A long-desired storage facility that will house evidence and the records of the New Mexico Department of Public Safety may soon be built in Santa Fe. Among its other missions, the Public Safety Department is tasked with housing and processing secured documents and evidence as required by law belonging to the New Mexico State Police. The structure will be built as an attachment on the northwest side of the existing Department of Public Safety’s headquarters at 4491 Cerrillos Road and is expected to cost around $14 million to build. The facility, upon completion, will also house the records of the State of New Mexico’s General Services Department, as well as the Facilities Management Division. As proposed, the new facility will measure around 23,500 square feet and will include a 2,560 square foot inspection bay. The New Mexico General Services Department has issued a Request for Proposals for the project, with a submissions expiration date of November 6. Funding to build the new facility is coming from a massive $925 million infrastructure appropriations bill approved earlier this year by the New Mexico State Legislature. By Garry Boulard
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Plans have been announced for the construction of a new fire station in Santa Fe that will go up near the intersection of New Mexico State Road 599 and S. Meadows Road. As earlier discussed, the 14,000 square foot facility will include living quarters, locker rooms, laundry space, bathrooms, a fitness room, and dining room and kitchen, among other amenities. The project, which has already been the subject of a community input meeting, will also feature 2,100 square feet of exterior portals and a three-bay drive-through apparatus room. The new facility will additionally feature an HVAC system and LED lighting. Also included: a multi-function tower for training purposes. The Santa Fe Fire Department currently has six stations located in various sections of the city. The new facility, designated as Station Number Two, would primarily serve the southwest side of Santa Fe. The City of Santa Fe has issued a Request for Proposals for the project, with a submission deadline of November 5. By Garry Boulard Plans have been announced for the building of a new Freddy’s Frozen Custard and Steakburgers outlet that will open sometime next year inside the Scottsdale 101 Shopping Center in Phoenix. The Wichita, Kansas-based chain, which was launched in 2002 and currently has more than 300 locations, opened around 60 new stores in the last year. According to reports, it is exploring the possibility of building new outlets primarily in the West, Midwest, and New England. Known for its steakburgers and chicken sandwiches, as well as frozen custard and a variety of multi-flavored sundaes, the company’s stores generally measure between 2,600 and 3,500 square feet. Sites are typically around one acre. Freddy’s locations, usually as new-built structures, but also in re-purposed retail spaces, typically include outdoor seating and parking space for up to fifty vehicles. Last year the company introduced a smaller restaurant prototype and updated kitchen design, a concept it has since built on. New Freddys stores are currently under construction in Birmingham, Alabama; Anthem, Arizona; and Tomball, Texas. To date, the chain has 20 outlets in Arizona, 26 in Colorado, and 8 in New Mexico. By Garry Boulard Three popular parks in downtown Colorado Springs may soon be in line for upgrades, depending upon the results of the upcoming November election. City officials have said that they would like to see voters approve what is officially known as Ballot Issue 2B. That question will allow the city to keep some $7 million in revenue it has earlier collected for a variety of new park and recreational facility work. If approved, the 3-acre Antlers Park at 31 Pikes Peak Avenue, and the 3.7-acre Acacia Park, located at 115 E. Platte Avenue, would both be in line for a series of improvements, including better lighting and improved accessibility. The Acacia Park is the first official park in Colorado Springs history, having been created in the 1870s. A third downtown park, also slated for lighting and accessibility improvements, is the Alamo Square Park, located at 215 S. Tejon Street. The center of that park is the Pioneers Museum, which is located inside the restored and historic El Paso County Courthouse. Altogether, it is expected that work on the Antlers, Acacia, and Alamo parks will cost around $2 million. Another $1.4 million will go for baseball field work at the Cottonwood Creek Community Park; another $1 million will target facility upgrade work at the Monument Valley Park. Additional funding will target work at the city’s Leon Young Sports Complex, as well as several of Colorado Springs’ historic cemeteries. Colorado Springs voters will also be asked to extend a 2015 sales tax increase for road improvements. That tax of 6.2 cents on every $10 of purchased goods in the city has generated around $250 million in revenue and paid for more than 1,000 miles in city road improvements. The five-year extension will be lower at 5.7 cents, and will pay for another 884 miles of road construction and upgrades. The initial 2015 sales tax increase was approved by more than 65 percent of the Colorado Springs voters. By Garry Boulard Plans are currently underway to build at least eight hundred new multifamily units in the city, on top of the nearly 1,200 units that are already under construction. Speaking before the Santa Fe Home Builders Association, Alexandra Ladd said that the push for new homes, given the expense of each project and challenging zoning issues, is being done on an incremental basis. But Ladd, the director of the City of Santa Fe’s Office of Affordable Housing, said the city has also been working with developers, allowing them to either set aside some 15 percent of any project for affordable housing, or pay fees to be used for affordable housing construction. Another option that has been proposed comes with a developer building all of the units in a given project for low-price market rates. All three of those options will be reviewed as part of a zoning proposal by members of the Santa Fe City council in early December. The Santa Fe Home Builders Association in recent years has been particularly visible on the question of providing more affordable housing in the city. The group is also a part of the Santa Fe Housing Action Coalition, which is dedicated to building more affordable housing throughout Santa Fe. The average price of a home in Santa Fe, according to the real estate site Zillow, currently stands at just under $381,000, compared to $200,000 nationally. By Garry Boulard A proposal, calling for the modernization of campground space within the massive National Parks system, is currently being reviewed by the Department of the Interior. The proposal, as formulated by the Interior Department’s Outdoor Recreation Advisory Committee, is calling for the redesign of some of the parks’ campground space, along with the building-out of family sites, and installation of Wi-Fi. In a letter to Secretary of the Interior Secretary David Bernard from