Supporting Aspen’s Future: Brush Creek Park and Go

Each year, millions of people visit the mountain town of Aspen, Colorado, to ski the city’s famous mountain, stay at their luxury resorts and embrace the beautiful natural landscape. This booming tourism industry has come at a cost, though, burdening the city’s limited highway and parking capacity.

The Colorado Department of Transportation’s Brush Creek Park and Ride project aims to address this escalating issue head-on by improving and expanding the existing bus-transfer facility and parking lot. The Brush Creek Park-and-Ride, located at the intersection of Colorado Highway 82 and Brush Creek Road (approximately six miles north of Aspen), will provide free parking year-round and frequent bus service directly to Snowmass Village and the slopes – encouraging more locals and visitors to take public transit in lieu of driving vehicles. 

“We are very excited to contribute to Pitkin County’s goal of providing world class service to both its guests and residents,” said Jacobs Buildings, Infrastructure and Advanced Facilities Design Director Dave Tidey. “That objective allowed us to pursue an innovative and highly sustainable design concept. Further, by weaving the existing Aspen Mass bike trail through this facility, we were able to emphasize an alternate means of travel.”

The new and improved Brush Creek Park and Ride addresses the key perceived issues that have deterred people from using the existing facility, including parking lot overflow, inadequate lighting at night and presence of portable restrooms. It will offer 200 additional parking spaces, LED energy efficient safety lighting and 32 landscaped islands for beautification. It will also upgrade the current portable restrooms to a Comfort Station with men and women’s restrooms serviced by a new well and septic system. An information kiosk is being constructed for the City of Aspen to distribute useful information to visitors and the community.

Jacobs is providing a variety of design and construction services to the Colorado Department of Transportation for the Brush Creek Park and Ride, including service improvements for an electric vehicle charging station.

The project is currently in the design stage collaborating with Elected Officials Transportation Committee, composed of elected Aspen/Snowmass community members, with scheduled completion by October 2021.