Vickie from Arvada writes, “What’s driving you crazy? On Ward Rd just north of I-70 there has been water running onto the sidewalk and has been before Covid. It looks like you can’t even use the sidewalk right there. Who owns the property where this water is coming from? Kaiser? City of Wheat Ridge? CDOT? RTD?”
The who answer is Kaiser, but the answer to why the water is flowing over the sidewalk and what can be done about it is a much more complicated question to answer.
When I went to take a look at the sidewalk, I was surprised not only by the amount of water that was flowing over it but more so by the water fed swamp that has overgrown the sidewalk. There is so much bog like aquatic plant life that the sidewalk has become rather gross, very slick and nearly impossible to walk through without slipping. There are other water plants that have sprung up next to the sidewalk and down the curb as the water flows all the way down Ward Rd to the drain just before the old RTD Park-N-Ride north of I-70. I could also see the green stained remnants of previous plant growth that at one point covered the sidewalk but was recently cleaned by CDOT. Ward Rd is also State Highway 72 and is therefore maintained by CDOT…