Revised Alternatives Analysis and Project Assessment For Proposed County Road 595 Marquette County Road Commission January 9, 2012 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY An application for permit was filed with the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ) by Woodland Road LLC in August 2009 for the proposed Woodland Road in Marquette County. In May 2010 Woodland Road LLC withdrew the application for permit due to the inability to resolve pending issues with the project as raised by the MDEQ and U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). After withdrawal of the application, one of the members of the Woodland Road LLC, Kennecott Eagle Minerals Company (KEMC) made a decision to proceed with County Road 550 as the primary transportation route for the Eagle Development Project. The decision to utilize the CR 550 route, a portion of which travels through the cities of Marquette, Negaunee, and Ishpeming, caused substantial concern among local governmental units and the general public. As a result of the actions explained above, on October 4, 2010 the Marquette County Board of Commissioners formally requested that the Marquette County Board of Road Commissioners (MCRC) develop a new all-season primary county road from US-41 to Triple A Road within a four-mile wide corridor beginning at County Road FY (Appendix A). In response to this directive and after a public hearing, MCRC adopted a resolution on October 18, 2010, that concluded, in part, “that it is in the public’s interest to create a new all-season primary county road to run north-south beginning at the intersection of US-41/CR FY northerly to CR IAA (aka Triple A Road) and the name of the route shall be known as CR 595” (Appendix A). As the governing body granted authority by law to provide for and maintain public road infrastructure in Marquette County, MCRC is therefore applying for a permit from MDEQ to construct CR 595. The purpose of the proposed CR 595 project is to construct a primary county north- south road that (1) connects and improves emergency, commercial and recreational access to a somewhat isolated but key industrial, commercial and recreational area in northwest Marquette County to US-41, and (2) reduces truck travel from this area through the County’s population centers. Project Need MCRC has determined the CR 595 project is necessary to serve the mining, timber, aggregate, and recreation industries as well as emergency services in Marquette County. A primary economic benefit of CR 595 would be the overall reduction of travel distance required to access these industries and activities in northwest Marquette County by replacing the existing seasonal and circuitous routes. Improving trucking efficiency is important to the mining, timber, and aggregate industries and will benefit their long-term success. Not only would these industries benefit directly from CR 595, but the many businesses that serve these industries would benefit as well. The construction of CR 595 would directly create an estimated 200 jobs and the related benefits to the area businesses would be significant. More importantly, however, the CR 595 project will address public needs going far beyond the economic interests of these regionally key industries. There is a demonstrable need for improved access to northwest Marquette County for emergency fire control, emergency medical services, search and rescue, and for recreational access. Location of the project west of the Dead River dam system optimally addresses this need as a safeguard against access impediments created if that dam system fails again (as in 2003). There is a significant timber resource in northwest Marquette County and fire suppression provided by the Michigan Department of Natural Resources (MDNR) is critical to protecting this resource. In addition, providing better firefighter emergency access to the many private recreational “camps” in the area is an important additional benefit. CR 595 would vastly improve emergency response during winter months due to the shorter distance that snowmobile units with rescue sleds would have to travel from accident sites to reach an ambulance waiting on CR 595. Logging accidents are common in this area of Marquette County and requests for assistance from recreationists are also common. CR 595 would significantly enhance response time for EMS in this area. Specifically, as explained by Marquette County Sheriff Mike Lovelace and his staff: "Enhancement number one would be the effective and efficient response to any and all incidents, accidents, forest fires, floods, other emergencies and natural disasters in the remote northwestern portions of Marquette County that we did not previously possess. Currently we have to respond via two- track roads with front wheel drive patrol cars, four-wheel drive patrol trucks, ATVs, dirt bike, or on foot with Deputies and/or Search and Rescue volunteers. During the winter we would probably have to respond with snowmobiles on the State-maintained snowmobile trails in order to get anywhere as the seasonal roads are not plowed during the winter. Less time in a rescue sled being towed by a ATV on a rough two track road or trail, or by a snowmobile in the winter with more time spent in an ambulance on paved roads greatly enhances the chances for a victim's survival." MDNR Forest Management Division has stated that CR 595 would reduce fire fighter response time to the Yellow Dog Plains from the MDNR Ishpeming office to about 45 minutes, about half of the existing response time. The proposed road would also facilitate access for fire fighters to other areas of Marquette County to the north, such as Northwestern Road, and would provide quicker access to some of the lands south of the Huron Mountains. Forest fire response time can be critical to the success of containing a forest fire, especially in the jack pine plantations common in the Yellow Dog Plains. The proposed CR 595 would divert substantial truck and other vehicle traffic away from urban areas of Marquette County, thereby reducing traffic congestion and improving public safety. CR 595 would mitigate the potential impact of increased traffic volume associated with mining and timber operations in the more densely populated areas of Negaunee, Ishpeming, and the City of Marquette. As it relates to the increased traffic volume, area timber companies have estimated that their workers accessing the work sites in this area (not including the hauling of harvested timber) travel over 2,000 round trips per year. Most of those workers’ trips are currently on CR 510 or CR 550 and through Marquette. In addition, nearly 2,000 loads of timber are hauled out of the woods from the northwest part of the county on an average annual basis, meaning that there are 4,000 round trips of logging trucks. Currently half of those loads travel on CR 550 and through the City of Marquette. ____________________________________________________________________________ Revised Alternatives Analysis & Project Assessment January 9, 2012 Proposed County Road 595 Page 2 of 252 Wetland Impacts and Mitigation The proposed CR 595 impacts approximately 25.81 acres of wetland over a distance of 21.4 miles, including the impacts associated with the Trail 5 snowmobile trail relocation project and Triple A stream restoration. Impacts to wetlands are unavoidable with the proposed CR 595 project, but extensive planning and engineering design for the road has resulted in avoiding wetlands to the extent practicable and minimizing impacts as much as possible. A wetland mitigation plan has been prepared based upon extensive field study of potential sites. The unavoidable impacts to wetlands would be replaced at a minimum ratio of 1.5 to 1 in order to provide for no net loss of wetland. Wetland functions would be replaced by creation of a minimum of 48.41 acres of new wetlands. Five wetland mitigation sites are located in three of the four watersheds involved in the proposed CR 595 project. Due to the small amount of wetland impact in the Michigamme River watershed (0.6 acre), the wetland mitigation for those impacts is proposed in the Escanaba River watershed, relatively close to the wetland impact. It is anticipated that these wetland mitigation sites will replace the functions lost with the impacts to existing wetlands by providing similar ecosystem types in similar positions in the regional landscape. There are a total of 22 river and stream crossings of the proposed CR 595 road corridor (not including the East Branch of the Salmon Trout mitigation project) resulting in new, expanded and improved road crossings via the installation of new bridges or concrete box culverts at those locations. These crossings can have both a negative and positive impact on surface water resources. Of the 22 regulated stream crossings in the CR 595 project, 15 are existing stream crossings and seven will be new crossing locations. Of those 15 existing crossings, all of the structures are considered to be inadequately sized or are having degrading effects on the stream habitat. The implementation of aspects of Stream Simulation Methodology adopted by MDNR and MDEQ for this project will ensure that each of the stream crossings proposed on CR 595 has minimal negative long-term impact on the stream and near-stream habitat. A component of the stream mitigation plan is the relocation of a portion of Triple A Road and the removal and restoration of three existing culvert crossings on the East Branch Salmon Trout River. The road relocation will reduce the number of stream crossings over the East Branch Salmon Trout River on Triple A Road from three to one. The proposed new stream crossing is a 65-foot span box beam bridge that will span the East Branch Salmon Trout River and will not disturb the natural stream bottom or stream banks.