The 50% Draft Engineering Criteria Manual and project information are available on the ECM project website:

El Paso County Engineering Criteria Manual Update - Get Involved
www.elpasocountyecm.com/participate

The project website will continue to provide information and opportunities for stakeholder participation as the ECM update progresses.

The ECM has evolved over many years, and requirements are currently located in multiple sections, appendices, reference documents, and other County materials. The update is intended to create a more current, coordinated, consistent, and user-friendly manual.

The revised ECM retains applicable existing County criteria where practical while updating outdated requirements, resolving duplication and inconsistencies, incorporating current engineering practices, and making requirements easier to locate and understand.

The revised ECM provides more complete and better-organized direction for applicants, design engineers, contractors, and County reviewers. Requirements that were previously limited, scattered throughout the ECM, or dependent on other references have been consolidated and clarified.

• Administration and Procedures: Clearer direction on submittals, responsibilities, deviations, construction documents, Record Drawings, warranties, project acceptance, and a framework for appropriate administrative updates to help keep the ECM current.

• Traffic Impact Studies: A new Traffic Impact Study (TIS) Guide provides clearer direction on when a Traffic Assessment or TIS is required, study levels, analysis horizons, methodology, documentation, and when an existing TIS must be updated.

• Pavement Design: Expanded Pavement Design Report requirements provide clearer expectations for pavement investigations, design inputs, analysis, documentation, minimum pavement sections, rehabilitation, and pavement recommendations.

• Geotechnical and Soils: More comprehensive direction for geotechnical investigations and soils, including reporting, unsuitable or expansive soils, groundwater considerations, earthwork, subgrade, and construction-related recommendations.

• Roundabouts: New Roundabout Design Guidance establishes a consistent County approach using current national guidance supplemented by County-specific criteria and applicable local practices.

• Transportation and Access: Updated roadway, geometric design, access management, multimodal, intersection, traffic operations, private-road, snow-storage, and related transportation criteria.

• Stormwater: Hydrology, hydraulics, conveyance, detention, floodplain, and major hydraulic-structure requirements have been reorganized and updated. Stormwater quality closely follows the existing Appendix I framework, with related requirements previously scattered throughout the ECM integrated where appropriate.

• Construction and Inspection: Construction, materials testing, inspection stages, nonconforming work, corrective action, warranty inspections, and acceptance requirements are more clearly defined and coordinated.

• Usability: Greater use of tables, figures, defined triggers, and cross-references, with less reliance on long narrative requirements.

A major objective of the update is to make County expectations clearer at the beginning of a project. The revised ECM more clearly identifies when specific studies, reports, analyses, permits, inspections, and supporting documentation are required and what those documents are expected to contain.

Examples include the new TIS Guide, expanded Pavement Design Report and geotechnical/soils requirements, Roundabout Design Guidance, stormwater criteria, and construction and testing requirements. Greater use of tables and defined applicability criteria is intended to help users determine requirements without piecing them together from multiple sections of the manual.

The goal is to reduce uncertainty for both applicants and reviewers and provide a more consistent basis for project design and County review.scription

No. The update is not intended to replace requirements simply for the sake of creating something new.

Existing criteria that remain appropriate are being retained where practical. In many cases, the change is primarily organization, clarification, consolidation, or presentation. Requirements that were previously scattered throughout the ECM are being brought together in the most appropriate location.

Not across the board. The objective is to establish clear, consistent, and appropriate minimum engineering criteria, not simply to make existing requirements more restrictive.

Some technical requirements are being updated where current standards or County experience support a change. In other areas, requirements are being simplified, consolidated, clarified, or replaced with references to established industry standards.

The ECM rewrite was also not undertaken for the purpose of increasing development costs. In some cases, updated criteria may provide opportunities to reduce both initial construction and long-term maintenance costs. For example, the revised roadway criteria allow reduced lane widths in appropriate applications, which can reduce pavement quantities, right-of-way impacts, stormwater runoff, and future County maintenance obligations. The ECM update does not include an increase in County Public Works development fees. As part of the update, the County reviewed its fee structure and elected not to increase those fees.

The revised ECM also provides clearer direction earlier in the development process. Better-defined submittal requirements, applicability criteria, design standards, and review expectations can reduce uncertainty, incomplete submittals, redesign, and repeated review cycles and may help expedite the entitlement and engineering review process.

Individual projects will be affected differently depending on their characteristics and the criteria that apply. The objective is not simply to add requirements, but to establish clear, predictable, and appropriate standards that support efficient development while protecting the County's infrastructure investment.

The revised stormwater quality criteria are being developed to closely follow the County's existing Appendix I framework rather than creating an entirely new stormwater quality program.

Applicable stormwater quality requirements that were previously scattered elsewhere in the ECM are being integrated into the stormwater quality volume where appropriate. The intent is to provide users with a more coordinated location for these requirements while retaining the established Appendix I approach.

Required forms, checklists, and similar administrative documents will be maintained on the El Paso County website, rather than embedding every form within the ECM.

This will make the forms easier to locate and allow administrative forms to be updated when necessary without revising the technical manual itself.

One of the goals of the rewrite is to make the ECM easier to use in day-to-day practice.

Where practical, lengthy narrative requirements and lists have been converted to tables that allow users to more quickly identify applicable criteria, triggers, submittal requirements, testing frequencies, design values, and responsibilities. Narrative is retained where explanation or engineering context is necessary.

Yes. The ECM establishes minimum County criteria, but it cannot anticipate every site condition or engineering circumstance.

The revised ECM more clearly identifies where engineering judgment, alternative approaches, or deviations may be appropriate and establishes the applicable County review and approval process. The Engineer-of-Record remains responsible for the engineering design and for addressing project-specific conditions.

National, State, and regional technical standards are updated more frequently than the ECM. Where an established standard adequately addresses a subject, the revised ECM generally references that standard and provides County-specific supplemental criteria only where needed.

This reduces unnecessary duplication and helps prevent County criteria from becoming outdated when the underlying technical standard changes.

That is one of the primary objectives of the update.

The revised administrative framework is intended to allow appropriate technical, reference, procedural, and similar updates to be addressed administratively, rather than requiring every routine modification to return to the Board of County Commissioners. Changes requiring formal Board action would continue to follow the applicable County approval process.

No. The 50% Draft is a working draft being distributed specifically for stakeholder review and input.

Comments received during the stakeholder review will be evaluated as the ECM progresses toward subsequent drafts and eventual adoption. Additional revisions should therefore be expected.

The County is currently targeting July 2027 for adoption of the updated Engineering Criteria Manual. The 50% stakeholder review is an important step in that process, and the draft will continue to be refined based on stakeholder, County staff, and Steering Committee input prior to adoption.

The schedule is a target and may be adjusted as the review and adoption process progresses.

The County is evaluating how the updated ECM will apply to projects that are already in the review or construction process at the time of adoption. Transition and applicability provisions will be established prior to adoption so applicants understand which criteria apply to projects already underway.

Stakeholders are encouraged to review the 50% Draft and provide comments through the participation opportunities identified on the project website:

www.elpasocountyecm.com/participate