Public Amenities Committee - Regular Meeting

Welcome back to this biweekly meeting of the South Platte River Committee of Denver City Council. Join us for the discussion as the South Platte River Committee starts now.

Good afternoon, everyone. Hi, welcome to South Platte Committee. Today is August 12th. We have one agenda item, but before we move over to that item, let's do introductions. I'm Councilwoman Torres. I represent West Denver District 3. Kevin Flynn, Southwest Denver's District 2. Thank you. And we've got two members online. If you'll please introduce yourselves.

We're at Vidris, Lucky District 7.

Hello, Diana Romero Campbell, Southeast Denver district for.

Thank you so much pulling up in the nick of time.

Chris, I was perfect.

Excellent. Thank you. We will turn it over to our presenters on the and if you wouldn't mind introducing all of yourselves 1st, before you start.

Good afternoon. Thank you for having us. My name is Laura Swartz. I'm the Director of Communications and Administration for the City's Department of Finance. I'll let my colleagues introduce themselves.

Paki Simon. I'm an Engineering Manager in Dottie. Good afternoon.

Laura Wachter, Interim Deputy CFO and Director of Capital Management and Financing. Thank you.

Go ahead.

All right, we are here today to talk about the Santa Fe Arts Project. We are going to go over two legislative actions that are in front of city council committee today, as well as give a general project status update and then allow plenty of time for Q&A and discussion as needed. We have a full team here in the audience to assist with Q&A for council members. The site that we are discussing, the Santa Fe Yards development site, is located just east of Santa Fe Drive and just south of I-25 in City Council District 7. This is a large, centrally located site, which is accessible by light rail. You'll see the approximate location of the future women's soccer stadium, where the yellow star is. To the east of that is the rail lines, and to the east of that is the RTD station. And so we'll be discussing today a north pedestrian bridge that will stretch from the RTD station across the rail to the stadium sites. The two actions in front of City Council Committee today is the first is to approve a grant agreement with the Colorado Department of Local Affairs for $5.3 million. This includes $4 million received from the state and a $1.3 million local match from the city. The second related action is to approve an amendment to the 2025 Intergovernmental Agreement or IGA that exists between the City and County of Denver and the Broadway Station Metropolitan District number one. The grant agreement, if approved, would allow the city to move forward with design of the north pedestrian bridge. The bridge's approximate location is shown here on the screen by the yellow rectangle, where it would stretch from the RTD station at I-25 and Broadway across the rail to the stadium site to the west. With the $5.3 million and being able to start design of the bridge, we expect that design would be complete by the end of 2027. And then contingent on future funding for construction of the bridge, we expect the bridge to be complete by 2030. There is significant public support for the North pedestrian bridge. And as you may recall, the amendments that were entered into by the city last year on the IGA required the city to fund construction of this pedestrian bridge. The grant itself, again, it's $4 million from the state under the transit oriented communities grant program. And we would like to specifically acknowledge and thank council member Sandoval, who in her role as council president last year, submitted a letter of support and helped advocate to the state for Denver to receive this grant funds. She was instrumental in us receiving the TOSI grant and we are very grateful for that partnership with city council on that. We also were required to make a $1.3 million local match to receive the grant funds. That money came from underspending on the Betty Cram Bridge that was recently constructed out of the National Western Center. The TOSI grant itself has a term through December 31st of 2029. The scope includes design, engineering documents, site work, and foundation. And it may also include items such as deckings, railings, elevators, or ramps, paneling, wall finishings, paint, signage, and other architectural elements for the project. Again, this $5.3 million will largely take us through design and potentially start some construction. It is not the full amount of funding that is needed for the bridge. Additional construction funding is expected to come from regional mills that already exist at the site, and the city will continue to pursue additional grant applications. The second action, which is related to this one that is in front of council today, is to consider a second amendment to the 2025 IGA. The original IGA was executed between the city and the metropolitan district in May of 2025. That IGA allowed for the purchase of the land and gave the city a future interest in the land if the soccer team is ever to not use it in the future. The second amendment to the IGA, which was signed on January 1st, 2026, following council action in December of 2025, required the city to provide funding for the North pedestrian bridge and also added the city to the TIF waterfall to allow the city to seek reimbursement for our costs. The amendment that we are considering today replaces section 4.1 of the IGA in its entirety. The rest of the IGA is untouched. The gist of the changes in Section 4.1 is to update the city's role to affirm that the city is responsible for the cost and the performance of the design of the North Pedestrian Bridge, and that is using the grant money which we are receiving. It is also to allow the city the option of managing construction of the North Ped Bridge and detailing the terms for either the city to manage construction or for the district to manage construction. And then lastly, the IGA continues to affirm that the Metropolitan District will be responsible for the ongoing maintenance, repair, and replacement of the Ped Bridge if ever required in the future. This is our last slide before we open it up for discussion and questions. Just to give a general project update on the Women's Soccer Stadium and the Denver Summit. We do expect that their timeline will have them out breaking, not breaking ground, but in the ground in September to relocate some existing utilities on the site, which is required for their site development plan to move forward. They are also delivering Vanderbilt Park East, which is a city park that was dedicated in the 1950s on this land, but was never built out. So the team has already begun having meetings with Denver Parks and Recreation on the design of that park. And we anticipate that their next step will really be to bring those design options back out to the community to solicit some public feedback on that design. And at this point, they are on track to open the park concurrent with opening the stadium. And our last update, when we were meeting with city council last year, we were still in conversations with CDOT on whether or not a fifth lane would be required to be added to Santa Fe Drive in order for the city to open Kentucky Avenue Bridge, which is already constructed. CDOT has decided that the fifth lane is required, and so we would like to update council and let you know that we will be moving forward with that in partnership with CDOT. That is it for our presentation today. To answer questions, we have a number of people here. We have Steven Wilson with Community Planning and Development. We have Brad Neiman with City Attorney's Office, Frank Cannon, a representative for the Denver Summit, and Mark Tompkins with the Metropolitan District.

