A long-awaited hiking and biking trail to be built through Cortez and Mancos leading into Mesa Verde National Park has some new progress, but a longer road is further ahead, pending financial support.
Natural Resources Planning and Public Lands Coordinator James Dietrich presented updates on the trail’s development to the Montezuma County Board of County Commissioners during Monday’s regular meeting, outlining more funds needed to bring the costly trail to its completion. In an answer to questions from The Journal, Dietrich said that projected costs have increased because of unexpected economic factors.
Dietrich’s main focus on Monday was to ask commissioners for their approval of a grant proposal numbered at about $1.7 million submitted to Great Outdoors Colorado, a funding source for recreation and wilderness projects.
“In a nutshell, what this will do is back fill the funding gap that we have now for the Paths to Mesa Verde on the Mancos side,” Dietrich told the commissioners.
But some adjustments to the grant might dial the request back by about $80,000, Dietrich said. Even so, the application is not due until September, he said.
That money is still just a small fragment of the funds needed to complete the trail, with estimates for the trail’s cost multiplied by nearly 2½ since initial numbers were proposed in 2019, according to Dietrich.
Specifically, $5.7 million was the first estimate made, Dietrich told The Journal. The new estimate puts the trail’s cost at $14.2 million post-COVID-19 inflation, he said.
“Impacts from inflation and tariffs are unknown and could drastically change any funding projections like it did the last time,” Dietrich wrote in an email to The Journal.
The ambitious trail is a long time coming.
The concept for the trail is about 20 years old, Dietrich told the board during a January 2024 meeting. Initial plans for the trail were developed almost a decade ago in September 2016, even reaching a priority list set by then-Gov. John Hickenlooper later that year.
Plans reached a more mature stage by 2020. As the years have gone on, grants have been gradually awarded.
So far, approximately $2 million has been spent on the trail’s design and planning, minus staffing costs, Dietrich said.
That money spent has come from federal, state and local funding streams, he said, with over $180,000 consisting of local matching contributions.
A larger pool of money is still being sought after to actually build the trail, which has a completion date of 2028, according to the grant application presented to the board on Monday.
“We’re trying to leverage $10.8 million from central federal lands on this,” he said, referring to a Colorado division of the Federal Highway Administration.
“So this takes us all the way to Mesa Verde, then?” Commissioner Jim Candelaria asked.
“Yes, that’s correct,” Dietrich responded. “It would go Mancos to Mesa Verde. It would represent 50% of this whole project.”
Other segments are at different stages, Dietrich said.
The design of Segment B of the trail on the Cortez side has reached 95% completion, with the remaining 5% left open for environmental clearances, he said.
But that project will be put on hold until further funding becomes available, said Dietrich.
The design of Segment A on the Cortez side is about 30% finished, but has hit some delays because of the need to address stream crossings, he said.
“There’s a fair amount of hydrology we’ve got to work through on that.”
In addition, there’s also more to address in the plans with regards to right-of-way road matters, he said. Some tracts of the segment cross through private land and the city of Cortez.
Dietrich estimates that all planning on that last segment should be done by June 2026.
The length of the trail too – 17 miles – may change depending on the finalized plans, he said.
On Tuesday morning, the commissioners voted unanimously to approve the grant application for the ongoing trail project.
