Water Is the Limiting Factor — and Colorado Is Running Out of Time

Colorado’s growth story has always depended on one fragile assumption: that water will somehow keep up. That assumption is now breaking down.

As the City of Lone Tree considers approval of the proposed Hillcamp development, it must confront a simple but uncomfortable truth: water is no longer an abstract planning issue — it is a binding constraint, a public-safety concern, and a generational risk.

A Will-Serve Letter Is Not a Guarantee

Hillcamp’s proponents point to a will-serve letter from Parker Water & Sanitation District (PWSD) as proof that water is “handled.” It is not.

A will-serve letter satisfies a procedural requirement, not a prudence standard. It does not dedicate project-specific water supplies, does not guarantee long-term availability, and explicitly conditions service on future system capacity, drought restrictions, and regulatory compliance.

Once homes are built, they cannot be “unserved.”

Any shortfall in supply, pressure, or reliability becomes a public burden — borne by existing residents, future ratepayers, and first responders.

PWSD’s Own Plans Reveal Structural Risk

PWSD’s 2024 Master Plan shows that a significant portion of its water portfolio still relies on non-renewable Denver Basin groundwater, supplemented by conditional surface water, reuse flows, and anticipated future acquisitions.

While the plan repeatedly describes the system as “diversified” and “reliable,” that reliability is largely accounting-based, not grounded in physically renewable, fully owned water supplies.

Critically:

• Groundwater is being consumed now

• Replacement supplies are projected, not secured

• There is no binding timeline for transitioning away from groundwater

• There are no enforceable caps tying new development to depletion limits

  
  

This is not resilience. It is deferral.

Douglas County Warns Demand Is Outpacing Supply

The 2050 Douglas County Water Plan draft does not just raise abstract concerns — it quantifies the problem.

According to the County’s own analysis, water demand is projected to increase by approximately 30 percent by 2050, while total water supplies are projected to increase by only about 12 percent over the same period. In practical terms, demand is growing more than twice as fast as supply.

Demand increases outpace supply by more than 2:1

The Plan explicitly warns that:

• the margin between available supply and peak demand will continue to tighten,

• future growth will place increasing stress on already constrained systems, and

• land-use decisions made today will directly determine whether water supplies remain viable over the next 25 years and beyond.

  
  

The County emphasizes that this growing imbalance requires caution, conservation, and deliberate alignment between development approvals and physically sustainable water resources — not acceleration of large subdivisions based on future, unsecured water assumptions.

Hillcamp moves in the opposite direction.

Building First, Solving Water Later

Hillcamp relies on continued groundwater extraction today while deferring replacement through speculative future projects. PWSD’s planning documents do not require:

• replacement water to be secured before development,

• new growth to fund future supply acquisition in advance, or

• development approvals to pause if depletion accelerates.

This creates a classic intergenerational cost shift: today’s growth consumes finite resources while tomorrow’s residents absorb the financial and operational consequences.

Wildfire Turns Water Into a Life-Safety Issue

Water planning is not just about taps and lawns.

In wildfire conditions, water demand spikes precisely when system vulnerability increases. Fire flow, pressure reliability, and storage capacity become matters of life and death, not convenience.

Yet the water demand studies prepared for Hillcamp components assume uninterrupted service and full system performance under peak conditions — assumptions that fail to meaningfully address drought, wildfire response, or emergency evacuation scenarios.

Climate Reality Is Already Here

Colorado is experiencing:

• warmer winters,

• reduced snowpack,

• earlier runoff,

• and increasing variability in water availability.

  
  

These are not future projections — they are present conditions. Planning approvals based on historical assumptions or optimistic projections ignore the climate reality Colorado is already living with.

The Colorado River Clock Is Ticking

Compounding local risk is a looming regional one. Critical operating rules governing the Colorado River — which indirectly supports Front Range water systems through interstate compacts, reuse, and substitution effects — expire in 2026. Negotiations over what replaces them are ongoing, contentious, and unresolved.

Every credible analysis agrees on one point: there will be less water to go around Approving major new development now — without physically secured, renewable supplies — assumes that future agreements, infrastructure, and hydrology will all break in our favor.

That is not planning. That is gambling.

Water Risk Does Not Stay Contained

Water scarcity does not respect jurisdictional boundaries or subdivision lines. A failure in planning for Hillcamp would ripple outward:

• downstream neighborhoods,

• emergency response capacity,

• wildfire protection,

• and long-term ratepayer stability across the region.

  
  

Once built, these impacts are irreversible.

A Responsible Path Forward

At a minimum, the City of Lone Tree should require:

• a rigorous demonstration of physically renewable, dedicated water supplies,

• enforceable timelines for groundwater replacement,

• development caps tied to depletion metrics,

• and alignment with Douglas County’s water planning framework.

Approving Hillcamp based on current documentation shifts unacceptable water risk onto the community and undermines long-term resilience.

Water is the limiting factor. Ignoring that reality today guarantees consequences tomorrow.