Rampart Range Metropolitan Districts | Lone Tree, Colorado
The RidgeGate Development in Lone Tree, Colorado, is a “New Urbanism” mixed use development that includes single-family residential, multi-family residential, office parks, retail development, a hospital, recreational facilities, and open space areas. Merrick serves as the district engineer for the Rampart Range Metropolitan Districts 1 through 9, formed to construct the major roads, utilities, and drainage systems for RidgeGate.
Merrick provides full district engineering services including assisting with capital planning, design contract coordination, construction contract administration, design review, engineering, construction staking, LiDAR mapping, plats/legal descriptions and project coordination.
Merrick reports monthly to the Board of Directors on the status of all improvement projects within the districts. Merrick has an active role in developing the sub-area plans, street standards, master street lighting plan, and the master dry utility plan for the Development. Additional services include preparing commercial exhibits for land sales, grazing exhibits, street maintenance maps, and district maps.
Designing with Future Improvements in Mind
One challenge included the RidgeGate Parkway/Peoria Intersection. The existing roadway profile for Peoria Street at the intersection with RidgeGate Parkway, done by another firm, did not account for the ultimate typical section of RidgeGate Parkway, which includes a centerline crowned pavement section. Expanding RidgeGate Parkway from two to four lanes and providing a crowned section, as outlined in the planning documents, would expose an existing 20-inch gas main and result in significant pavement reconstruction along Peoria Street. Merrick developed a solution to transition the proposed RidgeGate Parkway pavement cross slope through the intersection to avoid costly impacts to the gas main and reduce the amount of reconstruction along Peoria Street.
Lesson Learned: Thoughtful pre-design consideration of the RidgeGate Parkway ultimate section by the Merrick team enabled the planned typical section to be constructed at lower current/future design and construction costs.
Developing Tools for Future Lot Development
During the master planning efforts for RidgeGate City Center, Merrick prepared capital planning and budget documents to compliment the master planned infrastructure. Separate map exhibits and associated budgets were prepared for roadway, water, sanitary sewer, storm, and landscaping infrastructure. These documents provided the owner with a tool to reference when entertaining prospective developer projects.
When developers and investors express interest in a specific lot or block within the study area, RidgeGate can quickly generate a concept budget for infrastructure costs associated with bringing that lot online. Using the budget exhibits, they can quickly generate multiple cost estimates depending on which development phases are engaged. These exhibits are also very helpful in generating the future capital improvement budgets.