Needed renovations on Ruxton Avenue are facing limitations due to budget and funding constraints.
“I think we all had the sentiment that, boy, we’re going to go in here and work with Colorado Springs and dig up the whole street, Colorado Springs [Utilities (CSU)] would replace their big … water lines and we’d … bury the utilities and just have this beautiful, pristine street that would last for 50 years,” said Mayor John Graham during the Manitou Springs City Council Feb. 11 work session. “We’re all feeling a little bit crestfallen and then to see the prices go up – that’s not encouraging, either.”
The City has $4 million in funds from the Colorado Department of Transportation and has allocated $835,870 for the project.
“We’ve been working this for some time, and it’s probably the most challenging project that we will do, and that CSU has done,” explained City Administrator Denise Howell. “Going down a canyon – that’s very limited access, residential impacts, you have businesses, and you have the Incline, so lots of different parties that we’re working with.”
Howell said that at first the City looked at just doing the upper part of Ruxton getting power lines put underground, but that smaller project was cost prohibitive.
“There was going to be no other money left,” Howell said. “We weren’t going to be able to help with the part that’s down on Ruxton and it wasn’t going to help with our storm water system, which we desperately need on the Ruxton corridor.”
Howell cited “a lot of moving parts,” such as CSU’s waterline work and a promising grant that ultimately didn’t pan out.
“We looked at undergrounding all of the utilities along the whole Corridor and we got an estimate of about $23 million,” she said. “We have about 60 easements that we would have to do, so we started looking for a grant, and we thought we had a grant, and we were starting to write that and then we were meeting with the grant organization and they said, ‘Oh you don’t really qualify because it’s not a low-income area and there haven’t been enough accidents on Ruxton.'”
Howell explained those are typical considerations with federal grants.
Working with the money available
With only the $4.8 million to work with, City Engineer Andrew Morren presented Council with four options, requiring the City to choose between undergrounding electric lines and forgoing walkability and stormwater enhancements or focusing on the sidewalks and water lines while leaving the electric lines overhead. Morren recommended Council focus on the option that would provide new asphalt, improve water, stormwater and sewer, and install new curb gutter and sidewalks for the portion of Ruxton from New York Avenue to Manitou Avenue.
It’s probably the most challenging project that we will do, and that CSU has done. – Manitou Spring City Administrator Denise Howell
Councilor John Shada raised concerns about repairing only a portion of the corridor at one time without replacing gas and water lines owned by CSU.
“If we pick this kind of thing here and we put all new sidewalks in and we put all new asphalt in and we put our infrastructure in as well and then you guys [CSU] decide in two years that, oh, out of the blue you want to replace that … raw water line,” he said. “I guess we just wait until some magic thing happens that you decide you want to do it or the same thing with the gas line then we have the whole street all torn up again.”
Bill Balch of CSU explained that he was simply responding to the limited options provided by the city. “We work very closely with the City of Manitou Springs on all your utility infrastructure and all of our utility infrastructure,” he said. “We coordinate our efforts so that we can make sure we’re as efficient as possible with the least amount of impact to the city residents here so to answer what I think was your question – we have been consulting on this for several years now and we’ve looked at all the various iterations that have been presented to Council tonight, and your folks made their determination this is the project to bring forward. We have discussed this and we support them and we will continue to support them in their efforts. There’s no way to know exactly how long a water line or electric line or a gas line is going to last but we try to coordinate.”
Residents concerned about project’s impact on neighborhoods
Ultimately, no guidance was given by Council to staff during the work session, other than none of the options were adequate, leaving some residents frustrated.
“Manitou Springs has to make a plan for the citizens, because the Ruxton Avenue project is going to affect [the city] immensely because of traffic, because residents will have nowhere to go,” said Linda Morlan, who lives on Minnehaha Avenue, in an interview with the Pikes Peak Bulletin after the work session.
But Morlan also sees the need for those improvements.
“It’s not safe right now to walk on Ruxton Avenue. People have had their cars side-swiped. People have been bumped with vehicles.”
She explained the impact the project will have on neighboring streets.
“The traffic comes off the highway on Serpentine. If Ruxton Avenue is closed or partially closed, then they’re going to come off of Serpentine [Drive] and they’re going to go over Minnehaha to get to the Cog, to the Incline, or whatever else they want to do, which is going to cause a lot of problems,” she said. “There are no sidewalks, no curbs, very little walkway on Pilot Knob or Minnehaha. Traffic is already intense … How are we going to be safe? It’s not safe. It’s going to get worse. When they start that Ruxton Avenue project, it’s going to be chaos, and they don’t have a plan.”
