Early cost estimates to construct the new entrance to Aspen put the project at $300 million-400 million, Aspen Deputy City Manager Tyler Christoff told the Aspen City Council and the Pitkin Board of County Commissioners on Monday.
Christoff said the figure should be taken with a grain of salt, especially because the city is still in the middle of a reevaluation of the decision that was originally reached as part of a 1998 record of decision for the entrance and because it doesn’t take into account construction escalation or other unforeseen impacts. But the “very preliminary budget estimate” includes the preferred alternative highway alignment as currently proposed in the 1998 ROD; a cut-and-cover tunnel over a portion of the road through the Marolt Open Space; and potential modifications to the design like improvements to the Maroon Creek roundabout, Christoff said.
The preferred alternative proposes rerouting two general traffic lanes and two bus-only lanes of Highway 82 over a portion of the Marolt Open Space, bypassing the S-curves to merge directly with Main Street.
The city is still months out from completing the reevaluation, which will confirm whether the original preferred alternative is still valid for decision-making on the entrance to Aspen, Lynn Rumbaugh, the city’s transportation director, told the council. But Christoff said the city will lean on the Colorado Department of Transportation and Federal Highway Administration for a large source of funding for the project when it comes time.
“This is obviously infrastructure that is owned by those entities, and so we would look pretty heavily to get those partners to come up with the majority of the funding,” Christoff said. “I think they would probably look back at us for some local support, especially in some of the infrastructure that we own and manage, but I think they understand that they have obligations in this project.”
The city is working with CDOT, FHWA and Jacobs Engineering to complete the 12-18 month reevaluation. The project team updated the city council and BOCC during a joint meeting Monday night, seven months after the council officially decided to pursue a reevaluation of the preferred alternative over a new environmental impact statement.
As part of the reevaluation, the project team is considering several modifications to the preferred alternative that take into account modern traffic modeling, growth assumptions and environmental analyses.
The team is evaluating the modifications to make sure they still encompass the same project limits outlined in the original environmental impact statement. The alternatives include reconfiguration of the Maroon Creek roundabout by potentially expanding the diameter or adding slip lanes; enhancing trail connectivity; utilizing pedestrian underpasses or cut-and-cover tunnels; realignment of Owl Creek and Harmony roads to eliminate an additional signalized intersection; westbound slip lanes and permanent HOV lanes.
Two groups of stakeholders meet monthly to work on the reevaluation, Aspen Assistant City Manager Teika Carlson said. The project management team consists of the city, CDOT, FHWA and Jacobs. The project leadership team includes major Roaring Fork Valley stakeholders. The Aspen Chamber Resort Association, Aspen Fire Department, Aspen One, Aspen Police Department, Aspen School District, Aspen Valley Health, Garfield and Pitkin counties, Roaring Fork Transportation Association, Pitkin County Sheriff’s Office and the towns of Basalt, Carbondale and Snowmass Village are all represented on the leadership team.
The city is also gearing up for public engagement on the project. A website will go live soon that will cover an overview of the project, history of the entrance to Aspen, next steps and more. People will be able to sign up for updates on the website.
It is also planning an open house in mid-March to share updates on the reevaluation with the community and gain input on the project’s modifications, Carlson said.
A reduction in the federal workforce and a federal government shutdown in the fall have delayed some work on the reevaluation.
The city is hoping the project can still be completed in at most 18 months.
“We’re still hoping that our key partners are going to be able to finish in around that time, but I think we want to be realistic about the time it takes to work with our federal government, especially with the reduction [in the workforce],” Christoff said. “They’ve been a great partner, but there are realities.”
