The Crested Butte News Serving the Gunnison Valley since 1999
A temporary stoplight is a “hard no”
by Mark Reaman
Gunnison County representatives are exploring ways to provide safe passage to transit for expected renters in the Whetstone Community Housing Project when it opens this coming ski season.
When the project is totally completed there will be a pedestrian underpass beneath a roundabout on Highway 135 to facilitate renters wanting to catch the RTA buses without having to cross the busy highway. But that underpass won’t be ready until sometime next summer. As part of its utility contract with the town of Crested Butte, occupancy cannot happen until the underpass is complete and open.
Assistant Gunnison County manager for operations and sustainability John Cattles met with the Mountain Express board of directors recently to see if that organization was open to facilitate a program with Via, the company Mountain Express uses to run the on-call FirstTracks in Mt. Crested Butte. The board was open to helping but suggested the county first reach out directly to other transit operators.
“We had hoped we could move ahead with the roundabout and underpass this summer, but we were wrong,” Cattles told the board. “We underestimated the time it took to get through the state and federal processes.”
Cattles continued, “We have an almost completed plan set for the roundabout and we expect to be able to go out to bid for a contractor this October. We will be lined up well for next summer.”
Cattles said the general contractor for Whetstone is telling the county some units could be ready to rent in February, but he is expecting it to be even a bit earlier. “So, we need to provide an alternative to the underpass for the town to consider changing that condition in our utility agreement. The idea was to run a shuttle at our cost from Whetstone to the Four-way in Crested Butte so people can get into town and from there go anywhere. Will Mountain Express work with us on that? You have the experience and licenses. We would pay for it but prefer to partner with you.”
Mountain Express manager Jeremy Herzog said by using the transit agency, it would have to be a fixed route, and he anticipated the trip would take seven minutes each way. “Given site constraints at the moment we couldn’t get our big 38-passenger buses in there so we would want to look at a 15-passenger van which is what a Via vehicle is. Via’s cost for that is about $95 per hour. Initially the thought was that that we could leverage our contract with Via but there is no reason the county couldn’t contract directly with Via.”
Responding to some board concerns, Herzog said Mountain Express sometimes has had issues hiring drivers, but drivers of the vans would not need to have a Commercial Driver’s License (CDL) so that process would be easier.
Board chair Roman Kolodziej pushed for the county to use the RTA, but Cattles said the RTA has been clear they don’t have the appropriate vehicles and wouldn’t want to detour into Whetstone and throw off the main commuter line timeline.
Board member Valeda Scribner asked that as odd as it might be, would a temporary stoplight work to safely get pedestrians across the highway from the apartment complex?
“We asked CDOT (Colorado Department of Transportation) officials and that was a hard no,” Cattles replied. “They might consider reducing the speed limit in that area. We are basically talking about January until next August. We are expecting 28 units to be ready in January and by August we think there will be 110-120 units ready for occupancy.”
“For me, there are questions about liability and capacity,” said Kolodziej. “And I have a concern about staff bandwidth managing this.”
“There is the option for the county to go directly to Via or Alpine Express,” said board member Gabi Prochaska. “We are so stretched right now that there could be unforeseen costs and other issues. Would any problems with the service be our problems? Would we be answering the phone? I’d like to see what sort of cost difference there would be if it came under Mountain Express. But I agree it is important to do something because people will be running across the highway and that’s just not okay.”
The board was open to gathering more information on how it might work and how Mountain Express could help the process. Cattles said he would reach out to Via and Alpine Express to gather more information.
“We are early in the process, and it will probably take a couple months to set up so we are not in a super urgent situation,” said Cattles. “I’ll reach out and also keep Jeremy in the loop. Hopefully we’ll have a solution lined up by October.”
