DenverInfill Blog

Here is the most recent Union Station urban design submission to the planning board.  Anne Hayes, who is Chairperson of Union Station Advocates and Vice President and Project Manager for Westfield Development Company, was kind enough to send it to me.  It focuses on three elements of the redevelopment plan:

1. The canopy connector between the train hall and Union Station.
2. The pedestrian bridge that connects Lodo with Central Platte Valley over the Amtrak and commuter rail tracks (formerly known as Kinetic Plaza).
3. The grand staircase at Wynkoop Plaza.

While the design of the canopy connector seems to be acceptable to all or most parties, the updated design of the pedestrian bridge appears to be causing some heartburn. In fact, at its April 28 meeting, the planning board sent the design team back to the drawing board.  The original design called for a grand public space with public art and plenty of room for tables where it connected to a proposed adjacent building on the Central Platte Valley side on the tracks.  With that building now in question, the new bridge design is far more utilitarian and has lost all of its public space features.   See pages 8 and 9 in the link above for renderings of the current bridge design.  The August 4 planning board meeting should bring the bridge issue to an interesting conclusion.

(See July 22 update below)

Cheyenne Frontier Days must be upon us. Steam engine 844 and the rest of Union Pacific’s historic train is pulling into Union Station as I write this.

In past years, the train has backed into the tracks behind the station and broken itself into two pieces such that the front half parks on one set of tracks and the back half on another set.  This year, there is only one set of tracks.  As you know from previous DenverInfill blogs, the other tracks have been removed as part of the Union Station redevelopment project.

Amtrak’s California Zephyr is due to arrive in a few hours from Chicago.  Hmmm.  Where it will park?

Next year, it will be even more challenging.  All the tracks behind the station will be gone and Amtrak will be using its temporary terminal on the other side of 20th Street.  Hmmm.  Where will 844 park?

I am dashing off on my bike to take a few photos.  I will add them to this post when I return.

July 22, 1:55pm update:

Finally, here is a photo (another appears on Jobsite Visitor and more will follow).  A technical glitch prevented me from posting it earlier.

Shortly after taking that photo yesterday afternoon, the train pulled away and parked about a half mile to the northeast, out of sight of Union Station.  It returns to Union Station on Friday (today) and Sunday for public display from 10am to 8pm each day.  Union Pacific and Amtrak appear to be well coordinated on the use of the limited track space behind the station.

Current activity is all about building foundations for the bus terminal and the light rail station.

First, let’s look at the bus terminal.  The six-inch-thick concrete mud slab is expanding through the area occupied by the foundations for the two escalators and the elevator.  The water-proof membrane is being installed over the portion of the mud slab that was poured last week.  Likewise, rebar is being installed over the membrane.

I’ll try to decipher the photo below that I took from the eighth floor of Glass House.  To the right is the bare concrete mud slab.  The dark area against the shoring wall is concrete covered by the membrane, which is covered by a very dense amount of rebar.  Between the rebar area and the bare concrete is the area covered only with the membrane.  It’s identifiable by the light-colored grid.  Work on the concrete, membrane, and rebar is continuing.

Considering the size of the rebar (it takes three men to carry one piece of it) and the fact that the floor will be four feet thick, it appears that the foundation will be a pretty solid.

Now for the light rail station.  This part of the project is far less dramatic in scope than the bus terminal, but vital nonetheless.  The following photo is from the Millennium Bridge and shows that the station  foundations are now approaching the Union Gateway Bridge (in the background).  The ground surface will be raised to the tops of the concrete foundations/walls.  Then the tracks can be laid, and the passenger platform can be built.

I’ve uploaded 13 new photos to our Denver Union Station page at JobSiteVistor.com so far this week.  I expect more will follow as progress becomes visible.

While there is no big Union Station construction news this week, there are a few noteworthy items that you might finding interesting.

The crane came to life, lowering a rebar “basket” into one of the utility holes (see the photo below).  It was interesting to watch how nicely it fit into the concrete box.  Since I took the photo, similar baskets have been placed into the other two utility boxes in the foreground.

In Update #20, I mentioned that an insulated pipe would be installed over 20th Street to supply water to the temporary Amtrak passenger platform at 21st and Wewatta streets.  Here’s a shot of that pipe (it is parallel to the top of the fence).  In the background, the westbound California Zephyr takes on fuel and passengers as it sits behind Union Station at about 9:00 this morning.

On Tuesday night, 9News reported on some unique flowers that are now decorating the project fence along 16th Street.  Here is the 9News report.  Below is my photo. Thank you to the Ladies Fancywork Society for adding some original artwork to the neighborhood.

Throughout the day, everyday, I admire the hard work by the Kiewit construction crew, especially on hot days like we have had this week. Here is a worker getting some morning refreshment at an oasis in the middle of the project.  I doubt it is hot coffee, and given on-the-job-risks, it’s probably not a cold beer either.

I’ve posted another 14 photos this week to our Denver Union Station page at JobSiteVistor.com .