Twenty-five years ago (June 1, 1991), Governor Roy Romer and a host of other officials and VIPs cut the ribbon on the first five-mile section of the E-470 toll road, linking the I-25/C-470 interchange to Parker Road. It was the only toll road in Colorado at that time.
Speakers at the event hailed the toll road’s future and the intergovernmental cooperation that made it possible in the absence of any state or federal funding. They expressed confidence that the skeptics who derided E-470 as the “road to nowhere” would be proven wrong. And their confidence was not misplaced.
Serving about 5,000 customers per day in 1991, today E-470 is 47 miles long and has traffic volume, as measured in toll transactions, averaging more than 200,000 per day. While there will be no ceremonies this year to mark the milestone, “We’ll take note of this special date but
otherwise it will be business as usual,” said E-470 Executive Director Tim Stewart on June 1. “We’re busy making sure we’re delivering what was promised 25 years ago: safety, service, speed and stewardship.”
The toll road has been financed, constructed, operated and maintained by the E-470 Public Highway Authority and is not taxpayer funded. The authority is a political subdivision of the State of Colorado, operating as an “enterprise” under state statute and thus is self-sustaining, generating its own revenues without recourse to taxpayer funds. The authority is composed of its eight member jurisdictions, those being five municipalities (Aurora, Brighton, Commerce City, Parker, and Thornton) and three counties (Adams, Arapahoe and Douglas). Each jurisdiction has one voting member on the eight-member E-470 Board of Directors.
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NEWS MEDIA CONTACTS: Jessica Carson, E-470 Marketing and Communications Manager, 303-537-3706, [email protected]; Dan Christopherson, Christopherson & Co. Public Relations, 303-779-4920, [email protected]
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