City of Colorado Springs and Downtown Partnership officials announced that the Tejon Street Revitalization Project is scheduled to begin on Monday, March 24, with the stated goals of boosting public safety, increasing accessibility and growing business activity.
“Downtown Colorado Springs is experiencing tremendous development, along with continued growth in tourism in our region,” said Richard Mulledy, the City’s Public Works Director. “From an infrastructure perspective, it is important that we meet the growing and changing needs of our downtown community. Expansion of our outdoor dining spaces is a consistent need we hear from business owners in these two blocks, as well as the need to make our downtown corridor more accessible. We are proud to work closely with the Downtown Partnership on this project.”
“We are incredibly thankful for our partnership with the city to invest in our historic core and support our locally owned businesses” said Chelsea Gondeck, Director of Planning and Mobility for the Partnership. “Our Downtown is a growing neighborhood with thousands of new residents making the city center their home in the last decade. This project expands opportunities for businesses, enhances safety for their growing number of visitors, and fulfills a variety of goals the community identified in the Experience Downtown Master Plan.”
The project features the following improvements to the two-block segment:
- Wider sidewalk space for pedestrians, including those using wheelchairs and mobility scooters. Recent data from VisitCOS show that 30% of visitors to our region have at least one person in their group with mobility barriers.
- Expanded and uniformly sized outdoor dining space for restaurants.
- Removal of the center lane (currently used by delivery trucks), improving safety by relocating deliveries to new zones on side streets.
- Preservation of diagonal on-street parking once construction is complete.
- Designating short-term parking areas for food delivery and ride-hail vehicles.
- Planting larger trees and expanding landscape areas for increased aesthetics and to provide increased shade.
- Enhancing opportunities for extra pedestrian lighting, public art, and seating.
The anticipated traffic impacts during construction include northbound Tejon Street closing from Colorado Avenue to Kiowa Avenue in phases during construction in March through December. Southbound Tejon Street remains open in that same segment. Access to all businesses will remain intact with a focus on safety.
While on-street parking on these two blocks will be unavailable during the project, the South Nevada Street parking garage is adjacent to South Tejon Street and available for only $1 per hour. Its recent maintenance project allows a reopening of the top two floors during busy times. This means the garage, on the southwest corner of South Nevada Street and Colorado Avenue, offsets the temporary parking loss. Businesses on the blocks under construction also will have free two-hour parking vouchers for City-owned garages to give to customers.
Motorists also can park in the City-owned garages at Nevada Avenue and Kiowa Street (127 E. Kiowa St.) or the one at Cascade Avenue and Bijou Street (215 N. Cascade Ave.). All City-owned garages offer free parking on Sundays. Learn more about the parking incentives and options offered during the project at ColoradoSprings.gov/TejonStParkingIncentives.
About the project
The first phase, Colorado Avenue to Pikes Peak Avenue, starts construction in late March 2025. The project then moves to the segment known as Block 2, from Pikes Peak Avenue to Kiowa Street, after the Fourth of July. This segment is scheduled for completion by the end of September. Finally, crews will move to the “Historic Busy Corner” at the intersection of South Tejon Street and Pikes Peak Avenue. That portion of the project should start at the end of September and finish by early December. The project will repave those two blocks of South Tejon Street.
Funding comes from a $1.6 million grant from the Colorado Department of Transportation and the City’s local funds. The Downtown Development Authority provides funding for the redesign and construction of aesthetic enhancements to “Historic Busy Corner" at the intersection of Tejon Street and Pikes Peak Avenue.
The project is a collaboration between the City of Colorado Springs and the Downtown Partnership’s Downtown Development Authority.
Open house scheduled
People are invited to attend an open house event on Tuesday, Feb. 25, from 4:30-6 p.m. at the City Administration Building (30 South Nevada Street) in room 102. Parking is available for $1/hour in the parking garage on the southwest corner of Colorado Avenue and South Nevada Street.
For more information about the project, visit ColoradoSprings.gov/TejonStreet.