US-24 Sucks! (Denver, Colorado Springs, Loveland: real estate, houses, established neighborhood)
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I live in Oklahoma. My parents and a number of other relatives live in Colorado, in and around the Colorado Springs area.
Every time I visit. I mean every time, there is always some grisly, bloody needlessly fatal accident happening on US-24 east of Colorado Springs.
IMHO, this situation is unforgivably PROFANE. There is so much traffic, particularly high speed truck traffic on US-24 between Colorado Springs and Limon (where the road meets I-70) that US-24 should really be expanded to a 6-lane Interstate highway. Instead, US-24 is a puny, stupid, extremely DANGEROUS itty bitty 2 lane suicide route. That has got to change. It is absolutely outrageous that this road has been left in that stupid dangerous condition for so many years.
This situation is also very typical for Colorado Springs. I visit at least once or twice a year and each time I drive up from Oklahoma there's some new subdivision cropping up somewhere with hundreds of housing plots cut apart by beautifully landscaped and divided 4 or 6 lane streets. Yet those streets dead end in some stupid CHEAP 2 lane itty bitty suicide route.
What exactly is going on in Colorado that CO DOT doesn't seem to have the first clue on how to build a proper highway? Are they all on dope? Huh?
I mean, really! Let's take a look at Woodmen Road for instance. They go through some long drawn out process to "upgrade" that street from Falcon on into the city. And what does everybody get? ANOTHER STUPID 2 LANE ROAD!!! Ugh! That's another major route that at the very least needs to be a divided 4 lane road if not a full blown superhighway.
Those idiots in Denver and Colorado Springs are inviting upon themselves the very same extremely expensive road problems that cities like Houston and Phoenix have had to deal with in previous decades. Thanks to the traffic nightmares in Houston the entire state of Texas has become much more proactive in building roads or at least securing road corridors in advance of need. Phoenix and AZ DOT has had to pay out a dear fortune for putting off building loop highways and such until the city was exploding in population (and real estate costs hit an extreme in price).
In terms of US-24 between Colorado Springs and Limon, I just don't understand why CDOT didn't four lane this route a long time ago. A good number of Colorado citizens have a very snotty attitude of superiority to those in other neighboring states. That's all the more reason to see the US-24 situation as a profane embarrassment. If some back-water state like Oklahoma can manage to connect a lot of sparsely populated towns and villages with four lane highways then just what in the hell kind of excuse can Colorado hide behind?
I think (I may be wrong) that US-24 is not under CDOT. (Sometimes a local or state department will manage a higher level road, For example Colorado Springs Utilities manages the lighting on CO-83 in the COS city limits; Also CDOT now manages Powers for example but that is because Power is now CO-21).
But I noticed the same thing in the original post about Woodmen. It is more than a two lane road east to Powers then it is a two lane road to Falcon. I think in time it will be widened - there are a lot of homes destined to be built in Falcon/Peyton/Calhan and Banning Lewis Ranch. Marksheffel is set for huge changes between Woodmen and Constitution. In fact there are now traffic signals on it at Stetson and maybe Barnes and I would expect Dublin, maybe Carefree and Circle too.
Here's another pet peeve. I notice a lot of huge trucks on CO-83 through the Palmer Divide. My suspicion is they are avoiding the Monument Hill scales.
Interesting little nugget of info on CO-83 through the Cherry Creek State Park
I can't vouch for US 24 that far east but I can tell you that the lack of road infrastructure was the number 1 reason we scratched the Springs off of places to consider for relocation to CO.
I was stationed in the Springs in '71 and didn't return until the mid '90s. It didn't look to me as if any new roads had been built nor any main arteries expanded in that time. We visited a few times since but after a day or so of driving around looking at houses and neighborhoods we headed north, to Loveland.
As long as developers are allowed to build with scant requirements to provide infrastructure that their developments require, the kinds of problems decribed here are going to only get worse. Quite frankly, I think a lot of long-time residents of Colorado are getting very tired of new developerment chewing up thousands upon thousands of acres in sprawl and then have many of the costs of those developments and their related impacts being socialized upon them.
