Kootenai County Planning Stays the Huetter Corridor Overlay

Director David Callahan and the other commissioners present, in the meeting on October 28th, 2021, put a stay on Huetter Corridor zoning overlay. The hold on the overlay was in agreement with the Idaho Transportation Department (ITD). ITD has confirmed that if the ecology study moves forward at this time, they will be looking at every option they currently see, and the publics, to improve traffic in Kootenai County. The focus will not be on the Huetter Corridor alone.

In effect, the Zoning Overlay would have added particular criteria to an area in question. In this case, the Overlay would have stopped all residents from building, improving, or performing any other actions to their property for at least two years, possibly more. The measure would have further impacted the potential to sell now and in the future.

Kootenai County Planning has added the overlay area in question to the Kootenai County GIS system. The Huetter Corridor is massive. Taking up nearly 150 feet more and close to double that of SR-41’s right-of-way after its expansion, the planned Corridor continues to shed doubts on the Kootenai Metropolitan Planning Organization’s (KMPO) ability to design road systems that provide value to the community.

KMPO continues to iterate that it is necessary to consume over 430 acres of land to enable people to get out of the prairie. However, their hypothetical model of 2040 shows that there would be less than an 8% overall improvement to traffic flow. Additionally, their report does not show the traffic saturation rate to each lane per road but rather just how many vehicles would be reduced per hour. The measurement is almost meaningless besides to setup up data for the more impactful analysis of lane saturation.