Wye Infrastructure Plan

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Current Status

The Wye Infrastructure Plan is a guiding document that envisions how to improve roads, sewer, water, stormwater, public safety, parks, and schools to support future housing and job growth at the Wye.

A draft of the Wye Infrastructure Plan will be available on October 21, 2025, for public review and comment. A series of public meetings will be held to gather input, including public hearings with the Missoula Planning Board and County Commissioners. Please see the Key Dates section on this webpage for details on how to attend meetings or comment online.

Background

In 2019, following a robust, multi-year public engagement process, Missoula County adopted the Missoula Area Land Use Element, a vision to guide growth and development in the Missoula Valley. This document identified the Wye as an important location to meet the county’s growing housing and employment needs. However, the plan also recognized that the Wye lacks the infrastructure necessary to support this vision for growth and called for detailed infrastructure planning to determine the scope of needed improvements and potential funding options.

The Wye Infrastructure Plan is an infrastructure-focused planning document that evaluates the best options for improving roads, sewer, water, stormwater, public safety, parks, and schools to accommodate growth in the Wye over the long-term. The plan assesses infrastructure needs, provides conceptual layouts for how improvements might best serve the community, and offers a framework for potential financing strategies.

Over the next twenty years and beyond, the plan will guide infrastructure development and placement based on the community’s 2019 vision for growth. The Wye Infrastructure Plan focuses on infrastructure—it does not determine where development will occur or at what densities.

Public Comment:

Submit public comment by using the comment tool below.

Aerial map view of planning area for Wye Infrastructure Plan


Current Status

The Wye Infrastructure Plan is a guiding document that envisions how to improve roads, sewer, water, stormwater, public safety, parks, and schools to support future housing and job growth at the Wye.

A draft of the Wye Infrastructure Plan will be available on October 21, 2025, for public review and comment. A series of public meetings will be held to gather input, including public hearings with the Missoula Planning Board and County Commissioners. Please see the Key Dates section on this webpage for details on how to attend meetings or comment online.

Background

In 2019, following a robust, multi-year public engagement process, Missoula County adopted the Missoula Area Land Use Element, a vision to guide growth and development in the Missoula Valley. This document identified the Wye as an important location to meet the county’s growing housing and employment needs. However, the plan also recognized that the Wye lacks the infrastructure necessary to support this vision for growth and called for detailed infrastructure planning to determine the scope of needed improvements and potential funding options.

The Wye Infrastructure Plan is an infrastructure-focused planning document that evaluates the best options for improving roads, sewer, water, stormwater, public safety, parks, and schools to accommodate growth in the Wye over the long-term. The plan assesses infrastructure needs, provides conceptual layouts for how improvements might best serve the community, and offers a framework for potential financing strategies.

Over the next twenty years and beyond, the plan will guide infrastructure development and placement based on the community’s 2019 vision for growth. The Wye Infrastructure Plan focuses on infrastructure—it does not determine where development will occur or at what densities.

Public Comment:

Submit public comment by using the comment tool below.

Aerial map view of planning area for Wye Infrastructure Plan


  • Comment on the Draft Infrastructure Needs Assessment.

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    The County is currently asking for input on a draft needs assessment. The needs assessment identifies the infrastructure needs in the planning area, and analyzes future service requirements and deficiencies based on projected growth. It will be adopted as part of the plan, and comments will be accepted on the needs assessment all the way up to plan adoption. View the needs assessment and let us know your comments.

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  • What the Wye Infrastructure Plan Is and Is Not

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    The Wye Infrastructure Plan will:

    • Implement the recommendations of the 2019 Missoula Area Land Use Element.
    • Describe existing conditions, development constraints and opportunities.
    • Identify opportunities for expansion of water service and wastewater treatment within the planning area necessary to serve the planned population and development intensities.
    • Include a transportation element that identifies existing and potential transportation deficiencies for both motorized and non-motorized users based on current conditions and planned population and development intensities, and recommended improvements necessary to address those deficiencies including complete street principles.
    • Include an implementation strategy with estimated costs, timeframes, and prioritizations of the plan’s recommendations.

    The Wye Infrastructure is not:

    • A land use plan looking at appropriate density and use of the area
    • The Wye 2 Targeted Economic Development District process
    • Engineering-level design of systems
    • Requirements or regulations, although new regulations such as stormwater standards might be recommended in the plan
    • A proposal by the City of Missoula, although the city is an important stakeholder

  • Relationship to Wye 2 Targeted Economic Development District

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    Missoula County is also considering establishing a second Targeted Economic Development District (TEDD) at the Wye. The process to establish the Wye 2 TEDD is a separate process from the Wye Infrastructure Plan. The creation of a Wye 2 TEDD will enable Missoula County to fund infrastructure, such as sewer, water, transportation, life safety services and workforce housing, to support value-adding enterprises that will improve the economic well-being of the area. The Wye Infrastructure Plan will likely identify infrastructure projects that the Wye 2 TEDD can fund, but these two projects have different outcomes, timelines and processes for adoption under law.

    Visit the Wye 2 TEDD Missoula County Voice page to learn more about that project.

Page last updated: 17 Oct 2025, 09:18 AM