The solution to both problems would be a constitutional amendment that would both permit and mandate that new development be compelled to pay its own way for ALL infrastructure costs (including improvement and expansion of arterial roads, water system improvements, etc.) that the development would require. If we're going to have sprawl, then let it at least pay its own way--don't foist the costs of it on people who may neither want it, nor benefit from it.
And, yes, I think that Colorado Springs is a great example of the kind of "closet socialism" that developers like to play, but it is no means limited to just there.
Yep; the development in the Springs reminded me of Houston. Just slap it up and then let the "business minded", "low tax" politicians play catch up on the infrastructure.
I've driven Hwy 24 several times between COL SPGS and Limon and can't believe this is still a 2-laner. It is a dangerous old road and should have been replaced MANY years ago by a 4 lane highway built to full-up interstate specs. But, they should NOT widen the existing crappy road running through tiny towns – there isn’t room for more lanes without tearing down half of each town. Build a new highway bypassing the towns, leaving their character intact. Through traffic belongs on through highways, not old roads like 24. I'd bet Rte 24 goes back to the 1930's and New Deal program of road building as a way to put people to work and spend our way out of the Great Depression.
JazzLover has good points about development paying its way up front. In the north end of COL SPGS where we live, that seem to have been done, most roads up here are 6-lanes (Union Blvd, Austin Bluffs Pkwy, Research Pkwy, Briargate Pkwy, much of Powers Blvd, etc). Except for residential sidestreets, all others up here are 4 lanes. When I first saw these roads a few years ago, I thought I'd found the promised land - compared to Fairfax County, VA where we were.
Years ago (early 1980's), Fairfax said NO on state highway funds because strings were attached. How stupid was that. No new roads were build for a long time. At the same time, the egotistical county executive who said 'NO' to the state led a charge to 4-wall Fairfax County with development of every sort. The resulting mess became a nationally-used verb, as in Don't "Fairfax" Our County. The TX Transportation Institute rates traffic in Fairfax County and Northern Virginia as one of the WORST two or three traffic nightmares in the USA.
To make matters worse, VA had a period where a "cut my taxes" crowd had their way, further tightening VA's road building budget. Yes, they make developers widen a road when homes or commercial stuff goes in, but ONLY for that stretch of road that fronts their parcel of land. What this means, and this is a TRUE example, as I drove these roads for years, is that Centreville Rd, from Herndon to Chantilly, VA, went from 6 lines to 2 lanes to 4 lanes to 2 lanes to 6 lanes (at Rte 50) back to 4 lanes, then to 2 lanes then to 3 lanes where it ends at Rte 28. That’s the insane effect of their arcane set of rules back in VA. Little patches of widening where something gets built, but no coherent, comprehensive solution. That's why we were so glad to come here, this place is a breeze compared to there. Fairfax County and the state of VA have a huge backlog of projects and precious little money to pay for it. The cost to retrofit lanes and interchanges onto existing roads, while handling heavy traffic loads, is 2-4 times the cost of building it right the first time. Road builders get a huge bonus out of all this, taxpayers only get to pay bloated bills. I’m hoping we will do the right things here. Our motto should be “Don’t Fairfax Colorado.”
Back to Colorado Springs and Rte 24. Not sure why there is no new road. El Paso County and COL SPGS long ago passed a point of having sufficient size and critical mass to get a new link to I-70 at Limon. We’re a major national defense center with a huge & growing Ft Carson, 4 major USAF bases, many defense contractors, and continuing growth. A new Limon-COL SPGS road is long overdue. Where are our elected “leaders” on this? Why haven't they gotten Federal, state and local funds allocated for this?
I know we have a Taxpayers Bill of Rights law (aka TABOR) here in CO that limits spending and is aimed at returning “excess” money to taxpayers based on some formula. IMO, the formula is flawed, badly. IMO, this law, brainchild of an anti-tax ex-Californian, is part of the problem. Efforts to temporarily put TABOR on hold and spend some money on roads narrowly lost in a vote the the other year when anti-tax forces waged a campaign of fear on a basis that since there was no list of road projects associated with the bill, that the money could be spent anywhere, not on roads. They may be right, maybe not. No one really knows for sure.