Thank you all so much. Let me go first to Councilwoman Alvidrez, District 7, if you have any questions or comments.

Thank you. Yes, we all... Thank you so much. Yes, we also were very involved in advocating for this grant and we're really grateful for it. I am very concerned about the conversation that you ended with Laura about widening the C dot road is that. Finalized in this agreement.

No, this is not part of our agreement. This is a general update that we wanted to provide to council. It is not a topic for the IGA. It is a decision by CDOT. And I will invite Becky or Shannon to provide any more detail on that.

The way it gets, I guess, expressed is through the plan review process and the access permit that CDOT requires on the state highway on South Park River Drive. So it kind of comes to play in the permitting process.

great can you connect my office with the cdo uh person that is in charge of making that decision we would like to continue that conversation um that's extremely concerning to my district and to the mobility of the area one of the first deaths that happened after i was elected was with um someone getting hit right there on santa fe and mississippi and so um I think that needs to have further discussion and I don't know why that was really brought into this conversation with if it's not in the, but. We're supportive of the changes, but I'll just can you please provide me with the C dot contact for this issue?

Yes, absolutely. We'll follow up with that.

Great, thank you. That's all I had. Thank you, Committee Chair. Thank you so much. Thank you. Councilman Clinton.

Thank you, Madam Chair. What is the estimated cost of the bridge itself, total cost of construction included?

Yeah, so we included that in the grant agreement to the state. The estimated cost is anywhere between like $22 and $23 million.

Okay, and that includes the 5.3?

That does include that. That includes design and construction, as well as right-of-way, if needed, yes.

Okay, and what are the sources for that?

So the sources currently is this TOSI grant that we have received from the- For design. For design, and potentially construction if we can stretch the dollars. We are also working through the capital stack to build up to the total construction cost of the bridge too. Once we go through the design, we'll have more awareness and knowledge of what the construction costs will be. We will be pursuing additional grants through the state. We will also be pursuing additional federal grants, as well as the regional mills that are currently in place. Right now, the regional mills are projected to be about $14 million through 2047.

Right, because I remember during our briefing, we talked about those regional mills, but regional mills through 2047 don't help us build a bridge in 2027. So how...

We can work on the regional mills. This is very true. The regional mills will come in over time through the district, and we can work through that financing and the funding of the bridge in the interim.

So as we're expecting the regional mills to come in. Tomorrow against those mills? Yes. Okay, not cash funding. Yes. Okay. Thank you. Obviously, this is something that's needed. In the beginning, I didn't expect that the city would take over the whole thing. cost of it but i know that under the iga that the metro district is responsible for maintenance upkeep and potential replacement down the line so when we build it do we own it and turn it over to them or what's the mechanism for them taking ownership

Mark, I'm calling and I'm phoning a friend right now.

I love it when they look at each other. Exactly.

Who wants to answer that?

