Curving Vernon to line up with Quentin would create its own set of problems. While there are few (if any) properties that directly front Quentin, a large factory and a residential cul-de-sac depend directly on Quentin for access. Downtown Savage businesses also depend on it secondarily for vehicles coming in from 13 (now that the RIROs between Quentin and Lynn have been closed off). And then there's the matter of that kink at the railroad bridge (an alternating two-way stop because the underpass isn't wide enough for two vehicles!!)
Thus, I'd almost have to assume the connection would necessitate / accelerate an extension of CSAH 27 down the bluff from CSAH 16 to MN 13... and maybe that's the proposal's true endgame. (I did see a reference to this extension in a 2030 comprehensive plan a while back, though I forget whose, and I can't seem to find much anymore via random Googling). ROW acquisition for this could be a serious pain in the butt, though a quick glance at Google Maps suggests a route curving from the current terminus over to(ward) existing Xenwood Avenue might have a chance. (Someone with more actual engineering knowledge than myself would have to opine on whether there'd be sufficient room between the existing buildings just east of Xenwood, vs. whether the county would have to effectuate a full taking for properties on one side or other of the street).
Still problematic in that scenario is frontage-road access and the access between new 27 and existing 13. All parties involved sounded very enthused about the recent creation of continuous frontage-road access through the Savage industrial corridor, and it's hard to see how this could be maintained. Curve 123rd down into 124th, or build 125th through from new 27 to Quentin, to maintain sufficient spacing with an at-grade 27/13 intersection? Then you lose the grade separation at the railroad crossing and disrupt the continuity. Keep the continuity, and you blow traffic flow all to hell and risk a high volume of crashes. Could the solution involve maintaining grade separation on 13 and new 27 and taking some of the property on the north side of 13 for a quasi-interchange via stoplight, aligning at the existing Quentin signal? (For a current example, see CSAH 62 and Eden Prairie Road in the Glen Lake area).
Another question for engineers and legislative process wonks (rather than a random insomniac roadgeek): justification / warrants. I'm sure there's a non-negligible volume of, say, Prior Lake and western Savage residents who work in the Bush Lake area, the Highway 100 corridor through Edina, and similar places at some distance from both 169 and 35W. But would this anticipated volume -- in combination with the resulting VMT reductions on 13, Old Shakopee Road, CSAH 42, and/or I-494 (no more doubling back from the river crossings) -- be sufficient as a justification, whether engineering-wise or politically?
EDIT to address Bloomington's concerns on high traffic near residential neighborhoods (as well as neighborhood access). Would it be feasible to rebuild as a Super-2 between 84th and Old Shakopee Road? Certainly we'd want to limit intersections, possibly even pop in a folded trumpet at 94th/Poplar Bridge and another Glen Lake quasi-interchange at 102nd? Southwood Drive and the south leg of Norman Ridge Drive could almost certainly go, as well as the T-intersection at 95th. Reconfigure the dogleg near 106th into a single 90-degree intersection? Convert the northern leg of Norman Ridge (/ Toledo Road) to an underpass, doing a couple of full or partial takings to preserve RIRO at Norman Ridge and create new RIRO via a short stub road to 91st/Utica? Signalize Northwood Drive and extend it eastward to a new frontage road to be constructed along the western edge of Nord Myr Park, whose other terminus would be Mount Normandale Drive newly grade-separated by underpass? How many Benadryl am I going to have to take to make me drowsy enough to stop this?
