Here are 15 road projects at the top of Fort Collins' list for the next 10 years.

Fort Collins is making its list of the road projects it wants to complete in the next 10 years, and the plan is to give greater priority to projects that make roads safer and more accessible for pedestrians, bicyclists and other more vulnerable road users.

In the past, the city primarily used data around safety and road capacity to help determine projects. Now it's integrating two newly adopted city plans that align with other city goals around climate, sustainability and equity:

• The Vision Zero Action Plan, which aims to create safer streets so there are no deaths or serious injuries by 2032.

• The Active Modes Plan to create and improve multimodal design for pedestrians, bicyclists or those using a wheelchair, scooter or skateboard, so that by 2032, active modes make up 50% of all trips. This also aims to make roads safer for these most vulnerable road users.

The process is called the Transportation Capital Projects Prioritization Study, and it's how the city wants to prioritize projects in its 10-year Transportation Capital Improvement Program.

"We're trying to get to that Vision Zero goal," said city engineer Brad Buckman in an interview with the Coloradoan. "We're trying to support more active modes and less single-occupancy vehicles," along with enhanced transit, like bus rapid transit.

"This is just an extension of that, taking those priorities and putting them into action," he said. "This is a roadmap to actually implementing those road projects."

Projects to increase road capacity are still necessary, said Marc Virata, a civil engineer with the city, but the idea is to factor in active modes to a greater degree.

Council will vote Sept. 19 on adopting this methodology to serve as the foundation for the 10-year plan, which also includes current projects, Active Modes projects and regional projects with partners like Colorado Department of Transportation, Larimer County, Colorado State University and the North Front Range Metropolitan Planning Organization. Some of these include adding bus rapid transit on West Elizabeth Street and extending MAX to North College Avenue.

Here we've compiled the top 15 projects identified in the study, totaling $162 million.

Note that these projects and priorities might change based on circumstances, such as funding becoming available or additional evaluation. But here's the priority list as it stands now, in order from top to bottom:

1. Shields Street and Prospect Road

This project would create a protected intersection, where bicycles/pedestrians are separate from motor vehicles. It would also create a protected intersection at Stuart Street and Shields. And it would consider adding separated bike lines from Stuart to Prospect by reducing the number of vehicle lanes. Other changes being considered are converting the left turns on Prospect Road to single left-turn lanes.

Goals: "Improve safety along arterials and at intersections for multimodal users."

2. Troutman Parkway and JFK Parkway road diets

What's a road diet? It's when one lane of traffic in each direction is eliminated, and separated bike lanes are created.

An example of a road diet is West Mulberry Street. That change was made in 2018.

This project would do just that on:

• Troutman Parkway from College Avenue to JFK Parkway

• JFK Parkway from Harmony Road to Horsetooth Road

Goals: "Improve safety and provide a parallel bike route to College Avenue by adding dedicated/protected bicycle facilities. Reduce speeds through geometric improvements. Temporary, short-term improvements to provide low-cost solutions."

3. Lemay Avenue and Drake Road intersection

Narrow existing lanes on Drake to incorporate sidepaths and increase eastbound and westbound intersectionsight distance. Add southbound right-turn lane and westbound right-turn lane. Redesign existing right-turnlanes to improve bike-pedestrian safety.

Goals: "Improve safety by adding geometric intersection improvements and sidepaths."

4. Timberline Road overpass at Vine Drive

Grade separate Timberline over Vine. Provide bicycle and pedestrian accommodations from Timberline to Vine.

Goals: "Eliminate at-grade rail crossing. Improve safety, and traffic operations on Timberline. Improve multimodalconnectivity."

5. Drake Road Corridor road diet

From Overland Trail to Taft Hill Road, add separated bike lanes and remove one travel lane in each direction.

Goals: "Improve safety by adding dedicated/protected bicycle facilities. Reduce speeds through geometric improvements. Temporary, short-term improvements to provide low-cost solutions."

6. North Timberline Road roadway, from Lincoln Avenue to Sykes Drive

Widen Timberline to a four-lane divided facility with separated bike lanes.

Goals: "Widen roadway to accommodate future development. Improve multimodal connectivity."

7. North Timberline Road roadway from Suniga Road to Mountain Vista Drive

Widen Timberline to a four-lane divided facility with separated bike lanes.

Goals: "Widen roadway to accommodate future development. Improve multimodal connectivity."

8. Heatheridge Road and Prospect Road intersection

Replace existing crosswalk signal with traffic signal. Add advance crossing signs, raised median/pedestrian refuge for speed mitigation and added protection for pedestrians.