You're the short straw. There are no short straws. Brad Neiman, City Attorney's Office. It's a good question. I'm not actually sure precisely what the mechanism would be to get ownership over from the city to the to the uh to the district whether it would just be a bill of sale whether it be something in the plat itself that would be a conveyance of the land i'm not i don't want to mislead but in some way shape or form at the end of the day the district would be responsible for the ownership of the bridge itself so tbd to be determined yes okay but it'd be nice to know that up front before we

vote on it obviously i would support the district taking over maintenance and and uh eventual replacement if necessary rather than leaving it on the on the city's balance sheet but it'd be nice to know how and when that occurs is it on completion is it you know because we don't know what those mills are going to generate because we don't know what the values are going to be so

Perfect. We'll follow up on that, sir.

I follow up on the Councilwoman's question about, and I know this is unrelated to the IGA, but the Fifth Lane, during the briefing, I was told that the Fifth Lane actually goes, continues south of Mississippi to the bridge over the plat, which is troublesome to me as someone who generally used to commute that way for 40 years to have a number one lane try to merge into that traffic to go over a bridge that is only four lanes wide. Or is it three lanes? I think it's four lanes. I would ask the council, and I know you're still listening, but when you talk to CDOT, you ought to ask them, how the heck does that traffic merge when you have the lane drop right before the bridge at a curve? It's already pretty problematic making those moves, and traffic's pretty heavy there. Because I had imagined when I heard fifth lane, my imagination was, oh, this is a must-turn left lane onto the new Kentucky Bridge. And so that's where the lane drops, people turn left to go into the stadium or into the site. But that's not the case, and I found that a little troublesome. So I'd like to understand that a little more. And I know CDOT's very, they might be watching, but I know they're very difficult to work with. We had the same issue at Loretto Heights, where they insisted that we have to have a deceleration lane on Federal Boulevard for traffic turning into the new Bates. And it made no sense because we're trying to slow down traffic on Federal Boulevard, which is a high injury corridor. And we had three fatalities of pedestrians there within 14 months at the campus back in 2013, 14. And so we wanted, and Dottie, thank you, you stuck with us when we pleaded to CDOT. Don't make us put in a deceleration lane. We want traffic to slow down for people turning right because that'll slow traffic down. We don't want people to get out of the way when they make a right so that somebody can zip straight down to Dartmouth at 45 miles an hour. And we lost that battle. So, Councilwoman, good luck with CDOT. And I hope you win. Thank you. That's all.

Thank you so much. Any feedback?

Without getting too technical, yes, the fifth lane would carry through the Mississippi intersection, so it would intend to increase that capacity at Mississippi as well. CDOT's main concern is With the development of this site, increased friction and land use, lots more traffic, whether that's, we're not sure we agree with that assessment, but causing traffic on Southmount, South Platte River Drive to back up onto I-25, and that's a pretty not great situation when you have traffic trying to get off the highway that's stuck in a standstill, and then there's traffic whizzing by at 70 miles per hour next to them. That's CDOT's main concern, so I think what you brought up, that concern, The idea is to get that congestion, which we know will likely be there, off of the highway. So whether it happens kind of further south or further north, it will probably be there. So from a safety perspective, probably better to happen off the highway. So I think there's some merit to what you're saying about the concerns.

Understandable. The southbound exit of 525 is very lengthy. It's hard for me to imagine that it would, and when it extends on to 25, it's a double lane exit and there's plenty of holding capacity. But that intersection of Mississippi for, like I said, I've been driving it for 45 years and it's always, always a pinch point. Maybe a suggestion would be that it be turned into a must-turn left at Mississippi rather than just at Kentucky. My concern is continuing south of Mississippi and then having to do a merge. Maybe they could do a big education campaign then on the zipper merge so that there's not, because people don't know how to, they don't know how to merge at a lane drop. I'm done.

Thank you, committee chair. I'm glad that we're talking so much about cars because I don't want to talk about cars at all. I want to talk about the pedestrian bridge and the potential for bottlenecks for non-car people who are trying to get to and from the venue. And incidentally, Councilmember Flan, I think CDOT's view of the City of Denver is It's not as well refined as the city of Denver's view on the city of Denver. And so it is a little frustrating that they want cars to move faster or more efficient. And, you know, meanwhile, we have kids and grandkids trying to learn how to ride a bike. Maybe not in this exact spot, but certainly we've got arterials all over District 10 where homes are there. And so sure would be great. Council Member Varela-Vidra, if you do put on the armor and go to battle with CDOT. I mean, really, hopefully we know more about what we should have in our streets in Denver than CDOT. So, but non-CARS, you know, I also want to make sure that people take as few cars as possible. And I think, you know, thank you for for prioritizing the North Bridge. I know that was a conversation piece, maybe a decision statement at some point in the past. I'm glad that I'm glad that you're moving forward with at least some ideas and plans on the North Bridge. We And also thank you for the briefing. In the briefing, I talked about how the Denver Fire Department continues to get eight elevator entrapments every day. And I just got an email yesterday of someone trapped in an elevator yesterday that the fire department was responding to because I was trying to reach out to the fire department. The fire department and the person was unavailable. because they were responding to an elevator entrapment. So it is something that is unfortunately far too common for us in the city of Denver. And I think that's why Ball Arena made the, well, I know that's why Ball Arena, among other reasons, made the decision to not have elevators at all in the bridge across Speer. Obviously, there's some pretzeling that has to happen there from a geography perspective for the Ball Arena Bridge. Will you talk a little bit about the pretzeling that has to happen here for this bridge?

