2016-2021 Capital Improvements Plan (CIP)
The Ames City Council begins at 5:15 PM.
This meeting is for an overview of the draft 2016-2012 Capital Improvements plan (CIP) . The CIP reflects $188,226,802 of expenditures from various City, State, and Federal revenue sources to accomplish infrastructure improvements in our community. I encourage you to read the city managers letter on the CIP. It gives a brief overview of the CIP budget, the cost of growth and plans to addresses those costs.
Some highlights include:
Public Safety - $7,044,222
- $252K at fire stations
- $750K for accessibility
- $649K for multi-modal
- Complete streets master plan
- Median on S Duff, intersection by Wal-Mart drive
- Traffic adaptive signals
Thoughts on Public Safety: Are we budgeting enough to achieve our goal for Complete Streets? Is $649K over 5 years enough for multi-modal transportation improvements when 71.4% of respondents in the 2015 Satisfaction Survey rated bikeability/walkability improvements as “very important”. And 84% said traffic flow improvements were very important. Also, Healthiest Ames recently funded a Complete Streets Plan through CDL, can we use parts of it to avoid duplicating effort?
Utilities - $105,041,950
- Electric $28.3 mil
- Water $35.7 mil
- Sanitary sewer $30.8 mil
- Storm sewer $8.3 mil
- Resource recovery $1.9 mil
Thoughts on Utilities: Have we budgeted for possible solar project? In addition to spending money for repairs and maintenance, we need to work to reduce our need through efficiency and demand side management.
Transportation - $70,583,130
- Grand Ave ’16/’17 will involve land acquisitions and design
- $35 mil to street improvements
- $2.6 mil to new shared use paths along Skunk River
- CyRide – vehicles, facility, bus stops, route improvements
Thoughts on Transportation: $2.6 mil in new shared-use paths, but all along Skunk River. We also need to look at gaps in our current bicycle infrastructure.
Community Betterment - $5,557,500
- Park improvements
- New Homewood clubhouse
- Accessibility study
- Neighborhood improvement program
- Downtown and Campustown façade grant programs
Thoughts on Community Betterment: $385K devoted to building a pedestrian bridge between Moore Memorial Park and land to the west. Community Betterment is mostly funded through sales tax, is this enough to keep up with the demands of our parks and neighborhoods?
Thanks for reading,
Matthew Goodman
Ex -City Council At-Large
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