Goals: "Improve intersection safety for pedestrians and cyclists, specifically for children crossing in platoons toschool."

9. East Prospect Road corridor improvements

Widen Prospect to a four-lane median divided facility with active modes/transit elements.Provide sidepaths.

Goals: "Expand vehicular capacity and improve multimodal connectivity."

10. Shields Street and Horsetooth Road intersection

This project would add a protected intersection with accommodation for future protectedbike lanes on Shields.

Goals: Improve safety along arterials and at intersections for multimodal users.

11. Boardwalk Drive and Harmony Road signal improvements

These changes would improve the physical alignment of the northbound signal, change left-turn signals to flashing yellow arrows, improve button accessibility and change the signal so pedestrians enter the intersection first. It would also add additional paint bicycle markings and consider a buffered bike lane on the eastbound approach.

Goals: "Improve safety at intersection by upgrades to existing signal infrastructure. Improve safety for bicycles andpedestrians."

12. Timberline and Harmony roads intersection

Add third northbound and southbound through lanes with separated bike lanes on Timberline with reduced lanewidths. Create a protected intersection for bicyclists/pedestrians. Prohibit right turn on red and show flashingarrow for right turns.

Goals: "Improve safety along arterials and at intersections formultimodal users."

13. Harmony Road and JFK Parkway/Hogan Drive intersection

Signal improvements on JFK Parkway, with widening on Hogan Drive to improve lane alignment. It would also add separated bike lanes.

Goals: "Improve safety at intersection by upgrades to existing signal infrastructure. Improve safety for bicycles andpedestrians."

14. Shields Street corridor road diet, Mulberry to Mountain

Add separated bike lanes with reduced lane configuration. Increase separation for pedestrians.

Goals: "Improve safety by adding dedicated/protected bicycle facilities. Reduce speeds through geometric improvements. Temporary, short-term improvements to provide low-cost solutions."

15. Suniga Road extension

This project would extend Suniga from Lemay Avenue to Timberline Road with a four-lane median divided section.

Goals: "Extend roadway to accommodate future development and improve multimodal connectivity"

So how do these projects get ranked, anyway?

The study produces a score for each project based on the following criteria, with safety and multimodal benefits weighted the highest:

• Crash reduction: Cutting crash incidents.

• Peak hour delay reduction: Cutting wait times.

• Equity: Giving more weight to a project in a part of town that doesn’t have as much infrastructure or may be in an underserved community.

• Expected growth estimates.

• Cost of a project.

• Readiness: This includes things like funding availability, right-of-way procurement.

• Multimodal benefit: For pedestrians, bicyclists and users of wheelchairs, scooters and skateboards.

• Synergy: An example of this is projects that overlap with other work, such as replacing a water line.

• Community: Addresses community needs and interest based on public input.

Here are 12 projects already in progress or funded:

Less further out, these projects total $70 million, with $30 million coming from grants. They are either already in construction or have some funding.

• South Timberline corridor improvements (in construction): To widen the road to four lanes between Stetson Creek and Trilby, make multimodal improvements including a pedestrian underpass under Timberline, and make intersection improvements at Kechter and Zephyr roads.

• Laporte bridges (in construction): To replace two deficient bridges on Laporte Avenue over the New Mercer Canal, just north of Grandview Cemetery.

• City Park/Mulberry intersection improvements (in construction): This includes removing parking on the east side of City Park Avenue from Plum to Mulberry and widening the sidewalk on the south side of Mulberry from City Park Avenue to west of Shields.

• Vine-Timberline intersection improvements (out for bid)

• College/Trilby intersection improvements (2023): To reconstruct the intersection, creating dual left-turn lanes from College to Trilby and right-turn lanes for each direction of travel.

• College Avenue signal improvements at Columbia, Pitkin and Harvard (2024)

• Siphon bike/pedestrian overpass (2024): Pedestrian and bicycle bridge over the Union Pacific Railroad tracks between Harmony Road and Trilby Road.

• College/Triangle signal improvements (2024)

• Pedestrian crossing improvements (2024)

• Taft Hill corridor improvements (2024): Between Horsetooth and Harmony roads. Construction of a four-lane street with auxiliary turn lanes, intersection improvements, curb and gutter, sidewalks, bicycle lanes, median and storm sewer.

• Laporte corridor improvements (2024): To address bike and pedestrian gaps between Fishback Avenue and Sunset Street.

• Extending the Power Trail under Harmony Road (2025)

This article originally appeared on Fort Collins Coloradoan: Fort Collins road construction projects focus on safer streets for all