Christensen Lane, a one-lane concrete street, sits quietly among tall trees in Columbine, offering a peaceful place for cyclists and pedestrians to recreate and the occasional car to pass by.

Under the surface, tensions simmer between a developer — with plans to improve the road and connect it to his new planned community— and residents, who are worried about safety with the additional traffic the improved street would bring and who want to keep the lane as-is. 

As it stands, the lane is open to cars. But it sees far more bicycles and foot traffic than car tires. It connects several greenways and neighborhoods and acts as a recreational path and a commuter route for many in the surrounding neighborhoods.

On one end of the lane, resident Dave Tabor hangs a sign from his fence, begging passersby to pay attention to its future.

“Stop! Look at the Lane! Developer is trying to make Christensen Lane a two-lane street,” the sign reads.

On the other end of the lane, developer David Tschetter walks the shaded lane envisioning his plans for a retirement community in the quiet, peaceful neighborhood, complete with a gathering area at a barn that has stood on the property for decades.

Tschetter hopes to use the lane for ingress and egress to his planned 55-plus community, saying in his development plans that he will improve the quality of the lane and maintain it, as long as he is able to use it. 

While it will see more traffic, Tschetter said, the fact that the development is for 55-plus statistically reduces the amount of traffic it will bring to the lane in comparison to a regular community.

In order to access the lane, Tschetter needs final permission from Arapahoe County’s Board of Commissioners. It was originally scheduled to cast that final vote on the lane’s future on Tuesday, but on Monday the meeting was tentatively moved to Aug. 12.

An Arapahoe County spokesperson said the vote was postponed due to “insufficient public notification time as required by our established meeting procedures and notification requirements.”

“The County is committed to ensuring full transparency and meaningful public participation in all development review processes,” the spokesperson told The Denver Gazette Monday. “The County is working to properly notify all affected parties and interested stakeholders about the rescheduled meeting date and details.”

A lane with history

Where now stands dense development — with several communities of houses and a country club right down the street — there was once acres of empty land surrounding Christensen Farm.

Aerial photos from 1937 show the lone farm, which is now the site of Tschetter’s property, where he plans to develop.

Long before Tschetter, original homesteader Ed Bowles purchased the parcel of land in 1868 in what is now Littleton and Columbine, Tschetter’s historical research of the property shows. 

Homes didn’t go up in the area surrounding the farm until the late 1950s and the two predominant neighborhoods sandwiching the lane now, Christensen Lane Estates and Fox Hollow, both went up in the 1990s, Tschetter said.

The patch of land at the end of the lane has changed hands several times since Bowles owned it, going to the Christensen family then to a family-owned landscaping company, and, eventually, to Tschetter in 2022.

Tschetter hopes to use it to connect his development to main roads. But in order for him to expand the lane into a two-lane street, Arapahoe County Commissioners need to approve an exemption to county safety standards.

The lane’s ownership is unclear. County officials, residents and Tschetter have looked into who owns the lane, but that remains a mystery.

In 2020, a court ruling decided Tschetter has ingress and egress rights to the lane, which is about 3,400 feet long and runs from South Platte Canyon Road and extends to the Arapahoe and Jefferson County line. 

Tschetter has also agreed to improve the drive and install a new culvert to accommodate the flows of Coon Creek, which runs past the property. Currently, the flood mitigation along the lane is outdated. 

A developer’s vision

Tschetter walks past the barn that remains on what used to be Christensen Farm with a vision of a peaceful community for people 55 and older to retire. In the barn, he said, he envisions a community gathering space, where community members can host events and socialize. 

Tschetter’s vision began with his mother’s passing, he said. As she aged, she needed a community like the one in his plans. 

“I didn’t have a home facility for her to be cared for effectively,” he said. “She would still be here if she lived in a home like this.”

His development plans include a gated community, where people “can age gracefully in place,” he said. He’s been working on the plan since about 2015, he added. 

“If you look at demographics for Arapahoe County, there’s a huge need for those communities,” Tschetter said.

The community, Arcadia Creek, is designed for safety — with curb-less house entries and showers, ice melting features on sidewalks and driveways and an association that maintains the houses and the neighborhood, Tschetter said.

Included in the community plan are 25 homes and the barn that is to be renovated. 

The development is split between Arapahoe and Jefferson counties, bounded by West Christensen Lane to the north, West Leawood Drive to the west and Dutch Creek to the south.

Arcadia Creek has two points of entry: West Leawood Drive in Jefferson County and West Christensen Lane in Arapahoe County.

Community concerns

Tracy Murphy lives with her husband and three young children in a house that borders the lane.

Every day, Murphy’s children play in the lane, which rarely sees car traffic, and she waves to the many cyclists, dog walkers and other pedestrians passing by. 

Murphy’s main concern, she said while she watched her youngest child run through the yard and onto the lane, is safety. Secondary to that, however, is lost recreational value.

“People are always walking, riding their bikes, kids are coming to and from school,” Murphy said. “It’s really just a treasure. You just don’t see this hardly ever, especially in the middle of an urban area like this.”

Dave Tabor lives across from Murphy in the Fox Hollow neighborhood. He, too, worries about safety.

Tabor supports development, he said, but the lane expansion proposed in the development plan would make it unsafe.

“Build your neighborhood — that’s fine. Just do it without creating an unsafe scenario that robs the community of this thoroughfare,” Tabor said.

In a mid-March Arapahoe County Planning Commission meeting, members of the public filled the commission chambers to plead their case for leaving the lane as-is.

More than 280 people signed a petition against the lane proposal, which was presented in the March planning meeting. 

To turn the lane into a two-lane street, Tschetter has to get an exemption from Arapahoe County’s safety standards, which require 40-foot wide roadways for multifamily residential neighborhoods. This accounts for two 10-foot driving lanes, one eight-foot parking lane and gutters on the side.

Tschetter’s plan would reduce the lane width for each of the lanes to 8 feet and have a four-foot pedestrian walkway on the side, separated by vertical barriers from the driving lanes. It also includes two, 2-foot asphalt shoulders on each side.

He argues that his improvements to the lane — which include the vertical barrier between cars and people — would make the lane safer for pedestrians than it currently is. 

A traffic study in July through September of last year showed that an average almost 98 bikers and pedestrians use the lane daily. Annually, the lane sees more than 23,000 recreational uses, according to the study Tabor presented to the commissioners.

Tschetter argues, however, that due to the nature of his proposed community, the traffic would be far less than from a regular neighborhood. 

A traffic study included in his plans estimates 108 traffic trips daily, with about 76 of those going to Christensen Lane. In a normal single family community, the average traffic count is 10 vehicle trips per day per household. 

In 55-plus communities, that number drops to a little more than four vehicle trips per day per household, Tschetter’s research shows. 

Arapahoe County’s Engineering Program Manager Ceila Rethamel said the community will have “minimal impact on traffic” and the engineering department approved the project.

South Metro Fire District and police districts that the lane is in have also approved Tschetter’s proposal, planner Molly Orkild-Larson said in a planning commission meeting in March.

The final decision

Whether or not Tschetter can turn Christensen Lane into a two-lane street with access to Arcadia Creek goes to the Arapahoe County Board of Commissioners in August. 

The meeting was originally planned for July 8 but was rescheduled, county officials announced on Monday on social media. 

Jefferson County has already approved the project.

Tschetter is not worried about the decision, he said. He is confident that his plans are up to standards and that the variance he is requesting is reasonable. 

Tabor and Murphy plan to attend the commissioner’s meeting Aug. 12 to fight back, they said.