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Stewart Road Closure May 10, 1999 Page 13 j road clo ed benefit by a reduction of traffic, noise and dust and some increase in safety. ~r The ind strial and commercial property owners at the other end of Stewart Road are all harmed y the closure. Their income is reduced, their costs are increased because of increase crime, and the threat to at least some of these businesses' safety is increased due to i creased break-ins and the cut-through traffic that creates a hazard of accidents and pro erty damage. art of the appellants' objections to the closure was the means whereby it was accomp fished. In the first instance they were not consulted or given an opportunity to help cre to the record that went in to the decision. Then, after the first hearings officer's decision that the City had proceeded in the wrong manner to make the decision, the City re-issue the decision with the same effect. It creates the impression that it does not matter hat degree of harm the west side of Stewart Road suffers, the City has decided to close th road. o matter what the impression, the Eugene Code does not allow that. It requires conside ation of several criteria that involve the balancing of the negative and positive impacts By the requirement that the reasoning be articulated and subject to an appeal, by implica ion the Code is stating that there is some point beyond which the City cannot make a ecision and implement it regardless of the consequences. he question in this appeal is, did the City give adequate consideration to all the evidenc and make an appropriate decision within the confines of the Code. There are several eas where the hearing brought forth evidence of matters that the City apparently had not onsidered prior to its decision. Most important are some of the effects on the ~rr` western side of Stewart Road. The evidence was that the number of cut through vehicles did not educe as quickly as the City assumed. The evidence was that the loss of business ~ was gre ter than the City assumed. The evidence was that emergency response time was more a ected than assumed and the evidence was that there was an increase in criminal activity ith the possible exception of the increase in criminal activity, the City conside ed all of these categories of effects, but the City did not respond to the extent of the pro lems revealed in the hearing. This is not surprising, since the City made its decisio before the hearing. The City recognized the loss of the road and the resultant deliver problems, and no additional evidence was introduced to indicate that the City's evaluat on was not complete, although obviously the appellants disagreed with the City's conclus on that the negative effects did not outweigh the other positive effects of closure. he City concluded that cut through traffic would decline, and that the emergency respons time increase would not be significant. The evidence at the hearing was that the City ha underestimated the continuing problem that this would represent. The differe ces exist at two levels. First, of course, the City and the appellants assign differe t weight to the problem. Perhaps that is to be expected, but it is not grounds for determ'ning that the City erred. Eugene Code section 5.055 does not indicate what weight hould be assigned to any factor or criteria. In other words, the Code creates room f r a range of evaluative decisions. As long as the City considered the evidence and rea hed a conclusion allowed by, or within the permissible range of decisions 'I '~I I