{"id":92670,"date":"2019-08-05T19:24:57","date_gmt":"2019-08-05T19:24:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/durangos-population-ebbs-and-flows-putting-strain-on-resources\/"},"modified":"2019-08-05T19:24:57","modified_gmt":"2019-08-05T19:24:57","slug":"durangos-population-ebbs-and-flows-putting-strain-on-resources","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/durangos-population-ebbs-and-flows-putting-strain-on-resources\/","title":{"rendered":"Durango\u2019s population ebbs and flows, putting strain on resources"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Traffic
Traffic congestion Friday afternoon on north Main Avenue. As a regional hub, Durango\u2019s population nearly doubles during the day compared with its nighttime population. The fluctuation can put strains on city staff, services and infrastructure.<\/span>Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Durango has a pulse.<\/p>\n

Much like a heart, the city acts as a hub for people all over La Plata, Montezuma, Archuleta and San Juan (Colorado and New Mexico) counties. People flood the city by day and exit by night. Tourists visit in throngs during the summer and winter, and stay away during the shoulder seasons. Students attend Fort Lewis College from late August to mid-May and return home for the summer.<\/p>\n

The daily and seasonal pulse is a measured rhythm familiar and intuitive to businesses, longtime residents and city staff. People living in Durango have an intimate, albeit veiled, relationship with the commuters, students and tourists who invest their time and resources into making the city what it is economically and socially.<\/p>\n

The 2010 U.S. Census reported 16,887 people living in Durango, a number that grew to an estimated 18,985 by July 1, 2018, according to the Census Bureau\u2019s Population Estimates Program. But the Census Bureau does not account for people coming to Durango or leaving it every day for work. It doesn\u2019t show the influx of Fort Lewis College students each fall or the second homeowners who leave when the cold arrives.<\/p>\n

And who could forget the tourists?<\/p>\n

Take all those people into account, and the daily average population looks a little more like 30,000, according to the Durango Police Department. The math looks like this: 19,000 permanent residents; minus 3,000 residents who commute to jobs outside the city; plus 11,000 people who commute from outside city limits into the city for work; plus 3,000 tourists \u2013 a total of 30,000 people by day.<\/p>\n

The fluctuations have a unique impact on city services, businesses and infrastructure.<\/p>\n

Monday nights are slow for the Durango Police Department, but calls and activity tend to pick up around 10 a.m. weekdays before subsiding around 8 or 9 p.m., said Chief Bob Brammer. Officers can count on spikes each morning during the rush hour and a constant buzz of activity throughout the day. Fridays and Saturdays are busy from 8 a.m. to 2 a.m. of the next day. Sunday\u2019s are quiet, then the cycle starts again.<\/p>\n

The disparity between Census counts and police department staffing numbers makes it seem, on paper, like there\u2019s plenty of law enforcement in Durango \u2013 but in reality, Brammer said the department has fewer patrol officers than it needs to keep the community safe.<\/p>\n

\u201cStaffing continues to be an issue; we\u2019re competing against organizations that have less service demands and they pay much more money,\u201d Brammer said.<\/p>\n

\u2018You may want to avoid this time\u2019<\/div>\n

The same, in effect, can be said for the Parks and Recreation Department, which on paper, has more than enough indoor recreation space \u2013 128,284 square feet, to be exact. But Durango Community Recreation Center saw more than 400,000 users last year \u2013 many who waited for an open basketball court or swimming lane, department director Cathy Metz said.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople will self-regulate and go at a different time of day that\u2019s less likely to be impacted,\u201d she said. \u201cWhen things are popular \u2013 when we have classes and they\u2019re drop-in \u2013 sometimes people will come super early to reserve a space, and then what happens is we hit a capacity and we can\u2019t let people in.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Shannon
Shannon Ruetschle, left, and Linda Bayer, center, work the busy front desk Thursday at the Durango Community Recreation Center.<\/span>Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

