An agreement between the Regional Transportation District and the Colorado Department of Transportation removes what could have been a serious impediment to building the west light-rail line to the Jefferson County government complex in Golden.
Last November, CDOT chief Tom Norton revisited an old issue by requiring new conditions under which the state would give RTD the right-of-way for the line north of U.S. 6 between Simms Street and the government complex. RTD was asked to provide an equivalent amount of land to CDOT should the highway in that corridor need expansion within the next half-century.
It would have been irresponsible for RTD to make a blank-check promise that CDOT could cash anytime before 2056. But CDOT was holding the cards – RTD couldn’t allow the disagreement to derail the $511 million, 12.1-mile light-rail line, which is to be the first of six new lines to be built under the $4.7 billion FasTracks project.
RTD directors accepted an arrangement Feb. 6 that would require the transit district to return an equivalent amount of land to CDOT only if highway improvements on U.S. 6 are included in the regional long- range transportation plan by 2017. That’s a reasonable period of time; for one thing, by then, FasTracks should be complete. The agreement also has been endorsed by Norton and the Colorado Transportation Commission.
“This is going to be the first of several inter-governmental agreements we’ll need to make for all the corridors,” said RTD general manager Cal Marsella. “The other side of it is it goes both ways: We have property CDOT needs, and they have property we need. We wanted to make sure we had an inter-governmental agreement capable of being replicated throughout without major deviations. It’s good for both sides.”
Although there are some congestion problems along U.S. 6 (also known as the 6th Avenue Freeway), the difficulties are toward the Denver end, where the roadway has been widened over the years to the point where very little space remains between the highway and homes and businesses.
As we’ve said before, it’s not as if CDOT were giving away the public’s property to a private entity – Denver-area taxpayers, through their gasoline taxes, long ago helped pay for the state’s right-of-way along 6th Avenue.
When the light rail is completed between central Denver and the Jeffco center, it could help relieve congestion on U.S. 6 and put the need to expand the road farther into the future.
