MEAD — With Colorado’s demographers projecting that the northern Front Range will lead the state in population growth over the next 30 years, planners have already started seeking relief for the heavily traveled Interstate 25 corridor.
In addition to a road-widening express lanes project that broke ground on I-25 last fall, the state is planning a brand-new road just east of the interstate, stretching 14 miles from Mead to Loveland.
The new road, still in the conceptual phase and without a formal name, would go through the heart of an area where thousands of homes and millions of square feet of commercial buildings are expected to be built in the coming decades — places like Berthoud, Johnstown and Mead, which had a combined population under 20,000 in the 2010 census.
“With that (growth) in mind, we have to be proactive now in terms of the evolution of our transportation needs,” said Matt LeCerf, town manager for fast-growing Johnstown. “I think it’s critical to have arterial roadways to allow people to get to where they need to get to.”
But as with most plans for growth, people already living among the quickly disappearing farm fields north of Denver see a new north-south route as disruptive and undesirable — and likely not even a viable alternative for the 80,000-plus vehicles a day that currently move past Johnstown on I-25.
That was made clear last week at a public meeting Weld County hosted on the proposed project, where Colleen Peppler picked up a black Sharpie marker and wrote on a giant map showing the road’s possible path: “Family Estate — Don’t want a road in it!”
The Pepplers’ 80-acre farm just north of Mead grows corn, wheat and barley. The proposed road, which would roughly follow the alignment for Weld County Road 9 1/2 about half a mile east of I-25, would cut it in half.
“If agriculture is important to Weld County and Colorado, that should be taken into consideration,” Peppler said.
Population to nearly double
Elizabeth Relford, deputy director of public works for Weld County, said the new road would essentially be the backbone of a “regional coordination” effort among I-25-anchored communities near the Larimer and Weld county lines as they fulfill long-held growth plans.
Instead of having a hodgepodge of developers put roads in on their own and at different times as their projects come online, Relford said, connectivity and cohesion throughout the area can be maintained if everyone builds off of one central thoroughfare.
“Developments in Johnstown, Berthoud and Mead are happening right now, so they need to come up with arterial corridors in their communities,” she said. “We’re planning into what communities are already doing.”
That said, Relford noted that planning is in the early stages and the road’s alignment can still be adjusted as public feedback comes in. She said an agreement between the neighboring towns on the location and timing of the future four-lane arterial, which is expected to cost around $250 million to build, likely won’t occur until sometime next year.
But growth will continue along I-25 regardless of what infrastructure gets built. The Colorado Demography Office pegs the north Front Range with the highest rate of growth in the state going forward, projecting that in the next five years the population in Larimer and Weld counties will grow at an annual rate of 2.5% — nearly double Denver/Boulder’s annual 1.3% rate.
Looking out to 2050, the demography office projects the north Front Range will burgeon from 665,000 people in 2018 to more than 1.2 million 30 years from now.
In Mead alone, a comprehensive plan drawn up by the Weld County town last year projects the community of 4,500 about 10 miles northeast of Longmont could expand to as many as 44,000 people by 2038.
The growth is “already foreshadowed by the increasing number of development proposals received by the Town in recent months,” the plan states.
Signs up and down I-25 and adjoining roads between Mead and Loveland advertise land for sale or developments about to take root. Berthoud is about to make its presence known in the corridor with the 1,600-acre Wilson Ranch development, which will feature some 4,000 homes at the southeast corner of I-25 and Weld County Road 44.
Meanwhile, at the northern end of the 14-mile stretch, the Johnstown Plaza is open for business even as more shops are added to the site at the southeast corner of I-25 and U.S. 34. Just south of the shopping center, four-story multifamily buildings are getting the finishing touches as part of the Rise at 2534 complex.
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While Johnstown today encompasses approximately 13.5 square miles of land, the town’s “growth management area” covers more than 48 square miles. The town, which straddles Weld and Larimer counties, has grown from approximately 9,000 residents in 2006 to 18,000 today, according to town figures.
Troy Mellon, a Johnstown town councilman who comes from a local fifth-generation homesteading family, said the new road could prove critical for an area that doesn’t have “a significant north-south movement that doesn’t involve I-25 or U.S. 85.”
“It’s about growth being inevitable so you have to deal with it,” he said.
“Middle of it again”
Doug Staver, who grows hay and raises cattle on his farm not far from the Pepplers’ farm, is more than familiar with the rapid growth the area has seen of late. The Guardian Angels Catholic Church in Mead, which he attends, opened a new location last year because the old location was overwhelmed by new parishioners.
“It’s unbelievable,” he said of the growth over the last few years.
He’s leery of the relief road being considered — largely because it would come within 300 feet of his front doorstep as currently laid out. Several people at last week’s meeting wondered if improvements could be made to Weld County Road 13 instead of building a new road. Others mentioned the need for a rail line along the Front Range — from Pueblo to Fort Collins — a concept that is being explored by state transportation officials.
Staver wonders if he’ll eventually be forced to sell his farm.
He said he moved out to western Weld County from Longmont 20 years ago to flee the congestion that was taking root there. Now he may be looking for another escape.
“I moved out to this place to get out of the middle of it,” he said. “Now I’m in the middle of it again.”
