Muskegon – A highway, an amusement park and five townships are the focus of the Sustainable North Central Muskegon County Charrette.
With significant recent growth and more anticipated for the Cedar Fair LLC owned Michigan’s Adventure Amusement Park, the surrounding municipalities have had to examine the roadways, sewer lines and zoning that exist in the area, making sure the necessary infrastructure is in place to sustain that growth.
The charrette site includes the area around the amusement park from the M120 corridor to White Lake Drive between the Whitehall Road corridor and US 31, the Russell/Riley Thompson entrance corridor to Michigan’s Adventure and the portions of Muskegon Lake, Bear Lake and Duck Lake contained in the area.
Roland Crummel, supervisor of Laketon Township, said the charrette hopes to address issues such as supporting traffic volumes, developing a plan for storm-water infrastructure and developing a master plan, as well as cementing cooperation between the communities involved in the recent establishment of the North Central Muskegon County Joint Planning Commission.
Working together is paramount for proper growth of the region, Crummel said and it is important to regional residents, who expressed through a survey that they wanted to see more cooperation among the government entities.
The townships have already worked together on the Muskegon Areawide Plan, which was developed in 2004.
“Once we made that step, the players started coming out,” said Dave Fisher, community development director for the Muskegon Charter Township.
Fisher said Michigan’s Adventure could increase its capacity well beyond what is has now, and he wants to be prepared.
“It’s a huge, huge potential of what can happen in this area,” he said.
Crummel said he hopes having the opinions of experts and being able to hear how others have solved similar dilemmas will help the area townships decide how best to meet the future needs of the area.
“That’s what we need is exposure to what other communities have done, and those people apparently are able to provide that.”
Crummel said participants decided to apply to be a part of the charrette after they were approached by Robert Daverman, chairman of the West Michigan Regional Urban Design Charrette and an architect with Progressive AE. Crummel said the area attracted Daverman’s attention because of the potential for collaboration between municipalities.
“We thought it would be a good idea and proceeded from there,” Crummel said.
“It will bring in a whole amount of professional expertise.”
