Traffic main concern from residents in Coliseum case

Judy and Jim Barnes know they’ve been spoiled.

They bought their home at the corner of St. Charles Road and Norwick Drive in 2000, finally settling in four years later. They liked Columbia for its abundance of health care options, including a VA hospital for Jim, a Navy shipyard worker. At the time, Judy said, St. Charles Road had a country feel to it, with just a few houses along the street and the occasional subdivision sprouting from the side. Police and deputies would use Norwick Drive, which features just two homes, as a place to monitor speeds of drivers making their way between Highway 63 and the Lake of the Woods Exit of Interstate 70.

“They’d just sit here for a minute, then they’d go and catch them and come back, and sit a minute, and catch another one,” Barnes told ABC 17 News.

Their home looks out onto a single house across St. Charles Road surrounded by nearly 14 acres of open land. That could soon change, if the Columbia City Council approves a 43-home subdivision called “The Coliseum” from SBSR II Properties. Preliminary plans from the city revealed Tuesday night show a four-road neighborhood, with two round cul-de-sacs and two dead-end roads, that fit the 43 homes. The north end of the neighborhood is left open for a potential connection to Ballenger Lane, just north of I-70, city planner Steve MacIntyre said.

The Barnes’ fear that connection to Ballenger Lane might continue onto their street, going farther south towards Richland Road. The constant traffic, Judy Barnes said, may make their home an undesirable place to keep living.

“If it stays quiet enough for the next 10, 15 years, maybe we’ll just stay here,” she said. But it’s a concern. As we’re getting older, we wouldn’t like to have a whole lot of traffic coming through here.”

The Coliseum is SBSR Properties’ first foray into the home market. Rich, a local developer with Enrich Construction, partnered with Scott Broadius, the former co-owner of AdKarma. Rich told ABC 17 News he expected the homes to look similar to those around it, estimating their price at around $200,000. He said the company wanted to preserve as many trees on the property as possible, but didn’t have a planned start date, should they get approved.

Several residents at Tuesday’s public input meeting said traffic would only worsen due to the neighborhood. St. Charles Road would be the only entrance and exit, generating around 215 trips in and out of the area. Barnes said the new construction of Battle High School has increased traffic along the road, which connects Keene Street and the MU Women’s and Children’s Hospital to the Lake of the Woods Exit of I-70.

The city’s Planning and Zoning Commission will vote on the issue Feb. 23. The city council has final approval on the plan.