Colorado Springs Real Estate Brokerage
What are the odds that rocks actually fall on you when you’re driving through the Colorado mountains and see dozens of “watch for falling rock” signs? Probably pretty slim; however, after the major rockslide on Interstate 70 this morning (near Glenwood Canyon), it will probably be awhile before you scoff at those warnings again:
Photo credit: Colorado DOT. More rockslide pics via TwitPic
Thanks to local tweeter QualityFrog for the link to the pics.
Here’s the major events that will be taking place in the Woodmen and Academy interchange construction project this week, via WoodmenRoad.com:
Preparatory work for the opening of Prince Drive at Woodmen Road
Traffic Changes
The project is scheduled to be completed in two years.
The Academy and Woodmen interchange construction project continues. Here’s the major points of the 7-day outlook for this week (through October 24th):
You can view the complete schedule at WoodmenRoad.com.
View Woodmen Corridor Improvement Project in a larger map
The big Woodmen Road Corridor Improvement construction project has started to ramp up. The project will widen Woodmen Road to six lanes from Interstate 25 to Stinson (see map above). The project is optimistically scheduled to be finished in September 2011 – originally it had been estimated to take about 2 years and 9 months, but the city and contractor are now promising it will be completed in just two years.
The first part of Phase One started September 30th and is expected to be completed by April 2010. It includes the following projects:
There are construction updates, a 7-day outlook, maps of the planned phases, progress photos, and more at WoodmenRoad.com
Well, according to INRIX, a traffic-data firm, it’s bad enough to land it on the list of “Top 100 Cities with the Worst Traffic”, but just barely – in 2009, Colorado Springs ranked 91st. It’s up a little bit from 2008 – we were ranked 93 then – but down from 2007 in which we ranked 76 on the list.
Anyone who’s ever lived in a larger city and then moved to Colorado Springs is likely to say traffic is a non-issue – of course, roads are busy during morning and afternoon rush hours, but it’s pretty rare to be at a stand-still unless there’s an accident or road construction. (You could, of course, argue that there’s always road construction, but isn’t there everywhere?) The biggest complaint among local drivers is the lack of efficient east/west thoroughfares.
You can easily check traffic conditions in Colorado Springs with the city’s traffic camera map. It amplifies the lack of major east/west roads – there are only a handful of cameras off of north/south running Interstate 25 and Academy.
Relatedly, the average commuting time in Colorado Springs is 20.6 minutes according to the US Census Bureau. For comparison, Denverites have an average commute of 23.7 minutes.
Here’s a few random questions that I’ve been wondering about and finally found the answers to:
Where do Colorado Springs block numbers start? (Also known as zero point.)
Point zero in Colorado Springs is at Pikes Peak and Cascade Avenue (downtown, of course). However, that’s somewhat complicated, because there’s a second point zero at Lake Avenue and First Street in the Broadmoor area. It’s really hard to tell how far that area extends, though it’s certainly not out of the Broadmoor area. It looks like that grid extends north to around Cheyenne Blvd and south to Marland Road, maybe?
Either way, in general, street numbers are based off of the starting point of Pikes Peak and Cascade. That’s good to know, but it’s also not helpful with streets like Union Blvd that twist and turn like a ride at an amusement park. We tell newbies to just remember that the mountains are to the west. If you can remember that, and have accustomed yourself to what Pikes Peak looks like from different parts of the city, you ought to be able to determine where you are and where you need to be pretty easily.
How is the elevation in Colorado Springs determined?
The official elevation in Colorado Springs is 6,035 feet, but exactly where is that elevation located? I thought it might be an average of the whole town, but found out it’s measured from the south steps of City Hall. Relatedly, according to the Gazette, the lowest point in Colorado Springs is along Fontaine Blvd, between Marksheffel Rd and Powers (5,706 feet), and the highest point within the Springs city limits is the northern part of Cheyenne Mountain, know as “The Horns” (9,212 feet).
And where is Cheyenne Mountain, anyway?
Cheyenne Mountain is the mountain to the south of Pikes Peak – the one with all the radio towers. Yep, you know where that mountain is! Here’s an article with some interesting history about Cheyenne Mountain.
With the Woodmen/Powers interchange complete and the Woodmen expansion almost completed from Powers to Hwy 24 in Falcon the next major project is the interchange at Academy Blvd. The links below have an animation of the planned interchange.
Video of Academy/Woodmen Interchange (small)
Video of Academy/Woodmen Interchange (large)
In the video above you’ll see Academy will pass under Woodmen allowing traffic on Academy to proceed unobstructed at all times. The new intersection above should also greatly improve traffic flow on Woodmen with only brief interuptions to allow ingress/egress to Academy ramps. Once complete, this project will greatly improve traffic flow throughout the entire North Academy Blvd area.
Have you ever wondered what exactly the plan is for the Powers Blvd corridor here in Colorado Springs? Here is a good source for that information: The Powers Link
(You’ll notice this doesn’t address the proposed route North of Hwy 83 through Flying Horse – I’ll touch on that another day.)
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