Anchorage planning commission postpones Mountain Air Drive design over yard and well impacts

The state's design for the Mountain Air Drive extension would cut roughly 45 feet into Brett McKinnon's parcel, he told the Anchorage Planning and Zoning Commission on Monday. Pointing to plan sheets showing his property line, the cut line and the right-of-way line, McKinnon said, "it cuts approximately 45 feet into our parcel."

The commission postponed approval of the 65% "plans-in-hand" design review, the final step in the municipal review process, until the Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities resubmits an updated design to Planning and Zoning. A commissioner made the motion, and it passed.

Staff described the project as building less than a mile of rural collector roadway connecting Sandpiper Drive to Rabbit Creek Road, providing secondary access for Fire Station 10, Bear Valley Elementary School and nearby residents.

McKinnon and his wife, Chelsea Bailey, own the home at 15985 Mountainaire Drive, on the east side of the road, where an 8-foot multi-use pathway is planned. The right-of-way take "would require relocation of our well and it would take away the only usable yard on our property," McKinnon said. He asked that no approval move forward until a new survey plots the existing structures.

Bailey said the couple met with the project manager and design team two weeks earlier. "We did walk away feeling concerned that nothing was going to change with the current design, and that's why we're here before you tonight to once again raise our concerns and ask for your help," she said. She said the 65% plan applies one typical section across the whole corridor, with no design alternatives for hillside lots where the ground falls away at 10% to 30%.

DOT project manager Connor Eshelman said properties along the corridor have not been surveyed since 2017. He estimated four additional homes have been built there since, and said surveyors are now working to refine the cut-and-fill limits. Options include tightening the 7-foot buffer between the pathway and the roadway or steepening slopes, he said, though a detailed analysis requires the new survey. He hopes to have it before snow falls.

Stephanie Mormillo of HDL Engineering Consultants told the commission the trail is not optional. Title 21 requires a non-motorized facility on at least one side of rural collector and arterial roadways, she said, and the pathway is also recommended by the Metropolitan Transportation Plan and the Hillside District Plan. The project team has never considered eliminating the trail connection, she said, adding that the community once petitioned for a pathway on each side of the corridor.

James Michael, who testified that he supports building the road, questioned what the federal money buys. He said the project reaches a single neighborhood, with no meaningful work toward a Jamie Avenue link into Bear Valley, where Clark's Road remains the only way out in a wildfire.

The extension would run less than a mile between Sandpiper Drive and Rabbit Creek Road at an estimated cost of $15.25 million, with over 90% funded by federal highway grants. Eshelman said right-of-way acquisition will take about two years, putting construction in 2029 or 2030. Staff said that if the revised design brings new documents, such as the survey, the public hearing will reopen.