Cimarron/I-25 contractor to host open house May 26 at City Aud
The session will be from 5 to 7 p.m. at the City Auditorium downtown. Before and after a formal presentation starting at 5:30, there should be “ample opportunity for the public to visit various information stations [and] meet and ask questions of the project team,” according to Kraemer/TSH spokesperson Jimmy Luthye. Scheduled for completion in December 2017, the project will build a new interchange and ramps, along with a westward freeway realignment starting about a quarter-mile to the south. The contractor was hired by the Colorado Department of Transportation (CDOT). A recent addition to the project plan, suggested by Kraemer/TSH, is to build a new road connection through CDOT-owned land southeast of Eighth and Cimarron, which is intended to relieve traffic at that intersection. The link at Eighth is to line up with a stoplight at the currently difficult Colorado Place shopping center exit, while the Cimarron connection will be west of the freeway. One of the open-house information stations will provide more details, Luthye said. “There have been a few other requested elements that we will discuss in detail at the meeting as well,” he elaborated, “but I would say that this creative connection, or 'quadrant intersection,' is the most significant addition to the plans presented last June [in a public meeting hosted by CDOT, also at City Auditorium].” Luthye clarified that although public comments, questions and concerns are welcomed, “the time for input on any design or project-specific elements has passed. That input was incorporated into the project RFP [request for proposals] and has been addressed in the Kraemer proposal.” Edward Kraemer & Sons, Inc., (Kraemer) is a century-old highway construction company from Wisconsin. Tsiouvaras Simmons Holderness (TSH) is a Colorado engineering design firm. Early work on the project has included removing trees and other large vegetation west of I-25 and south of Cimarron, clearing the area into which that part of the interstate will be realigned. Westside Pioneer article |