Years of planning, months of preparation and hours of meetings and conversations were put to a halt Monday when the Cañon City Council rejected an intergovernmental agreement with the Department of Transportation for the proposed Cañon City U.S. 50 Access Control Plan.
The vote came down to Mayor Preston Troutman’s tie-breaker. Council members Frank Jaquez, John Hamrick and Kaitlin Turner voted in favor of approving the IGA, while Dolly Gonzales, Amanda Cochran and Jim Meisner voted in opposition.
Mayor Pro Tem Ashley Smith was absent.
The plan evaluates the existing access scenarios and analyzes impacts of the anticipated changes along U.S. 50 and Fremont Drive from 16th Street to the Abbey access east of Raynolds Avenue.
According to the plan, the highway would consist of three-lane eastbound and westbound lanes separated by a wider, raised median and multi-modal bicycle and pedestrian lanes on the north and south side of the highway.
East Main Street would remain unchanged.
“I will not put my signature on it; vote it in if you like, but I will not put my signature on it,” Troutman said about the IGA. “We did not create this problem in Cañon City, CDOT did. You know damn well they did.”
He said the plan would impact every commercial entity along the corridor.
“You vote it in, find another mayor,” Troutman said. “That’s how strongly I feel about it.”
Troutman suggested having CDOT fix the Orchard Avenue intersection and work on other problem areas one at a time, but reiterated his opposition to the plan.
“It will have a chilling effect on commercial real estate because there’s an overhanging master plan that is going to be expensive to somebody,” he said.
Councilwoman Turner said that while the city may not have created problems along the highway corridor through the city, it is the council’s responsibility to help fix them.
“This plan is a way to fix the problem,” she said.
Councilman Jaquez said that the plan would be the first step in resolving longtime complaints from motorists along the U.S. 50 corridor.
“If we don’t do something with this now, the complaints aren’t going to get any better, they are going to get worse,” he said. “To me, this has a way of solving some of the complaints — you’re never going to get rid of all of them — but this has the potential of getting rid of some of those complaints and moving on.”
Councilman Meisner expressed concern about some access points that potentially would divert traffic to a secondary street north of existing Fremont Drive, which could potentially create “massive traffic issues.”
Lancaster said those issues were addressed in the plan’s “other design considerations.”
“These professionals that created this plan are giving the next people that pick up this plan a head’s up that when and if you do this to this access, you are going to have to look at these things,” Lancaster said. “There are a couple of off-system road connections that we think are necessary for this plan to work. Again, that’s back to the triggers — this can’t happen without that happening,” meaning that nothing would happen until something or someone triggers an improvement.
Meisner said the council would be approving the access that could trigger a problem in five years, but Lancaster said those things would be taken care of in the design stage.
The total cost of the plan is $133,000. CDOT paid $100,000 while the city paid the remaining $33,000.
Lancaster said this project was initiated by the city, for the city.
“Through our relationship with CDOT and their involvement in the US 50 Corridor Plan, we were able to get them to commit paying for the majority of this Access Control Plan,” he said in an email Tuesday. “This may put future non-grant discretionary funding from CDOT in Cañon City at risk.”
He said the U.S. 50 Pedestrian Improvement Project downtown will require an Access Control Plan, as well, and that project may be off the table now. Progress of the U.S. 50 Corridor Plan adopted in 2015 now will come to a standstill, as well, he said.
The plan will have a shelf life if the council would choose to revisit it in the future, but at this point, the council did not give Lancaster any direction on what they may want to be modified or whether they want to revisit it.
“Most comments or questions we received were related to final design of highway improvements and not access control,” he said.
Along with the city, Stolfus & Associates, Inc., and CDOT conducted open houses earlier this year and received public feedback from citizens and property owners. In addition to Lancaster, Cañon City Economic Director Ryan Stevens and two representatives from CDOT were on the team that met individually with stakeholders.
During a meeting earlier this year, Stevens said eliminating the signal light phases at the frontage roads and having immediate right turns should free up areas where traffic currently gets backed up.
“From a business standpoint, the removal of Fremont Drive should be a boon for all of these businesses,” Stevens said, adding that Village Inn will be one of the businesses to benefit the most by the removal of barriers to 19th Street.
“When you are traveling west as a tourist, and by the time you see the Village Inn sign, you’ve passed Orchard and you don’t know where to turn — you’re not going to turn at 15th Street and try to find your way back on a local street.”
Discussion on removing the frontage road with the past council and members of the public began in October 2014. The Cañon City Planning Commission in July 2015 approved a resolution amending the city’s Comprehensive Plan to add the new U.S 50 Corridor Plan.
Carie Canterbury: 719-276-7643, canterburyc@canoncitydailyrecord.com