Improvements coming soon to troubled Serpentine Drive in Manitou Springs but questions persist
MANITOU SPRINGS, Colo. (KRDO) -- How did a winding, half-mile road on the west end of town get to be in such bad shape?
That's what many drivers wonder about Serpentine Drive, which connects US 24 above town to a roundabout at the west end of Manitou Avenue.
"Yeah, it's terrible!" exclaimed Estella Kutschara, who has lived in Manitou Springs for two years and recently tried to dodge the many potholes on Serpentine. "The other day, there was actually a large motor home that got jackknifed over here, and I'm sure that probably contributed some to it."
From the highway, the narrow road goes down a steep grade into a hairpin turn in front of the Rainbow Falls entrance; it then twists along the banks of Fountain Creek until it reaches the roundabout.
Serpentine gets a steady amount of traffic from drivers seeking a shortcut between the highway and the congested downtown shopping district; that adds only more wear and tear to pavement that is also crumbling and eroding with little room to evade the damage.
And recently came this revelation from Roy Chaney, the town's public service director: A roughly 100-foot segment around the hairpin turn is in three jurisdictions.
"The upper part on the hill is CDOT (Colorado Department of Transportation), the middle part is El Paso County and the lower section is ours," he explained.
That may be why it has taken so long to repair the road, but Chaney said that improvements are coming -- at least to Manitou's side -- over the next few weeks.
"We're actually taking the cheapest method just to make it as safe as possible," he said. "Chip-sealing is the way to go. And then next year, the plans are to repave it all and make it a better walkable area and drivable area."
That would be part of a project, Chaney continued, to extend a recently-improved trail and walkway from the roundabout to Rainbow Falls and could include curbs and gutters to improve drainage and reduce erosion along Serpentine.
CDOT repaved its segment of the road several years ago but the worst conditions are in front of the Rainbow Falls entrance -- a county owned park where that part of the road presumably is in the county's jurisdiction.
"My understanding is that the county and CDOT were working on a plan to repair that section," Chaney said. "It was supposed to happen this summer at around the same time we'd be chip-sealing our part. I haven't heard anything more about it."
A Manitou Springs crew began chip-sealing its part of the road Tuesday.
A county spokesman said that Tuesday that "there are quite a few moving pieces" with Serpentine Drive, but that officials are working on a solution to fix the county's section of it.
