ACHD proposes two‑service‑area impact‑fee plan; Garden City council presses for local benefit

On Sept. 22, Garden City councilors heard a presentation from the Ada County Highway District (ACHD) on a draft update to the capital improvements plan (CIP) and a proposed change from a single countywide impact‑fee service area to a two‑service‑area model.

Justin Lucas, an ACHD representative, told the council the commission directed staff to advance a two‑service‑area scenario after data analysis showed distinct travel and project patterns across the county. Using Compass regional travel surveys and aggregated cell‑data from a vendor called Replica, ACHD projects average trip lengths in Ada County of about 7.4 to 8 miles and models 20 years of growth when calculating capacity needs.

"We project forward 20 years, and we say, here's what the road is today. We add 20 years of growth, people, jobs, and the traffic generated by those people and jobs," Lucas said, describing the method ACHD uses to identify capacity‑expansion projects that are eligible for impact‑fee funding.

Lucas said staff isolates the impact‑fee‑eligible portion of future project costs and allocates fees by land use and trip generation. He provided sample fees from the draft schedule: a single‑family home in the West Service Area would face an impact fee of roughly $8,900, while the same home in the East Service Area would be charged about $5,300. The variation reflects differences in the number and type of identified eligible projects in each service area — the West shows a denser set of lane‑expansion and intersection projects, while some East projects (for example, the Lake Hazel extension) are high‑cost but fewer in number.

Council members repeatedly pressed ACHD staff on how much of the fee revenue collected from developments inside Garden City would be spent inside Garden City. Several councilors emphasized the city is dense and landlocked, with limited greenfield development, and argued the city therefore risks paying fees that primarily support projects in surrounding jurisdictions.

Lucas said impact fees are charged to development and tied mathematically to identified countywide capacity projects; they are not assessed directly to the city. He also noted ACHD has other funding programs — including pursuit of federal dollars and locally allocated commission dollars — that can and have funded projects within Garden City even when the impact‑fee plan lists no city‑specific eligible CIP projects.

On bicycle and pedestrian funding, Lucas said state law limits impact‑fee use to future capacity needs generated by new development and generally excludes funding stand‑alone bicycle projects or remedies for existing deficiencies. "ACHD's impact fee program does not include in any scenario bicycle and pedestrian facilities," he said, adding that some pedestrian and bicycle elements are typically required of developers when they build frontage improvements.

Lucas also described the agency's approach to intersection design, saying ACHD prefers roundabouts when traffic analyses support them because roundabouts tend to reduce the severity of collisions compared with signals.

The ACHD staff said the draft impact‑fee plan will be formally released to the public on the 25th, with presentations and a public outreach period through September and October; the ACHD commission will consider public input when making a final decision on the CIP and fee schedule.

Why it matters: Impact fees shift the near‑term cost of long‑range transportation capacity improvements onto new development rather than existing property taxpayers. For a landlocked city like Garden City, differences in how service areas are drawn and which projects are designated as fee‑eligible can determine whether developers inside the city pay higher or lower per‑unit fees and whether fee revenue supports improvements that city residents experience directly.

Next steps: ACHD will publicly release the draft plan on Sept. 25 and accept input through October. The commission will review outreach findings before deciding the final CIP and impact‑fee schedule. Council members said they will consider whether to submit a formal letter or request a joint meeting with ACHD commissioners.

Quotes used in this article are taken directly from the meeting transcript and attributed to speakers who spoke on the record during the Garden City City Council meeting on Sept. 22, 2025.