SKANEATELES - If you could design the western approach to the village of Skaneateles, what would it look like? More trees? A walking path for pedestrians? Detailed signage announcing that you've arrived in a special place?

Bergmann Associates, an engineering firm based out of Rochester, is seeking public input on what is commonly referred to as the Western Gateway project.

This $428,000 project includes streetscape and landscape improvements to a stretch of U.S. Route 20 (roughly from the Red Apple store east to Franklin Street) that local officials, business owners and residents hope will improve the safety and aesthetics of the area.

The construction - which is scheduled to be completed by the end of the year - will be funded by a $342,000 federal grant and, if property owners and the Skaneateles Town Board agree to it, a special district.

The town held a public information session recently to explain the progress on the long-delayed project and to seek input about how residents and business owners envision this gateway.

“We don't have any preconceived ideas of what we want for this,” explained Bergmann senior landscape architect Christopher Centola, asking that Skaneateles residents think about the image they'd like to project to the outside world. “We'll try to come up with something unique that hopefully, everybody can say, 'Yeah, that's it.'”

Nothing has been designed or conceptualized yet, added project engineer Richard Bennett, and Bergmann and the town are open to listening to all ideas, suggestions and concerns.

The idea for making landscape and streetscape improvements to the western approach to the village dates back to the late 1990s. The town then received a Transportation Enhancement Program grant in April 2000 for the corridor plan, but that grant required the town to contribute 20 percent of the project budget before the funds could be freed up, and the town set the project aside to explore ways it could fund the $86,000 without taking money from the general fund, said Mirbeau Inn & Spa owner Gary Dower, a member of the Western Gateway Committee.

The project and money sat idle until 2005, when Bill Palvus, a former town supervisor, approached Dower about getting things up and going again. The town subsequently formed a Western Gateway Committee, signed a contract with the state Department of Transportation to secure the funding and hired Bergmann Associates as the engineer.

The idea of having a special district fund the local share served as a catalyst to re-energize the project, Dower said.

Now in the stage of collecting data about everything from traffic to drainage, Bergmann Associates will be investigating the feasibility of a variety of improvements. These include a pedestrian trail, the relocation of utility lines, westbound and eastbound bike lanes, pedestrian crossing areas, better-defined driveways, and left-turn lanes for eastbound traffic at both the entrances to Mirbeau and Transportation Drive.

“If anyone has tried to turn left onto Transportation Drive, you can feel the trucks on the back of your neck,” Dower said, making reference to truck and car traffic that routinely travels above the speed limit as it comes down the hill and into the village.

The idea behind the corridor is to “have a gateway that announces you're entering a more populated area,” Bennett said, noting that several techniques can be used for “traffic calming,” where people unconsciously slow down as they realize they are entering a different area.

Moving forward

With what Bennett called an “aggressive schedule,” the engineers would like to receive feedback from the public by Feb. 10. As the project progresses, there will be several other public information sessions and hearings.

Because Route 20 is a national highway owned by the state DOT, Bergmann must compile and receive approval of a report that outlines all of the proposed design plans before proceeding with construction. Work is estimated to take about six weeks and is scheduled to begin in late summer or early fall of this year, thereby disrupting summer traffic as little as possible.

The intent is to make improvements within the state's current right-of-way so as not to affect current property owners#, parcels.

William Carroll, owner of The Dealer Auto Sales and Carroll Equipment at 816 W. Genesee St., is in favor of the improvements.

“I think it's a good project,” Carroll said. “It's worth putting some money into for all of us. I think it's going to increase the value of everybody's property.”

The financial impact on property owners in the proposed special district - now estimated to be about 19 parcels - is minimal, Dower said, noting that roughly $100,000 will be borrowed over a period of 15 years.

Each property owner in the district will pay an annual fee based on assessed value and highway frontage.

“We're hopeful that we're going to get unanimous approval because it seems to make a great deal of sense for the property owners,” Dower said.

Property owners will have to make a petition and go before the town board, after which time there will be a public hearing on the matter.

Dower said that if this project is successful, there is also the possibility of mirroring the gateway on the eastern approach to the village.

What about the

gas stations?

One related area that many in the community wish could also be resolved is the old Mobil station at the corner of Genesee Street and Fuller Road.

In early 1990, residents of the Highland Street area began to notice a gasoline odor in their homes. The state Department of Environmental Conservation was called in to investigate, according to the archives of The Citizen.

The state later determined that the spill's source was the Mobil station, as well as the neighboring gas station owned by Frank Hudgins, according to the state's 2000 complaint against Petr-All and Hudgins. Cleanup of the estimated 2,000-gallon spill continued for months.

The New York Environmental Protection and Spill Compensation Fund had expended $508,869 as of April 2007 to remediate petroleum contamination at the two stations, according to information provided by Dan Weiller, deputy press secretary for the Office of the State Comptroller. Weiller had said at the time that there was an environmental lien of $223,243 on the Mobil site, but John Milgrim, a spokesman for the state attorney general's office, said last week that there was no lien on that property.

He said that the property is involved in ongoing litigation and that he couldn't comment much on it.

Clearly concerned and frustrated, Dower said on Thursday that he believes the Petr-All case is the longest unresolved spill file in the AG's office. Milgrim said that was not the case.

He added that the current litigation involving that property shouldn't have any effect on the Western Gateway project.

Dower did note that one of his companies was able to acquire the abandoned gas station originally owned by Hudgins (located just west of the Mobil). After an extended effort, Dower was able to purchase the property and reach an agreement with the state about two years ago. He said the agreement allowed him to work with the DEC to complete the environmental cleanup in exchange for the state releasing its claims against the property.

“That was a little scary because we weren't quite sure what we were getting into, but we felt it was important for ourselves and for the community to get the property cleaned up,” Dower said.

“The prior owner had walked away from it,” he said, noting that he was concerned that the barrels of toxic materials on the site were going to spill onto the Mirbeau's adjacent property and then be washed into a tributary of Skaneateles Creek.

Dower's company entered into a cleanup agreement with the DEC, and “over the course of about a year, everything was catalogued, removed and properly disposed of,” Dower said.

Weiller confirmed that Dower had completed remediation at the site under the oversight of the DEC.