I think you make a great point. There's so many great qualities arguing on the side of the ramps versus elevators. And I think that would be the ideal scenario for this bridge. mentioned the pretzel lane. Very true. We are ADA compliant in all of our construction through DOTI. And so this bridge will follow ADA requirements for ramps, which is very specific in terms of landings and slopes and that sort of thing. So sort of dictates the winding down of the ramps and how much of a footprint that that requires. So we have just started looking at the engineering and the right-of-way lines and the ownership lines to see how we might kind of pretzel in these ramps in the available right of way. The east side is the RTD station, which has a parking lot already existing. So maybe there's some conversations about appetites for rearranging some of the land uses or parking lots to be able to accommodate ramps. This bridge is a little bit trickier than a bridge over a road because the vertical clearance is over railroad five or six feet higher than a So that's even more ramps that we have to make up that vertical distance So we're just getting started on kind of taking a look at the engineering of it But I think that's by far the preference if we can make it work to do ramps Yeah

I'm trying to figure out how to put this as delicately as possible. It's great that the city, the government is complying with also the government as in the Americans with Disabilities Act. I would say that that is a minimum standard. That's for the entity that couldn't care less. for people with disabilities. Um, so I'm glad that we have minimum standards. I would hope that, uh, that we would go, we would, we would think about, uh, a broader inviting pedestrian experience as opposed to, uh, we're ADA compliant and we're gonna, we're gonna be that way. Um, just like not trying to be mean. I'm just trying to, um, you know, there, there's like with elevators, uh, with the, the sheer interest in these professional women's soccer games. They're selling out games already and they haven't even built a stadium. And so if the North Bridge is constrained for those with people in strollers or other folks that have non-mobility needs but still want to use an elevator, I think that would become a pretty major choke point if elevators end up being the, I would say, not the right answer, but the only answer that remains. So I'm hoping that ADA compliance is the minimum. And I hope that we, I don't mean to, I just, falling back to ADA compliance is the least we can do. And I hope that in our conversations we're not, you know, hiding behind or using a federal law to just kind of say that's what we're going to do. So, I mean, I think that there are benefits, as I was trying to say, so I think there are benefits for a whole bunch more communities than just those who qualify under the Americans with Disabilities Act. And so if there's something that we can do to help pave the way or, you know, we've got tier three encroachments. I don't know what RTD's equivalent of a tier three encroachment is, but I would hope that their mission would be similar and that they also want people to use RTD. And one way to do that is to make sure that there's as robust a flow as possible. And so many elevators that go down every day that I just, I would hate to have an elevator go down 6 a.m. on game day or, you know, whatever, and not have it repaired. So, thank you for looking into that. Thank you, committee chair.

Thank you. I have a couple questions. The first, the Betty Cram Bridge dollars, what was the source of that original funding?

The original source, and we can absolutely get more details there, but the original source is actually a federal grant that got pulled back, so we did supplement some of the Betty Cram Bridge with CIP funds. And so because the Betty Cram Bridge came in so far under anticipated expenditures for the construction, we were able to see that savings and allocate some of those savings for the match for this TOCY grant.

Were the savings under whatever CIP funding we put into it? Yep. So we basically recovered the savings for ourselves? That's correct.

That's correct. OK. Originally, we budgeted into a bridge programming grant. Sorry, a bridge program, CIP program. Okay. Yeah.

Perfect. Thank you. The language itself, Brad, this might be a question for you on the amendment. What it sounds like, because it contemplates if the city is responsible for construction, it also contemplates if the district is responsible for construction. Why would we need both if we're paying for it? Is there a universe where we're bringing the money to the table and the district is still going to be building it?

Thank you for the question, Brad Neiman, city attorney's office. Possibly, yes. I think the intent was to keep the language as flexible as possible to allow for the entire universe of how this bridge would ultimately be constructed and whether it would be a district lead construction project, in which case there's a bunch of caveats and check-ins that would require more city input, or if it was city constructed project, in which case the city would just construct it according to how the city would construct it. Okay. There's really, well, I guess let me pause there. Does that answer your question?

