’t see a good reason why improvements can’t be done in conjunction with each other,” Watkins said. “The city still has to issue certificates of occupancy before the business can open. It’s not like they (the city) don’t have plenty of triggers.”

Vehicles clear the intersection of 31st and Iowa streets near Home Depot. The Lawrence-Douglas County Planning Commission is considering a change to city rules to prevent construction of new commercial developments until nearby road and infrastructure improvements are complete.

Yet Durflinger, a home builder by trade, said the rule could be helpful to developers.

“In the areas that I’ve seen that worked well,” he said, “the asphalt was done before anything else.”

Johnson agreed.

“I think they should’ve built the intersection before they built the store,” she said.

The infrastructure rule is one of several Horizon 2020 proposed revisions aimed at resolving major commercial development controversies of recent years:

• The policy would require proposals for new “regional commercial centers” like South Iowa Street to demonstrate they would not have a substantial negative impact on downtown.

¢ 6News video: New construction rules being considered¢ Ron Durflinger, Douglas County planning commissioner, speaks on the importance of infrastructure improvements being completed before new building begins¢ Durflinger: On what the revisions to the chapter are meant to accomplish¢ Home Depot, Best Buy highlight retail development at 31st and Iowa (4-12-03)¢ 6News video: Home Depot asks to open early (3-1-03)¢ Home Depot asks city to bend rules (3-1-03)

• Commercial development at the intersection of Sixth Street and Wakarusa Drive would be capped at what the city has already approved, including zoning for a proposed Wal-Mart site on the northwest corner. That would dash the hopes of the owners of the northeast corner, who have had a previous commercial proposal rejected by the Planning Commission.
• New commercial developments would be required to have a length-to-width ratio of between 1:1 and 3:2.

“It creates squares or fairly square rectangles,” Durflinger said. “And that eliminates strip development.”

The Planning Commission will discuss the revisions at its next meeting, 6:30 p.m. May 29 in City Hall, Sixth and Massachusetts streets.

“I think we’re in agreement for about 95 percent of this,” Planning Commissioner Myles Schachter said. “We’ve put in more detail than I’ve ever seen in a comprehensive plan commercial chapter.”