Project would create community larger than Basalt

Representatives from Related WestPac, a joint venture with New York-based Related Companies, asked local elected officials serving on the RFTA board Thursday to partner with them on an elaborate bus station as part of their 950- to 1,000-unit Cattle Creek Crossing proposal.

But Related WestPac’s request prompted statements of concern about the scope of the project, which could add between 2,300 and 3,500 residents to the lower valley if approved by Garfield County, depending on the methodology used to estimate household size.

Jacque Whitsitt, a member of Basalt Town Council and a Roaring Fork Transportation Authority board member, said that a report on the project’s financial impacts would be important, especially for “a development the size of Basalt in a jurisdiction that is not a member of RFTA.”

Garfield County is not a member of RFTA, so it does not collect sales and use taxes to help finance bus service in the county, although it has helped pay for some specific transit projects and programs.

The Cattle Creek Crossing project would be located near Glenwood Springs between Highway 82 and the Roaring Fork River on a parcel of vacant land just upvalley from the intersection that provides access to Thunder River Marketplace and the Colorado Mountain College Spring Valley campus.

Rockwood Shepard of Related WestPac and Glenwood Springs attorney Jim Lochhead, representing Related WestPac, appeared Thursday before the RFTA board, which is made up of elected officials from New Castle to Aspen.

Related WestPac is also developing the Base Village project in Snowmass Village and owns the balance of the commercial property there. Related is one of the largest privately held developers in the United States, with $10 billion of development in its portfolio.

“That’s the point of the whole development — to impact RFTA,” said Shepard. “Our plan is to build a community for working people who will use the RFTA system.”

To that end, Related WestPac has a contract on a triangular piece of land at the intersection of Highway 82 and County Road 154 across from the Thunder River Marketplace.

On the property, it proposes to build a bus station, a cluster of commercial buildings, and 272 parking spaces, at least 50 of them set aside for transit riders. This portion of the project would be designed as “transit-oriented development” and would fit with RFTA’s current plans to build a series of bus stations for its “bus rapid transit” system.

The new transit station and commercial area would be served by an internal shuttle bus system paid for by the proposed Cattle Creek Crossing homeowners association.

“It could possibly serve as a model on how RFTA and the private sector could work well together on projects,” said Dan Blankenship, the CEO of RFTA. However, Blankenship went on to say that he also has concerns about the project and RFTA’s role in providing transit services for it.

“What the developer is proposing so far, which is quite generous in terms of their desire to promote transit, doesn’t really go far enough to take into account the other impacts on the system,” Blankenship said. “That particular development is going to be larger than the town of Basalt. And with all of their efforts to promote transit, we could see a higher level of ridership than in the Basalt area.

“The cost could be high to meet that demand, and because Garfield County is not a RFTA member, any sales tax generated by the commercial activities associated with the development are not going to be levied for transit purposes. There is a very high cost to serving that development without a mechanism to offset it. And we’re already grappling with standing-room-only conditions at peak hours,” Blankenship said.

Aspen Mayor Mick Ireland attended Thursday’s meeting and told his fellow local elected officials that “there will be an additional burden on RFTA to serve these people.”

Blankenship said there are members of the RFTA board who feel strongly that new development in the valley should occur only within the urban growth boundaries set by towns. On the other hand, RFTA chair Dorothea Farris sternly reminded her fellow board members that Garfield County will be making the land-use decisions on the project and that RFTA board should restrict its review to transit-related issues.

That notwithstanding, RFTA has a potentially pivotal role to play in the project. It signed a 2002 “letter of understanding” with a prior owner of the land who had proposed what was called the Bair Chase project.

Now, River Bend Colorado LLC, the Related WestPac ownership vehicle, is asking RFTA to agree to a new letter of understanding about how to manage the Rio Grande trail through the development, the development of the proposed bus station and other aspects of the project.

Related WestPac intends to submit a planned urban development application to Garfield County in September seeking the right to build the 1,000-unit project.

“The developer owns the land and wants to develop it, and the county is reviewing the land-use application,” Blankenship said. “But if we are asked for our comments on this proposal, we are going to do our best to make people understand that it is going to have significant transit impacts.”

bgs@aspendailynews.com