I think it does. There's a decision to be made of who's actually going to build it. Why don't we know that yet?

I think because we don't know what the cost of construction is going to be yet. We don't know what the best method of procuring it may be. We don't know. There's just a lot to do. Even after this just to get the design in place and so it really was just to set the stage to be as flexible as possible at some point and probably Laura might be better than me to answer this there will be kind of a go-no-go point of all right We're gonna do this or you district are gonna do this and we'll figure out how to how to manage that at that point Okay

And just to chime in to that as well, there will be, depending on whichever action we take, there would be additional council actions, either through the construction of the bridge or through the disbursement of those funds over to the district. So there would be subsequent council actions regardless of that decision point.

Got it. Thank you. The increases in cost, it says shall be borne by the party responsible for the construction of the bridge. Is that something that we're still keeping in mind as we gather those final costs and whether we've got the grants to cover that? At the end of the day, my concern is that we still end up paying more from CIP for the bridge or some other city source?

Yeah, that's a really good question. All right. I think that that really comes down to, we don't know what the funding is going to be yet. There is a mechanism in place in the contract where if the district is going to be the one responsible for constructing it, that there would be a sit down ahead of time and probably be memorialized in a future agreement. um further where a maximum construction budget would be analyzed based upon the engineering known at that time and that at that point funding would have to be identified and if it does go over then It would be similar to the city had a construction project that had additional unexpected construction increases.

Okay. Got it. Thank you so much. Um, Mark, um, this might be for for you on the district level. Um, it's been mentioned that there's, um. 14 million in regional mills that might be collected through 2047. I can't assume that all of that can go to the bridge or do you think it could?

Well, contractually, Mark Tompkins, president of the Broadway Station Met District. Contractually right now, it is the city's discretion as to how the regional mill levies are used. So it's really up to the city on how those are applied to the project. Okay, got it.

Thank you.

And as part of the agreement in 2025, we did add the North Ped Bridge as a regional project. So this is, the North Ped Bridge is an allowable expense, allowable use of the regional mills.

Okay. How do we determine if other projects receive regional mill funding?

As Laura said, in the 2025 work that was done on the existing project agreements, there's a list within the infamous Exhibit B to the service plan that has asterisks on them. that say this might be regional mill levy funded, this one, this one, this one. So there's line items within the list of projects. And when we go to construct something, we ask for that clarification on this is one that's allowable. What's the city's determination on it?

Okay. All right. Thank you, Mark. Thank you. Sure, I'll go back to you. The... Let me see. Um... Is there, I know that there's a proposed station around here for the Front Range passenger rail and funding for things associated with that. Does this qualify as something that could utilize that funding?

It could, it could. So the dollars from the front range passenger rail could be invested at transit sites, which this is. It's not something that we are anticipating at the moment because it still needs to go to the ballot and we don't build that into our anticipated revenues until something legislation is actually passed and we know for sure what that would look like. But this is a transit site, yes.

Okay. And that is on the freight line and I'm trying to remember where the freight line is. It's right in there, right? It's right next to it. Okay. All right. Councilman Flynn?

Thank you, Madam Chair. As we look to put together this capital stack, we have regional mills we can borrow against, grants potentially, are we looking at diverting any local CIP money to it? You probably know the reason I'm asking. New Lynn Street Bridge on Bear Creek Trail. Less than a million dollars.

That one is also on our six-year CIP. This bridge is also, the North Penn bridge is on our six-year CIP. We, it's always an option. However, that is the last option that we would go to. First, we would be looking at the regional mills. We'd be looking at all of the, all of grants, all other options. And then as last resort, we would be looking to the CIP. But again, not our priority, not our desire.

And that would be three or four years down the road. It would be three or four years down the road from now.

All right. Because this is not something we were anticipating taking on our shoulders. That's correct. And I know that the Newland Bridge won't carry nearly as many pedestrians, but it's just as needed.

That one is also on one of my personal priority lists. Okay. You fan on the inside.

Okay. Oh, President Romero Campbell please join. Please go ahead. Go ahead.

Actually, I don't. Yes, thank you. And thank you for the presentation. Actually, my question has been answered. So. We're good, so I'm good, but thank you.

Okay, excellent. Thank you so much. I don't see anyone else joining queue. These are 2 action items. If we can consider them in a block, we have a motion in a 2nd. 2nd, thank you both any need for a vote. No. Online, you good? We're good. Okay. Thank you so much. We will see you in council. Appreciate it. Thank you. Thanks, everyone.

You can say we're adjourned. We're adjourned.