150 MILLION Annually in Multi–Modal Funding for the Next 20 Years! You read that right, it’s estimated that if Proposition 110 is approved by voters $150 million would be put towards multi-modal projects annually. For 20 years…
— from an October 30, 2018 article on the ColoradoTransit.com website.
Effectively isolated from one another by public health policies, the community leaders who serve on the Pagosa Springs Town Council engaged recently in a couple of Zoom “work sessions” — computerized video conferences during which equally-isolated members of the public (such as myself) were allowed to watch, but not participate in.
Some might refer to these gatherings as “meetings”, but I would describe them more accurately as “pseudo-meetings”.
To go along with the “pseudo-lives” we are living during the coronavirus pandemic?
One of the work sessions was focused, nominally, on transportation. For the past ten years or so, the Town of Pagosa Springs has been chipping away at the “Town to Lakes Trail” — a long-term project built upon the fantasy that people living in downtown Pagosa Springs, and people living uptown in the Pagosa Lakes area would someday make regular use of a multi-million-dollar “commuter trail” running from the Ruby Sisson Memorial Library on South 8th Street to the Wyndham Resort offices, located near Pinon Lake.
Listening to various discussions over the past 10 years, it’s never been clear to me who, exactly, would be using this trail, if it were ever built… considering that its course runs rather steeply uphill for the first two miles.
It’s possible that our Town leadership hasn’t noticed the rather dramatic demographic changes happening in Pagosa Springs over the past 10 years? Younger families and individuals leaving the community, and older retirees and investors buying up the available residential homes?
We shared a chart earlier this month, showing the growth of various age groups here in Archuleta County (81147) between 2011 and 2019.
The most well-represented age group in Archuleta County is “55-64”. That demographic has stayed fairly steady over the past decade, at about 2,500 members. The most radical element on the graph is the group aged “65-74”. That group, shown by the blue line rising steeply from left to right, has more than doubled in the past decade, from about 1,100 to about 2,500.
The three demographic groups that have declined are “5-17”, “18-24”, and “45-54”.
Archuleta County has been growing significantly older over the past decade. Perhaps the Town government noticed the change? If so, does it concern them, as they move forward on a proposed multi-million-dollar “commuter trail” that runs steeply uphill for two miles?
But I suppose, so long as the State of Colorado and the US Department of Transportation are handing out millions of dollars in grants for “multi-modal” transportation projects, communities like Pagosa Springs will be applying for those millions of dollars in grants, to build “commuter trails” that almost no one (in my humble opinion) will ever use.
According to the presentation we listened to, on February 18 — featuring Jared Lee, a consultant with Albuquerque-based engineering firm Bohannan Huston — the next short section of this “commuter trail” will connect the never-used sidewalks in the Aspen Village subdivision with the never-used sidewalks in the Harman Park subdivision, at a cost of about $1.5 million.
From the February 18 work session packet:
At this time, the design and engineering for the “Harman Hill Phase” of the Town to Pagosa Lakes Trail is about 30% complete. At this time, direction from Town Council is being sought on trail surface and width in order to complete the design and estimates, as well as prepare for construction bidding. Council has requested information in the past on various alternates prior to bidding. The goal is 2022 for construction. The trail is to serve as a multi-use commuter trail to connect downtown with uptown. A Town to Lakes Trail Master Plan was prepared in April of 2011 by DHM Design Corp. and Davis Engineering…
Completion of the whole trail has been in the works for many years and, to date, two sections have been completed (one by Walmart and one between 8th St. and 10th St.). After the Harman Hill Phase, three middle sections will remain as well as several “back roads” and peripheral routes. Bohannan Huston is the engineering consultant on the project. Partial funding has been awarded through CDOT using the Transportation Alternative Program (TAP).
Like so many of us, once the Town government gets their teeth into a fanciful project, they are unable to let go. And I probably shouldn’t be so cynical about this project. At the rate Highway 160 is deteriorating — along with other streets and roads in Pagosa Springs — we might, someday soon, be unable to drive our cars, and we’ll be back to walking or riding horses, just like in the good old days.
Maybe our burgeoning demographic of 65-to-74-year-olds will be grateful for the “Town to Lakes Trail”.
Which brings us, perhaps, to the central theme of this editorial series. ‘Sustainability’.
A word unnecessarily tainted by politics, perhaps.
The idea of “sustainability” dates back to at least the 1600s, when Europeans looked around and noticed that their forests were quickly disappearing, especially, it seems, in Germany. The term “Nachhaltigheit” came into use, to promote the idea that forests could be ‘sustainable’ and didn’t need to vanish off the face of the earth. I studied the German language back in high school, and I would translate the term as meaning, roughly, “the intention of setting something aside for the future.”
The German term is still popular, although its meaning has now transcended the preservation of forests per se. If you do a Google search for the term “Nachhaltigkeit”, you will find dozens of illustrations that look similar to this one:
Nearly all of the German images I found this morning featured, prominently, the color “Green”.
In the 21st century, “sustainability” typically refers to the capacity for Earth’s biosphere and human civilization to co-exist. It also applies, often, to a process by which humankind maintains a homeostasis-balanced environment, where — at least theoretically — the exploitation of resources, the direction of investments, the orientation of technological development, and institutional change are all in harmony and enhance both current and future human needs and desires.
I will be using the term is a slightly different sense… in the sense of a community which acts in such a way as to have a viable future.