In summer, you’ll be hard pressed to find a more happening place than Soldotna Creek Park on Wednesdays. Each year, the weekly Soldotna Wednesday Market draws hundreds of visitors to the collection of booths, food trucks and vendors that fan out across the grass, while musicians from around the country serenade crowds.
The market is Soldotna’s prime gathering place for residents in summer. But city officials have long had bigger dreams for that part of town. Capitalizing on the popularity of the park in summer, city officials envision a walkable tourism district parallel to the river.
Soldotna has inched toward a revamped waterfront for years. The process kicked off in 2022, when the city got a federal grant worth $360,000 to start assembling a project plan. Since then, the city’s finished that plan and gathered public input. Now, they’re turning to city code.
“The purpose of this work session is just to go over both the ordinances to go over the riverfront,” said Linda Mitchell. She’s Soldotna’s director of planning and economic development and led a council work session Wednesday to present the details of what’s being proposed. “First being the – adding a new sub chapter, which would be the riverfront mixed use district within the zoning text. And then the second ordinance is the rezone.”
The city has big ideas for the redeveloped waterfront: a plaza near the bridge, storefronts that face park spaces and a market hall, to name a few. But before any of that can happen, the city needs to figure out what type of infrastructure does and doesn’t align with that vision.
That’s where the two zoning ordinances come in. The first ordinance would create an entirely new type of mixed-use zoning that would be specific to the new riverfront area called the Riverfront Mixed-Use District. The second ordinance actually rezones the land – about 50 acres in all.
Right now, the project area is zoned commercial, which allows a wider variety of business types. The proposed mixed use zone has a narrower scope, describing development that “contributes to the overall district vision.”
As proposed, certain businesses would not be allowed to set up shop in the revamped riverfront area, including automotive services, churches, storage lockers and marijuana businesses, to name a few. But Mitchell says council members ultimately get the final say on what is and isn’t allowed.
“You can always change the land use at any point where you feel like there's a use that you see more appropriate,” she said.
After hearing Wednesday’s presentation, multiple council members voiced concerns about the limits of the new zone type.
Council member Linda Farnsworth-Hutchings used to own a business in the boundaries of the district. Her business moved across the street, outside of the zoning district. She says the area is a commercial hub for the city and she doesn’t want to put any restrictions on businesses that bring sales tax revenue into the city.
“I'm really having a lot of issues with this whole ordinance,” she said. “I mean, I have lots of yellow highlighting.”
Dan Nelson also has reservations. He says he’s “a little uneasy” about the ordinances as proposed. And he wants to know what the rush is.
“It's frustrating when you've gone through many Planning and Zoning Commissions, open houses, 100 different things, and we're here at the end, then you've got us going, or at least me going, ‘Wait,’” he said. “But you know, I think it's important to get it right as much as possible first.”
Council members are scheduled to vote on the ordinance creating the new zoning district Sept. 10. But they could vote to bump that back, if they want to. More information about Soldotna’s riverfront redevelopment plan, including maps and mockups, is available on the city’s website at soldotna.org.
