FAIRHOPE, Ala. — The City Council voted Monday to restart construction on the median project in front of Green Nurseries that it temporarily halted at its last meeting.

On July 14, the council moved to stop the project at Green Nurseries, continue the project north of Dyer Road, and schedule a meeting with city staff, Alabama Department of Transportation, several City Council members and the Greens to try and find a resolution to the median issue, according to the council minutes.

During a packed room in the mayor’s conference room before Monday’s council meeting, the council discussed the various solutions the city and council had been seeking with the Greens to provide access for large trucks to the wholesale nursery and landscape business. The Greens attended the meeting with their attorney.

The council had halted the construction two weeks ago in response to the Greens complaint that a median in front of their business on Greeno Road would seriously damage their business.

The council’s decision Monday to improve Hoyle Avenue adjacent to the nursery where an access through the median was already planned, left some questions unanswered at the time, Debra Green said at the meeting.

One question was whether the city would be able to accept a donation of plants and other materials from Green Nurseries in exchange for the city also improving the connection to Hoyle Avenue from the Green property.

“I’m afraid if we (work) on private property, we’ve opened a door we can never close (for other businesses that demand the same thing),” Councilman Cecil Christenberry said.

That question was answered Tuesday morning, City Council President Bob Gentle said.

“I just got off the phone with (City Attorney Marion “Tut” Wynne), who had spoken with the Alabama League of Municipalities,” Gentle said Tuesday. “He said it was their opinion, and in previous Attorney General opinions, that no work should be done under any circumstances on private property.”

Gentle said the current plan as decided by the council Monday and in light of Wynne’s opinion would be that the city would widen Hoyle Avenue and put gravel on that dirt road, but that the cost of any connection to the road would be the responsibility of Green Nurseries.

“We’re going to make sure it holds up to truck traffic,” Mayor Tim Kant said Tuesday, referring to the improvements to Hoyle Avenue. “We’ve been back out (on Greeno Road) working today.”

Kant said during Monday’s council meeting that the city would pay for the $5,000 cost for the improvements at Hoyle Avenue from the city’s capital improvements fund.

“We came away from the meeting frustrated,” Bobby Green said by e-mail Tuesday. “The council-mandated meeting with ALDOT never occurred. We were given only the one option on Hoyle. (Councilman Mike) Ford told us at the time the city would have (the contractor) do all the work at city expense. We were shown a Volkert (Engineering) drawing at (the) Hoyle entrance which we approved. Gentle told our attorney to draw up an agreement, which he did. We were told we would go over the agreement and the plans at the work session. Frankly, neither one was given much time.”

Kant said the project also includes upgrading all the pedestrian crosswalks to make it easier to cross five lanes of traffic.

“The overall plan is twofold,” Kant said about the Greeno Road median project from south of Highway 104 to Edwards Avenue. “(It is) to make it safer for pedestrians, and to distinguish where we want commercial from residential (development). We also wanted to see how we could slow the traffic down from Highway 104 and make it more aesthetically pleasing as you enter town.”