Colorado Springs residents want the city to focus on adding trails and preserving parks, according to surveys done for the city’s park master plan.

The survey results were presented to the Colorado Springs City Council Monday as an update to the Parks, Recreation and Cultural Services Department’s work to create a new long-term master plan. The plan, which the city is working with Kimley-Horn planning consultants on, will be the first overhaul of the parks system plan since 2014.

Kimley-Horn consultant Nick Kuhn said they had conducted an online survey and randomized household survey last year to gauge the public priorities. Both surveys reached more than 1,000 residents and asked about both the need for different parks areas and how important they were to residents.

“Some are lucky enough to have advocates that represent their needs that are on these lists, sometimes very loudly in the community, but there are also silent needs here that represent broad, underlying needs within the community,” Kuhn said.

Kuhn identified the interest in multi-generational programs and facilities as one area that was popular but had less organized support.

Both paved and unpaved trails rose to the top of the list of what residents wanted to see. When the results were broken down by council district, residents in every section of the city still rated natural trails as the most important parks facility.

The continued interest in the trail network was not surprising to Glenn Carlson, executive director of the Trails and Open Space Coalition. Carlson said the city had already been making great progress on projects like the 10-mile Legacy Loop trail around downtown Colorado Springs, which was nearing completion. Similar efforts were being talked about to connect trails on the east side of the city.

“Especially as the city grows and as certain areas of the city become more dense, trails are not simply a recreation aspect. They’re a transportation thing as well,” Carlson said.

The parks buildings that residents were most interested in adding were public bathrooms. Indoor and outdoor swimming pools also ranked high among the biggest needs. Colorado Springs currently has five public pools run by the city and the YMCA of the Pikes Peak Region — one of which, Portal Pool, has been closed since 2020.

Adding those facilities would be complicated by the other big-picture takeaway from the survey, which is that a vast majority of residents wanted the city to focus on maintaining its current parks facilities. Councilmember Brandy Williams asked how the final master plan would balance the current and future needs.

“I just want to make sure that you guys are going through the exercise to really look at those deferred maintenance projects in conjunction with future projects,” Williams said.

A 2021 study conducted by the city identified around $270 million in deferred projects and improvements in the Parks Department. The annual budget for the department is $64 million, including dedicated funds such as the Trails, Open Space and Parks program.

The biggest barriers for people to enjoy the parks centered on homelessness and overall security questions. Council President Lynette Crow-Iverson said the issue also tied into the questions about bathroom access, since the facilities would have to be designed to avoid vandalism.

The funding challenge for Colorado Springs parks was not limited to new acquisitions. Parks Advisory Committee member Steve Lenzo said he was personally concerned about how the city would improve the parkland it already owned. He pointed to Grey Hawk Park, which had been in the queue for improvements for 18 years until the playground addition was finished last year.

“People bought houses and moved their with their kids 18 years ago. Now the kids are all gone and we’ve just built the park,” Lenzo said.

Colorado Springs is running an additional “Vision Survey” through Feb. 13 to get input on the long-term priorities for the parks system. The anonymous online survey asks residents about what types of improvements the city should prioritize for parks and open spaces going forward. It also asks which type of park systems people would be willing to pay to support through taxes and fees.

Kuhn said the first draft of the full parks master plan would be released in April with a more detailed list of parks improvements, along with a possible timeline for them to be made.

The survey is available at coloradosprings.gov/ParkSystemMasterPlan.