What we KNOW for sure is that Rte 24 continues to be a dangerous old road, built in when COL SPGS was a sleepy tourist town with a list of TB hospitals, an era of 15-ton, 27-foot semi-trucks doing 35 MPH. Today, Rte 24 is not appropriate for 40-ton, 53-foot semi-trucks doing 65 MPH. Nor is it appropriate for a major metro area of half a million people and major defense center.
Bobby H - please tell that to the governor's office as well as those darned politicians in Washington. C Springs and surrounding areas (including other areas of our state that aren't along the I-70 corridor) are trumped by the needs of Denver when it comes to transportation dollars. What the politicians forget is that Colorado Springs and surrounding is about half a million people and with Ft. Carson's expansion, the stress on roads and other infrastructure will only be compounded.
This isn't a Colorado Springs thing at all. It's a Denver (state capitol) and Washington DC thing. Barking at a message board filled with taxpayers isn't going to change anything. The City of Colorado Springs has nothing to do with 24 coming from I-70 into town. It's an interstate road that has various political entities along the way.
Let's see: 24 runs through Elbert and El Paso counties. You have Matheson, Ramah, Calhan, Peyton and Falcon - all small towns that don't have much political clout along the way.
Major arteries through C Springs are: I-25, Academy Blvd and Powers Blvd. All are reasonably maintained. Recently the State and C Springs swapped control of Academy Blvd. from the State to the City. In return, the State took control over Powers. Powers was a good vision by the City actually. Initially people were against it but it has proven to be a source for not only better travel for north-south access but in recent years has become a boon for city taxes. Is it perfect? No. But given the fact our east-west routes are the su ck it's better than it could have been.
Long term planning in any community is difficult. It's not limited to Colorado Springs but virtually any mid sized city in the west. 30 year plans are difficult to come up with because growth is not fluid. Take into count that the City had little notice that the Army would be sending more soldiers, their families and such here. In addition, in times of war and since C Springs is so dependent on the military, population fluctuates. Many times when people are sent overseas, their families don't stay here but go back "home" to get the support and live near their families. In a city like this, it's different than other metropolitan cities.
Same goes for the towns that now are being stressed on the Western Slope because of the energy boom. They went through a bust in (I think) in the early 80s and growth was pretty stagnent. It swinged up a bit with retirees who wanted a nice home in Battlement Mesa but in that area, the communities are at the breaking point to keep up with services and infrastructures there too. Luckily many are on the I-70 corridor so they get looked at by the State more.
Anyhow, this isn't a C Springs problem, it's a State and Federal problem.
FWIW, I've never driven between C Springs and Limon. Never had the need. As for C Springs itself, man alive, the worst mass transit system I have ever seen. And, when the City joined forced with the County, it's gotten even worse. If we had a decent mass transit system here, our local roadways wouldn't be so clogged. You almost can't have a decent life here without a car. Denver has only scratched the surface with their own mass trans...it's better but not good enough.
I forgot to add: Also, the communities along I-70 that are experiencing a boom in populations also have "tax" (more like fees really) of all energy (natural gas, shale ((?)) oil and such) that is produced. Those taxes are supposed to go back to the communities to help them with infrastructure. Colorado Springs has no such thing.
Bobby H - please tell that to the governor's office as well as those darned politicians in Washington. C Springs and surrounding areas (including other areas of our state that aren't along the I-70 corridor) are trumped by the needs of Denver when it comes to transportation dollars. What the politicians forget is that Colorado Springs and surrounding is about half a million people and with Ft. Carson's expansion, the stress on roads and other infrastructure will only be compounded.
This isn't a Colorado Springs thing at all. It's a Denver (state capitol) and Washington DC thing. Barking at a message board filled with taxpayers isn't going to change anything. The City of Colorado Springs has nothing to do with 24 coming from I-70 into town. It's an interstate road that has various political entities along the way.
Let's see: 24 runs through Elbert and El Paso counties. You have Matheson, Ramah, Calhan, Peyton and Falcon - all small towns that don't have much political clout along the way.
