For city of Thornton residents, the signs of growth can be seen all around their Colorado community. 

"Everybody needs fresh water, and water is becoming hard to get," said Jay Miller.

It is why residents like Miller remain supportive of the city's 70-mile water project, a pipeline set to bring the growing community fresh drinking water from Larimer County land purchased by the city of Thornton in the 1980s. 

"[We've] been waiting for it to go through," said Miller. "We've been watching it go through the development and everyone paying for it, and batting court battles and everything."

This month, a district judge in Larimer County ruled in favor of the City of Thornton and the Larimer County Commissioner's court, after a lawsuit was filed by the Save the Poudre nonprofit to stop the pipeline's construction. 

The court's ruling upholds the Larimer County Commissioner court's decision to allow the city of Thornton to build the part of the pipeline that would be in the county's jurisdiction. Thornton city leaders say they've already been working on the project in other parts of the construction path throughout this ongoing litigation. 

"It was nice to see the court review all the evidence and confirm that again both Larimer County and the City of Thornton did everything correctly," said Brett Henry, Executive Director of Utilities and Infrastructure for the City of Thornton, "And really work with the community to make sure that the was a successful product in the end as well."

Gary Wockner, Save the Poudre's director, says the outcome of the lawsuit they filed is disappointing. 

"We supported Thornton getting the water. We just wanted them to get the water in a different method," said Wockner.

Members of the nonprofit have been pushing for years for Thornton city leaders to have this project's water source move through the Cache la Poudre River instead of a pipeline to increase river flow. In previous CBS Colorado coverage of this ongoing issue, Thornton city leaders said this option would cost close to a billion dollars to achieve, because it would mean the city would need to re-cleanse the water once it reached Thornton.

"It was a big opportunity for the people of Fort Collins to have water restored to their river," said Wockner. 

The court's decision says while Save the Poudre disagreed with the Larimer County board's vote to approve the project, disagreement alone does not mean the Board abused discretion:

"Aside from Plaintiff's arguments, there is nothing in the Record to support that the Board abused its discretion by not requiring Thornton to present the Poudre River Option as a reasonable alternative. Argument is not evidence."

While Wockner says Save the Poudre is still looking for ways to change the project's course, the city of Thornton says the water project will officially begin delivering water to its residents in 2028. Henry says having this date is crucial for the projects that have been put on hold amid these ongoing legal challenges. 

"We did have projects that were on hold within the city because we simply could not guarantee that there would be water available for them once the units were constructed," said Henry. "There were affordable housing projects and other projects as well that again, simply had to be put on hold."