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Glenwood Springs receives $300,000 grant for water infrastructure project

Glenwood Springs has been awarded a $300,000 grant from the Colorado River District to help fund a pipeline project and boost the city’s drought resilience.

Construction is slated to begin in October, according to a news release.

The Roaring Fork Pump Station Pipeline Connection Project includes 3,300 linear feet of 24-inch water line installed from the Roaring Fork Pump Station to the Red Mountain Water Treatment Plant as well as upgrades to the pump station, the addition of a mixing vault at the plant and erosion and sedimentation controls.



Estimated to cost about $3.3 million, the project will allow the city to pull water from both the Grizzly/No Name creeks intake and Roaring Fork River intake, serving as a significant upgrade to the city’s water infrastructure, the release states.

“With immediate recovery needs from the Grizzly Creek Fire and long-term trends for increased severe weather patterns, including drought and flash floods, this project is important to our ability to adapt and prepare for the future,” Glenwood Public Works Director Matthew Langhorst said in the release.



On Tuesday, Mayor Jonathan Godes told the Post Independent that he was thankful for the additional funds and proud the Colorado River District saw the project’s value to the community.

“We’re really happy to receive any contributions that aren’t on the rate payers,” Godes said. “The project increases capacity, resiliency and redundancy to our water system, which we’ve seen is vulnerable to extreme weather events.”

Currently, only one water source can connect to the water treatment center at a time, because it is fed by a single 45-year-old water line. Any inspections or service to the water line require the system to be shut down, which has previously been accompanied by water restrictions for Glenwood residents.

Installing a secondary line could provide the water treatment center with a redundant water feed and increase Glenwood’s drought resistance by facilitating the ability to pull from multiple water sources at the same time, the news release stated.

The water infrastructure project also includes a new mixing vault at the water treatment plant, which would allow staff to blend water pumped from the river and gravity-fed creek water. Blending improves the city’s flexibility to manage water quantity and quality during drought or degraded raw water quality conditions like those that have been occurring from large rain events over the Grizzly Creek Fire burn scar, the release states.

In the award letter from the Colorado River District, Amy Moyer, the district’s director of strategic partnerships, thanked the city for its “commitment to the mission of the Colorado River District to lead in the protection, conservation, use and development of the water resources of the Colorado River basin for the welfare of the district, and to safeguard for Colorado all waters of the Colorado River to which the state is entitled.”

Glenwood also received a $500,000 grant from the Colorado Department of Local Affairs for the infrastructure project as well as a $2.5 million loan from the Colorado Water Conservation Board. Construction is anticipated to begin in October and continue into spring 2022.


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