Major arteries through C Springs are: I-25, Academy Blvd and Powers Blvd. All are reasonably maintained. Recently the State and C Springs swapped control of Academy Blvd. from the State to the City. In return, the State took control over Powers. Powers was a good vision by the City actually. Initially people were against it but it has proven to be a source for not only better travel for north-south access but in recent years has become a boon for city taxes. Is it perfect? No. But given the fact our east-west routes are the su ck it's better than it could have been.
Long term planning in any community is difficult. It's not limited to Colorado Springs but virtually any mid sized city in the west. 30 year plans are difficult to come up with because growth is not fluid. Take into count that the City had little notice that the Army would be sending more soldiers, their families and such here. In addition, in times of war and since C Springs is so dependent on the military, population fluctuates. Many times when people are sent overseas, their families don't stay here but go back "home" to get the support and live near their families. In a city like this, it's different than other metropolitan cities.
Same goes for the towns that now are being stressed on the Western Slope because of the energy boom. They went through a bust in (I think) in the early 80s and growth was pretty stagnent. It swinged up a bit with retirees who wanted a nice home in Battlement Mesa but in that area, the communities are at the breaking point to keep up with services and infrastructures there too. Luckily many are on the I-70 corridor so they get looked at by the State more.
Anyhow, this isn't a C Springs problem, it's a State and Federal problem.
FWIW, I've never driven between C Springs and Limon. Never had the need. As for C Springs itself, man alive, the worst mass transit system I have ever seen. And, when the City joined forced with the County, it's gotten even worse. If we had a decent mass transit system here, our local roadways wouldn't be so clogged. You almost can't have a decent life here without a car. Denver has only scratched the surface with their own mass trans...it's better but not good enough.
I forgot to add: Also, the communities along I-70 that are experiencing a boom in populations also have "tax" (more like fees really) of all energy (natural gas, shale ((?)) oil and such) that is produced. Those taxes are supposed to go back to the communities to help them with infrastructure. Colorado Springs has no such thing.
coflower,
You and I disagree on some other stuff, but I agree with you wholeheartedly on this one. When it comes to Colorado politics, metro Denver considers itself the known center of the universe. Add in the rest of the urbanized Front Range, and rural Colorado doesn't have a chance. Of the 100 Colorado legislators, 13--right, 13!--are from rural Colorado. Doesn't take any genius to figure out whose bread is gonna get buttered.
Also, I agree with you--we need mass transit. I would add to that a decent intercity passenger rail network, as well as better rail freight service. Instead, Colorado is letting its rail infrastructure whither away. That is going to cost Colorado PLENTY in lost economic opportunity in the future, but nobody wants to look beyond the next 6 months in planning, much less 20-30 years into the future. Too bad. That same myopia that has been going on for 3 decades or more is what has gotten us into this sprawled out mess we have now.
. . .JazzLover has good points about development paying its way up front. In the north end of COL SPGS where we live, that seem to have been done . . .
Mike, yes, this goes on all over the Springs. As much as Colorodo Springs gets critricized for promoting development, they do a pretty good job of making developers bear the costs. The annexation agreement for the Banning Lewis ranch required the developers to provide for the infrastructure down to the electrical power substation level. Fire stations, roads, parks - these are developer costs. This was an agreement initiated about 20 years ago (a huge annexation, increasing the City's size by 50%) so this has been the approach used in the Springs for a long time.
. . . This isn't a Colorado Springs thing at all. It's a Denver (state capitol) and Washington DC thing. . . .given the fact our east-west routes are the su ck it's better than it could have been.
Long term planning in any community is difficult. . .
You were addressing the condition of highways in general, and I don't disagree. But when it comes to the lack of east-west routes in Colorado Springs, the blame clearly falls on Colorado Springs City Council, and by extension, the voters. And not just the current Council, but decades of previous Councils that could have fixed this problem merely by deciding on the route. The longer they waited, the harder it got to plan a highway through increasingly established neighborhoods.
A real lack of leadership. They allowed a problem to get so bad, that it is now nearly impossible to fix it.
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The Springs seems to be a problem
