Some Durango residents look at Downtown’s Next Step and see opportunity for their businesses and tenants on Main Avenue between Fifth and 14th streets. Others see a threat.
One view is businesses would prosper from a more pedestrian-friendly streetscape. Another view is costly construction will hinder businesses, and the new streetscape will hurt parking, delivery services and downtown’s character.
Next Step construction costs won’t be available until the project reaches 90% design. Designs have a total cost of $1.3 million. According to the city, the design is funded by a $640,000 Department of Local Affairs grant and the 2015 half cent sales tax fund.
Various views on the project were expressed last month at a community meeting where the latest designs were shared. Designs included nine additional parking spaces, the preservation of Main Avenue’s current lane configuration and 32 new trees in addition to trees currently on Main Avenue.
Many residents agreed critical infrastructure upgrades beneath Main Avenue are needed sooner rather than later. But residents and business owners are divided by the question of what to do with Main Avenue after it’s sewn up.
Cream Bean Berry owner Katie Burford said more seating space in front of her ice cream shop on the 1000 block of Main Avenue caught her attention in the newest conceptual design. She is an advocate for more outdoor seating, she said.
The proposed seating would serve the same purpose as the bump-out that currently exists outside Burford’s shop, she said. Since bump-outs were implemented in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, her revenue has risen.
Resident Bob Griffith, who owns the Durango Welcome Center and has six tenants in buildings on downtown Main Avenue, said he’s concerned about the cost of Next Step to the city and taxpayers as much as to downtown’s character.
He said he wants to know how much it would cost to perform utility work in addition to Next Step construction versus utility work separately. Does it make financial sense to implement Next Step?
“It's going to be hard on my tenants as it is, just doing the utility part of it,” he said. “I mean, look at Pagosa.”
He was referring to a major U.S. Highway 160 reconstruction project underway in the heart of Pagosa Spring’s downtown, which has hurt storefront access and made navigating the town a chore.
Griffith said he is also concerned about changing what people love about downtown. A business owner in downtown of 30 years, he said he can’t count how many people have told him they visited his shop because they love downtown.
Evan Tyler, city capital improvements project manager, said adding Next Step onto the utility work is financially strategic.
“It’s been universally agreed that we’d like to see the utilities be replaced. And folks have this idea that if we don’t move forward with this (Next Step) and we replace the utilities, we’re going to save more than half the cost,” he said.
That’s not the case, he said.
He said Public Works will foot the full bill if just utility work is performed. But including Next Step opens up access to multiple funding sources such as grants.
cburney@durangoherald.com
