Local Business

A pizza restaurant, a doggy daycare and an auto parts store won approvals from the City Council Tuesday night that clear the way for them to open business in Richfield. 

All three needed conditional use permits, which is council approval to operate in a way that isn't usually allowed under the city's zoning code. The council had a public hearing for each of the businesses Tuesday night before unanimously approving the exceptions.

Pizza Luce

The Twin Cities pizza restaurant chain will open its seventh location in the old Bridgeman's restaurant at 800 66th St. W.,  just east of SuperAmerica, sometime this summer. 

The restaurant will have a full bar (the reason it needed a special-use permit) and an outdoor patio facing 66th Street. The company plans to completely renovate the existing building.

One wrinkle will be the loss of parking for Postal Service employees, who now use the north end of the Bridgeman's lot.

Woof Central

Several neighbors expressed concern about odors and noise during the public hearing for Woof Central, a dog daycare business Lori and Don Swetala plan to open at 6315 Penn Ave., where Dave's Furniture World used to be located. 

Dog kennels are permitted as a conditiional use under the zoning plan for that block of Penn Avenue, according to the staff report to the council about the Swetalas' application. Woof Central will be used both as a day facility and for boarding for up to 50 dogs, the Swetalas told the council Tuesday.

Don Swetala said the couple plans to use the lower floor of their building to exercise the dogs, so dogs being outside and being walked through the neighborhood should be less of a concern. The animals will be able to relieve themselves inside the building, which is equipped with floor drains.

The Swetala's will also ask the council to allow an outdoor-relief area behind the building. A public hearing on that application has been set for the Richfield Planning Commission Feb. 27 and the City Council on March 13.

O'Reilly Auto Parts

O'Reilly asked the council to set aside building setback and parking requirements for the former King Oscar Scandinavian Restaurtant site at 12th Avenue and 66th Street. 

The company plans to build a 6,872-square-foot store on the vacant lot. 

Jann Owen, a neighbor who had spoken against the variances when the proposal was considered by the Richfield Planning Commission, told council members Tuesday night that she'd offered an alternative site plan to the company that wouldn't require building the new store so close to her lot line. But the council approved the company's revised plans on a unanimous vote.

55423.info, Richfield's independent news, information and community-building website, had its best month ever for site traffic in January.

The site recorded 3,393 visits and 9,417 page views by 1,561 different people, according to statistics compiled by Bluehost, the website's host.

Besides the 55423.info home page, the three most popular pages on the site in January were:

- The remodeling and sale of the 66th Street Dairy Queen
- Richfield police reports
- The announcement that Pizza Luce and Aria restaurants will open in 2012

Traffic on 55423.info has more than tripled since January 2011, when 514 unique visits were recorded.

The site's best previous month was November 2011, when a special feature about school board candidates and coverage of the general election dramatically increased traffic. That month, 1,553 unique visitors made 2,624 visits and viewed 9,158 individual pages.

55423.info went live in July 2011. Its traffic has grown steadily since then.