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Works Better Corporation, a nonpartisan public benefit corporation, builds this site.

Independent public-records project, separate from the State of Colorado and from every party and campaign.

Every number carries one of four labels (FACT, CALC, SAMPLE or PENDING) and a source you can open.
CDOTCentral 70 Project
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CDOT · Transportation

Central 70 Project

I-70 reconstruction through Denver: lowered highway, 4-acre cover park, express lanes. Denver County. Timeline 2018–2022.

Money in FACT
Est. total cost
$1.2B
Result so far
Complete. What this stage means

Complete. The work on this project is complete.

The stages, in order

  1. Requested An agency asked. No money yet.
  2. Funded Money approved. Work still to start.
  3. Underway Work started. Money goes out.
  4. Complete Work complete. This project

Halted Work stopped before the end.

This stage is our reading of the sources at the foot of this page, last read 24 September 2026.

Timeline 2018–2022

Still open PENDING
Spend to date

Reported complete. Colorado does not publish what it spent. 1 of 4 contracts prints its own paid-to-date under Who is being paid.

FACT A Honesty Framework The label says how we know the figure. The grade rates the source record, not the project. The grade rates the source record, not the project.

Your take on this project

How well does this project use public money?
Your rating and comment help show which projects residents see as a good use of public money, and which as a poor one.

A rating here is not a vote, a scientific poll or a message to your representative.

Your rating is kept with no name, and it is never published on this site.

How we use this
Your rating is stored without your name, address or any identifier. We count it into a total, so the people who govern this place can see how residents read their spending. No rating and no total is published on this site. We may publish summaries of what residents tell us about a place. Those are our own writing, never your rating and never a count, average or distribution of anybody's. Ratings and comments are grouped into themes that show elected leaders how residents rate each project.

Latest public update

CDOT and state officials celebrated completion in December 2022.

Open questions for the state (1)
ANALYSIS
  • What are the measured travel-time and local air-quality outcomes since completion?

Total cost and spending
Total project cost$1.2B

Total cost & funding are drawn from the official record(s) listed below.

Delivered. Project reported complete, so final spend approximates the total cost. TOPS, the state’s spending ledger, does not carry CDOT’s construction payments. CDOT posts a payment estimate each month for every construction contract. Each one covers a single contract, not a project, and we have not matched this project’s contracts to them.

The Whole Tab CALC

Who picked up the tab?

$1,117M counted once

Every layer of money behind the project, each dollar counted once at the layer that raised it. Adding every budget the dollars appear in gives $2,131M, which counts the same money more than once.

See the Whole Tab

Milestones (3)
  • Construction began — 2018
  • Lowered highway & cover park open — 2022
  • Project completed — December 2022

Who is being paid (4)
FACT
Funding sourceDesign-build (Kiewit); tolled express lanes with federal TIFIA financing.
Political giving
Kiewit Meridiam Partners LLCP3 developer & 30-year concessionaire (Meridiam 60% / Kiewit 40%)$1.2B programACDOT selection releaseSearch TRACER
Kiewit Infrastructure Co.Design-build contractor—PENDING Not published for this contract.AFHWA project profileSearch TRACER
WSP (formerly Parsons Brinckerhoff)Lead engineer for the design-build team—PENDING Not published for this contract.AFHWA project profileSearch TRACER
Roy Jorgensen Associates, Inc.Operations & maintenance (10-yr renewable, within 30-yr concession)—PENDING Not published for this contract.AFHWA project profileSearch TRACER
Where this comes from: award announcements and project records from CDOT, FHWA, agencies and the legislature’s nonpartisan staff — each Record link opens the source. Paid-to-date shows only published figures (green = verified); everything else stays PENDING, because the state does not publish payments project by project. Political giving links open TRACER, the Secretary of State’s official campaign-finance database, where contribution records are searchable by name — contributions are legal and public, and a search link implies no wrongdoing by anyone.

Sources and receipts (1)

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Central 70 Project

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