Bill Yeargin, the chairman of the Outdoor Recreation Advisory Committee, it has also been suggested that an effort should be made to build new employee housing, “either on public lands or in gateway communities.” “Small, cost-effective, and quickly constructed, easily retrofitted units could help solve staffing shortages on public lands,” Yeargin continued. Altogether, there are more than 1,400 campgrounds that are run by the Interior Department, but not every one of those facilities would be subject to an upgrade. Earlier reports have indicated that the Interior Department is currently looking at up to $331 million in campground facility maintenance and repairs, out of a total overall national park backlog of $12 billion. According to Interior Department statistics, more than 9.2 million people used the national parks’ campground facilities in 2018, with the Grand Canyon in Arizona and Rocky Mountains in Colorado as two of the most popular campground sites. A decision regarding the campground upgrade proposal is expected to be announced before the end of the year. By Garry Boulard Denver’s always-busy Broadway Station may soon see the construction of a 1 million square foot Class A office project. To be built jointly by the Dallas-based real estate development and investment company KDC and Denver’s Broadway Station Partners, the mixed-use project will feed into a growing demand for quality office space near the city’s transit stations. Officially called Santa Fe Yards, the project will be built near the Broadway Station, which is the second busiest light rail station out of more than fifty such Regional Transportation District stations in the city. As planned, the project will see the construction of four separate office structures, each measuring 250,000 square feet. Each one of those buildings will additionally house conference space, a fitness center, café, and patio balconies. Located at the intersection of Santa Fe Drive and Interstate 25, not far from the banks of the Platte River, the 5.3-acre project site will also include open space, bike and walking trails, and sports courts. In a statement, Chris Selbo, the vice president of development at KDC, said the Santa Fe Yards project was poised to become “one of the top headquarters sites in the country.” Selbo added that the project will include “everything corporate America looks for in a work environment, including adjacent mixed-use amenities, convenient site access via the highway and light rail, and building signage opportunities fronting the highway.” By Garry Boulard Voters in more than two dozen Maricopa County school districts will be asked in the November election to decide upon a series of bond proposals designed to upgrade facilities. The Chandler School District hopes to see passage of a $290 million bond, which will be earmarked for facility upgrades, as well the land acquisition for two new schools. A $236 million bond will be used to renovate a number of school buildings, while updating safety and security systems, in the Paradise Valley Unified School District. Voters in the Deer Valley School District will decide on a $175 million bond that will be designated for school building renovations, safety and security upgrades, and also improving technology. A $152 million bond will be used in the Dystart Unified School District to pay for general facility renovations, as well as the acquisition of land for a new high school. The Tolleson Union High School District has proposed a $125 million bond for the construction of an undefined number of school buildings needed in response to future growth, as well as new safety and security upgrades. A $90 million bond in the Madison Elementary School District will go for school renovations, building maintenance, and security and safety facility improvements. Maricopa County, the home to Phoenix as well as the fast-growing cities of Glendale and Mesa, is by far the largest county in Arizona with a population of more than 4.4 million. By Garry Boulard Legislation that could result in the construction of any number of sequestration facilities and carbon dioxide pipelines across the country is moving through Congress. The Utilizing Significant Emissions with Innovative Technologies Act, otherwise known as USE-IT, was introduced earlier this year by a bipartisan group of Senators and is designed to support carbon utilization and direct air capture research. In so doing, according to the legislation’s proponents, the bill would also provide funding for the development and building of carbon capture, utilization, and sequestration research centers. As proposed, the bill would provide up to $85 million in funding for direct air capture technology research, as well as research on how to use carbon dioxide for commercial products. The legislation, which has been approved in the Senate as part of the National Defense Authorization Act, promotes “carbon capture technologies that take carbon out of the air and find productive uses for it,” said Wyoming Senator John Barrasso in a statement. The chairman of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, Barrasso added that such “promising technologies could result in significant emissions reductions.” The legislation is currently being studied by members of the Subcommittee on Water, Oceans, and Wildlife. By Garry Boulard A large swath of land situated between Interstate 25 and the Denver’s historic Lincoln Park neighborhood could see a major repurposing in a way that would impact area transportation infrastructure. The Burnham Yards has serviced trains for more than 100 years. At the height of its operations was the location for not only dozens of interconnecting railroad tracks, but also upholstery shops, a blacksmith, and a foundry. Built by the Denver and Rio Grande Railway in 1874, the yard, eventually owned by the Union Pacific Railroad, was finally closed in early 2016. Since then state and city leaders, along with Union Pacific officials have been trying to imagine a new use for the property, which remains populated with buildings in varying conditions. Now, the Colorado Department of Transportation has announced that it is on the verge of purchasing the site with the goal of using the space as the home for a new passenger rail system. The CDOT is also interested in the site because it could provide space for a possible sectional realignment of I-25 in the downtown Denver area. The physical transformation of the Burnham Yard would obviously be a large project that would take years to be realized. For now, CDOT officials have confirmed that a purchase agreement for the land may be announced sometime before the end of the year, with the deal finalized in early 2020. According to Historic Denver, the yards’ existence was vital to area rail development in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. “The only way the Denver & Rio Grande could build a rail line in a remote wilderness hundreds of miles from the nearest metropolis and then successfully maintain that line and its rolling stock,” notes the publication, “was with a bustling repair shop like Burnham Yards.” By Garry Boulard |
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