The recreation center is also a popular summer field-trip destination for schools outside Durango, Metz said. It\u2019s great to see dozens of children alighting buses eager to exercise, she said, \u201cand that\u2019s impactful.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ll talk to regular users. We say, \u2018You may want to avoid this time or give us a shout and we can let you know if a group is scheduled,\u2019\u201d Metz said.<\/p>\n

Then there\u2019s the parks, specifically the four athletic fields at Smith Sports Complex on Fort Lewis\u2019 campus. People come from far away to play or practice soccer, lacrosse, football or rugby. But cleats rip holes in turf.<\/p>\n

\"The
The courts in the Durango Community Recreation Center were full Thursday and can be difficult to access during summer months.<\/span>Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Parks and Recreation plans months in advance with athletic organizers to manage the damage to Durango\u2019s premiere grass fields, Metz said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe track user numbers of all rec facilities and hours of use \u2013 what we\u2019ve seen is numbers continue to grow,\u201d she said. \u201cWe see a steady growth rate. We\u2019ll see surges when a new amenity comes online. We had Lake Nighthorse open in 2018. If you look at numbers, we\u2019ll see a big bump because of that.\u201d<\/p>\n

A night on the town<\/div>\n

The scene downtown is inverse of Durango\u2019s regular rhythm, drawing more people on nights and weekends. Residents of Durango and nearby communities flock to Main Avenue for dinner, drinking and dancing, said Tim Walsworth, executive director of Durango\u2019s Business Improvement District.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn summer, the disparity between day and night will be less, but in winter it\u2019ll be more pronounced,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The seasonal cycle can be quantified using Central Business District sales tax collections for each month, but it\u2019s not perfect. There are more purchases, and by extension, more people shopping in June, July and August, according to sales tax data. In 2017 and 2018, the city collected more sales tax from the Central Business District in December than any other month.<\/p>\n

But each downtown business is different. A large restaurant, for example, may have to employ more seasonal workers than a boutique shop, Walsworth said. And different crowds patronize different businesses at different times. The Durango Police Department bases its shift changes, in part, on the 2 a.m. last call, Chief Brammer said.<\/p>\n

Businesses predict patronage based on time of day and time of year, Walsworth said.<\/p>\n

\u201cEvery retail or restaurant or entertainment business downtown is going to staff up in the summer,\u201d he said. \u201cWhen I talk to businesses, most are pretty savvy about how to have an appropriate level of staffing to maintain profit margins and a good level of service.\u201d<\/p>\n

Faucets and drains<\/div>\n

There are about 7,200 homes, businesses and buildings that need fresh water or a place to put liquid waste, said Jarrod Biggs, assistant utilities director. The capacity of the system handles the fluctuation of usage, he said, but there are distinctive peaks city staff have to plan and prepare for.<\/p>\n

City water usage averages around 7 million gallons a day in the summer, but \u201cwe do see fluctuations on a daily basis. When people are showering in the morning, that\u2019s when a lot of drains are in use \u2013 so we\u2019ll have a peak,\u201d Biggs said.<\/p>\n

Wastewater flow increases in the morning, too \u2013 but the treatment plant at Santa Rita treats just 2 million to 3 million gallons a day, Biggs said. He attributes the disparity between fresh and wastewater to irrigation or the water people consume and deposit outside city limits.<\/p>\n

City staff may see more water and sewer use on big weekends or holidays, Biggs said. The influx of people into Silverton for Independence Day taxed the town\u2019s wastewater treatment plant and left parts of town smelling like feces.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re a popular destination, we\u2019re a regional job center, a good economic base,\u201d Biggs said. \u201cOne of the big questions I have is, how do we accurately or in any meaningful way measure tourism population?\u201d<\/p>\n

bhauff@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Durango has 19,000 residents by night, 30,000 people by day<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":92671,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5740,5736,5735,5808,6129],"tags":[13,445,1982],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-92670","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-frontpage-lead","category-local-news","category-news","category-newsletter-lead","category-parks","tag-frontpage-lead","tag-newsletter-lead","tag-parks"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92670","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=92670"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92670\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/92671"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=92670"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=92670"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=92670"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=92670"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}