Firestone – The volume of commuter traffic pouring into the Denver metro area from rapidly expanding southwest Weld County will almost triple over the next 24 years.
Motorists from towns such as Frederick, Firestone, Mead and Dacono made an average of 29,600 daily trips last year to Boulder, Adams and Denver counties, according to the Denver Regional Council of Governments.
Those same towns, as well as neighborhoods in unincorporated Weld, will account for nearly 80,000 daily commutes to the three metro counties by 2030.
While Weld drivers have a growing impact on congestion and road conditions in the metro area, Weld County doesn’t participate in regional transportation planning with its neighboring counties.
Without the county’s involvement, long-term traffic solutions will be difficult, if not impossible, to come by, say regional planners and local leaders.
“If growth continues to spread over such an enormous area, it will develop into a huge problem,” said Will Toor, a Boulder County commissioner.
Weld officials say they are open to talks about regional planning and are trying to work with local communities to improve traffic flow within the county.
“When we realized that up to 250,000 people will soon be settling in that area, we decided it was a good idea to find out how to handle it all,” said County Commissioner Mike Geile.
At least 11 major roads connect southwest Weld County to Boulder and Adams counties, and most won’t be able to handle the growing influx of vehicles, according to DRCOG, an association of 52 local governments in the Denver region that promotes regional cooperation in transportation, land use and other issues.
Because Weld County lies outside the boundaries of DRCOG, many officials worry Weld is not working closely enough with its neighbors to manage the growth it generates. “There is no joint planning going on in many areas,” Toor said.
Weld County is home to eight of the 10 fastest-growing cities in the state. At the epicenter is southwest Weld, where Firestone’s population tripled since 2000 to nearly 6,500 people.
Most of the growth is residential, not businesses that can keep workers close to home. More than 60 percent of the roughly 30,000 residents in the area commute to jobs outside the county, according to DRCOG.
Leaders of Weld communities say they are working to attract employers, including high-tech firms.
But retail and grocery outlets are needed as well, said Jennifer Hoffman, Frederick’s town planner. “Quite honestly, if you live in Frederick and you want to buy groceries, you have to leave the town,” she said.
So far, there is little effort to help manage the overflow of Weld commuters into the metro area, where the percentage of Weld’s daily commuters will almost double in 25 years – from 2.6 to 4.5 percent.
Further, there is little public transit in southwest Weld, though the state is considering bus service along Interstate 25 from Fort Collins to Denver. Weld County also plans to build two four-lane roads along I-25 to handle the influx of traffic.
Money for large-scale road expansion, however, is scarce, so communities hit hardest by incoming Weld traffic will have to look at measures such as ride-share programs, said Jeffrey May, customer-resource and support division director for DRCOG.
“Ultimately, you can’t just put down a new path for everyone riding their cars into work,” he said.
But several local towns complain that Weld County’s tendency to approve housing developments near their borders only adds to traffic woes.
Both Firestone and Mead protested the county’s recent approval of the 5,000-home St. Vrain Lakes subdivision – at Colorado 66 and I-25 – saying it would unfairly burden local utilities and roads.
Meanwhile, rancor between the county and the towns in southwest Weld continues, leaving the area without the consensus needed to be a partner in regional planning, officials say.
“It’s really two factions,” said Firestone Mayor Mike Simone. “All the towns and cities in the area versus the county.”
Consultants hired by the county to study southwest Weld recently suggested that city and county leaders attend a growth summit, facilitated by a professional mediator.
Geile said he doubts the commissioners would even be invited because of the hard feelings generated from the towns, adding that the county already has reached out to them.
“We ask them, ‘What are your ideas?”‘ Geile said. “So far, they haven’t given us any.”
Weld County is much like Douglas County 20 years ago – a ranching area fast becoming an urban boomtown. And while new development has brought in thousands of residents and commuters, Douglas County enjoys lush open spaces and corridors for industry and shopping, in part because of planning between job centers in other counties and its own housing zones, local leaders say.
Meanwhile, the growing traffic congestion continues to astound north metro and Weld County residents.
“Oh my goodness, it’s really gotten busy,” said Greeley commuter Arlene Boone, who travels daily to downtown Denver to her government job.
“I used to be the only one on the road … but over the past few years, I see more and more drivers,” she said.
Her commute has gotten a lot easier since she joined a van-pool program. More solutions for the region are out there, but only if Weld County participates, said Nancy Sharpe, DRCOG chairwoman.
“The impact on some of these local roads as they get more congested will be heavier and heavier,” Sharpe said. “I think we can help by offering some good planning solutions for everybody.”
Staff writer Joey Bunch contributed to this report.
Staff writer Monte Whaley can be reached at 720-929-0907 or at mwhaley@denverpost.com.
