Author: Bill Mckeown
-
Study on moving trains is delayed
A final report on the feasibility of moving interstate coal trains from the Front Range to the eastern plains will be delayed until early next year, in part so consultants can provide initial results to skeptical elected officials in rural counties.Moving the more than two dozen coal trains that rumble up and down the Front…
-
Endurocross man
“It’s not dark yet but it’s gettin’ there” – Bob Dylan By day, Tim Hilton is a lanky, longmarried, 49-year-old guy with three sons. He loves his family. He goes to church on Sundays. He builds custom doors in a roomy shop behind his rural Monument home. But once or twice a week, come early…
-
GETTING THERE: $4 bus trips from Springs to Woodland Park this fall
Express bus service between Colorado Springs and Woodland Park will begin Nov. 10, after the Colorado Springs City Council this week gave its consent – on a 5-4 vote – to $4 one-way fares between the cities. The service will be provided by Colorado’s Springs’ Mountain Metropolitan Transit. The 15 round trips a day at…
-
Charity event brings rare cars to Springs
In 1939, 11-year-old Malcolm Pray spied a stunning – and improbably Delahaye automobile at the French Pavilion of the World’s Fair in New York City.The city boy was so captivated by the rolling work of art that he later sketched it in a mechanical drawing class – and burned the memory of its lines into…
-
Contractor repairing gas line damaged by rain
A contractor on Monday began making emergency repairs to protect a gas line that was exposed when recent heavy rains roiled Sand Creek. Tezak Construction will cover the gas line and stabilize the sandy soil around it until material needed to make permanent repairs is available in about six weeks, said city spokeswoman Mary Scott.…
-
GETTING THERE: Readers’ 2 cents on commuter rail debate
Last week’s column about a study on the feasibility of high-speed commuter rail on either or both the Interstate 25 and 70 corridors provoked a lot of thoughtful responses on gazettedev.gazette.com. Since readers will be among the folks paying for such rail service should it prove feasible, here’s a selection of comments (edited for space).Aceventurapd:…
-
State honors owners of burned ranch near Fountain
It will be a bittersweet moment when six generations of an El Paso County family gather this afternoon at the state fair to be honored for owning and operating their ranch for more than 100 years.On Aug. 1, a wildfire swept over the 101-year-old Pease-Clements Ranch east of Fountain, destroying every building, including an old…
-
THE PINCH: 27% more riders hop on FREX so far in 2008
Ridership on the Front Range Express commuter bus service is up 27 percent through July 2008 compared with the same period a year ago, probably because of the steep jump in gas prices and the addition of more comfortable buses.That’s the take of David Menter, transit planning supervisor for the city’s Mountain Metropolitan Transit, which…
-
THE PINCH: Buying used instead of new
Katie and Mike Donnelly are a year and a half into an experiment that is enough to make a middle-class American break into a cold sweat. The Colorado Springs couple have not bought anything new since January 2007, dollar-store finds excluded. Well, that’s not exactly true. Just recently, Katie Donnelly reported that the couple had…
-
GETTING THERE: High-speed rail system attractive but expensive idea
An interesting exercise kicked off this week, when a coalition of governments and transit organizations announced a yearlong study on the feasibility of high-speed rail in Colorado.The $1.5 million study, to be done for an umbrella organization called the Rocky Mountain Rail Authority, will examine whether it is economically and technically possible to build high…