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Not only is
the historic, two-lane bridge in need of repair, when the lift section
is up it causes significant traffic backups on both ends of the bridge.
This frustrates drivers, generates air pollution at the river, and
interferes with commerce in the historic downtown business district.
Attempts to build a new bridge have failed, in large part because of
seemingly irreconcilable goals:
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Preserving the scenic quality of the area by
limiting the number of river crossings.
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Saving a bridge that’s listed on the National
Register of Historic Places, including protecting its historic use.
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Providing for the transportation needs in
rapidly growing parts of the Minneapolis-St Paul metro area and western
Wisconsin.
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Addressing the environmental impact that could
come with a new bridge.
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Doing all of this within budgetary
constraints.
Two decades ago, the Federal Highway Administration
and the states of Wisconsin and Minnesota began planning for an
Environmental Impact Statement to address a new river crossing. The EIS also
would be the focal point for assessing the impact to the St. Croix River,
one of 154 rivers entitled to protection under the Wild and Scenic River
Act. When the draft EIS was issued five years later, public reaction ranged
widely from supportive to pessimistic. In 1995, the departments of
transportation in the two states issued a final EIS with the expectation of
beginning new-bridge construction and demolishing the old bridge.
An ensuing lawsuit by environmental organizations
derailed those plans and nullified the EIS. A judge found flaws in the
decision-making process because the National Park Service was not as
involved as it should have been in determining the level of impact to the
river.
A few years later, another effort was made to reach
agreement so that a new bridge might be built. Despite cabinet-level
meetings between the U.S. Department of Interior and U.S. Department of
Transportation, no solution emerged. This time, the state DOTs came to the
conclusion that the cost of constructing a new bridge was too high. Then, a
third attempt to broker an agreement failed as a compromise solution seemed,
in the end, just that — a compromise — a solution that no one could endorse.
Mediation
Finally, at the request of the Federal Highway
Administration, the U.S. Institute for Environmental Conflict Resolution
conducted a conflict assessment. The assessment led to a mediation that has
attempted to chart a new course through the disagreement. This time, the
goal is to integrate the needs of all stakeholders and find a solution that
truly advances historic preservation, environmental, and transportation
needs. The mediation has moved forward in three phases.
1. Exploring needs, interests, values, and
viewpoints.
The first task was mutual education — making sure
that all affected parties were involved, helping stakeholders fully
understand each other’s viewpoints, and finding common ground. In the early
going, the group needed to listen to and learn from one another and to move
from either/or thinking — either environmental protection or transportation,
either historic preservation or environmental and scenic quality — to
yes/and thinking — effective transportation and environmental quality and
historic preservation and economic vitality and good design.
As part of its education and exploration, the group
translated their interests and those of all the stakeholders into specific
criteria that could be used later to evaluate different options. As a simple
example, the group agreed that a successful solution would have to meet all
regulatory requirements — the Historic Preservation Act, the Endangered
Species Act, and the Wild and Scenic River Act. Setting this kind of
standard or criterion helps the group take a more objective look at their
options when the time comes for evaluation.
2. Generating new options that resonate with
stakeholder needs.
With a greater understanding of each other’s
interests and viewpoints, stakeholders moved on to the second stage by
envisioning new options that would respond to everyone’s interests and
viewpoints and would satisfy their criteria. They talked about the
possibility of removing car and truck traffic from the historic lift bridge
and using the bridge as a bike and pedestrian trail. In doing so, the
project could avoid increasing the number of road corridors, integrate the
bridge into the river’s scenic trail system, and extend the life of the
bridge. Essential to this idea’s success was finding ways to ensure that
funding would continue to be available to maintain the bridge even as the
DOTs remove the bridge from the roadway network.
Perhaps the most important moment in this phase came
when the stakeholders began discussing bridge design. In none of the
previous attempts to find a solution were the stakeholders permitted to
wrestle with the aesthetic questions in the way they did in this mediation.
Removing constraints, ignoring old assumptions, and freeing the
stakeholders’ imagination allowed them to break new ground and move toward a
solution that could be acceptable to everyone.
3. Rigorous evaluation — which options meet needs
and satisfy criteria.
As the third and final step, the stakeholders
evaluated the options against the full set of stakeholder interests. This
included determining which option or options met the historic preservation
requirements, which would have the least environmental impact, and which
would best alleviate the traffic concerns. In the end, it seems that the
best answer is to build an exceptionally well-designed new bridge downstream
of the existing structure, and preserve the historic bridge while removing
car and truck traffic from it. The idea still needs funding commitments,
permitting approvals from government agencies, and a final mitigation
package for environmental impacts.
With this plan, every stakeholder is asked to move
away from previous positions: environmentalists have to forego the idea of
preventing new bridge construction; transportation proponents have to part
with the idea of a lower-cost solution; and historic preservationists have
to exchange historic use for protection and longevity. In stepping away from
previously held positions, the stakeholders will realize that the lift
bridge will have long-term protection and be integrated into the recreation
system for the Wild and Scenic River Act. At the same time, they will see
that a new bridge of exceptional design is worthy of the St. Croix Valley.
The group could not have come this close to a final resolution without a
real appreciation for the scenic values and the exceptional environmental
quality that underlie the Wild and Scenic River designation, for the visual
quality of the historic district, and for a bridge design that responds to
aesthetic questions as it answers the transportation need.
Where we are today
In the next few months, the public will see a Final
Supplemental EIS. It will enumerate many of the details, including
mitigation measures that will be necessary to maintain stakeholder support.
It will also point to the future, specifying the level of funding needed to
protect the lift bridge and the process for creating a Visual Quality Design
Manual that translates the stakeholders’ work into a final design for the
new bridge. If the final EIS successfully addresses all of the stakeholders’
concerns, and if the DOTs secure the funding they need, construction could
begin in 2007 or 2008.
This two-bridge plan is the result of the
stakeholders’ insisting on a fair and transparent problem-solving process
that involved all affected stakeholders. Overcoming fear, resistance, and
long-standing conflict is a matter of inclusion and helping all stakeholders
to see how much more they achieve from their collective effort.
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