Reminder: Union Station Movie This Thursday

Archive of posts filed under the History category.

Reminder: Union Station Movie This Thursday

Posted by Ken Schroeppel on March 16, 2010

This is just a friendly reminder to stop by the Oxford Hotel this Thursday, March 18, at 5:30 PM for the LoDo premiere of the movie Denver Union Station: Portal to Progress

I’m a big fan of both historical documentaries and Denver’s Union Station, but even I wasn’t prepared for how good this movie by Havey Productions was when I saw it the first time. You really must see this video, and Thursday night is your chance. Here are the details:

Denver Union Station: Portal to Progress
Thursday, March 18, 2010
5:30 – 7:30 PM
Oxford Hotel Ballroom – 1637 Wazee

The program begins with a reception and cash bar, followed by the film (35 minutes long) and comments by Dana Crawford and Jim Havey. General admission is $15, or for $30 you can see the film and get the DVD, or for $60 you can see the film, get the DVD, and get a discounted membership to Union Station Advocates. Click here to download a PDF flyer about the event or for your convenience, you can pay online here. I hope to see you Thursday night!

Filed under Events & Meetings, History, Union Station.

3 Comments

Commemorating “Justice Through the Ages”

Posted by Ken Schroeppel on March 14, 2010

On May 3, demolition will begin on the Colorado Judicial Building at 14th and Broadway in Denver’s Civic Center district to make way for the new Ralph L. Carr Colorado Judicial Complex. Perhaps the most prominent feature of the existing judicial building is the mural entitled Justice Through the Ages by notable Colorado artist Angelo di Benedetto (1913-1992) that graces the underside of the building as it spans over the plaza and the skylights that look down into the building’s law library.

Since I posted my blog about the Judicial Building and the mural in February, people have asked me what is going to happen to the mural when the building is demolished. I didn’t know the answer to that question until now, thanks to an excellent article by Matt Masich posted on March 10th in Law Week Colorado. The answer (and the good news): the mural will be saved and put in storage for the time being. The problem is no one quite knows what to do with it. Some people are advocating for it to be installed somewhere in the new Judicial Complex, but the challenge is the mural’s size. If laid out in one long row, the mural’s 74 panels would stretch 100 yards, and there’s no place in the new Judicial Complex that long to accommodate the mural, and no one seems to like the idea of breaking the mural up and installing the panels in different locations. Anyway, please read Matt’s article as it contains a lot of interesting information about the artist, the mural, and its future. Use the link above or click here for a PDF of the article.

Since the mural will be removed soon from public view and put in storage for who knows how long, I feel it is my civic duty to provide an online commemoration of the mural for people to enjoy after its removal. Also, there’s no plaque in the plaza that tells you who the 60 individuals are on the mural but, thanks to a state law librarian who dug around and found for me a document with that information, I’m happy to provide the names of those honored on the mural as part of this effort.

All of the names, dates, and biographical information presented below is quoted from a publication called Colorado Courts, a monthly newsletter issued by the Colorado Judicial Department back in the 1970s. The feature about the people in the mural followed the mural’s October 1978 dedication, and was spread across several issues of Colorado Courts, starting in December 1978 and concluding in April 1979 (catalog reference “The Mural” – KFC2308.A16 C66 – “Colorado Courts” - Dec. 1978, Jan.-Feb. 1979, March 1979, and April 1979). According to the article’s final installment, the authors of the biographical information below include Angelo di Benedetto, Don Cherno, Otto and Helen Friedrichs, Robert Dallenbach, the Denver, Westminster, and Adams County libraries, Astrid Galindo of the Mexican Consulate, Stephanie Albo, Terry Goldhammer, and Karoline Freed Briggs, and others. The photos, of course, are by me.

Without further ado, Justice Through the Ages (from left to right):

Hammurabi (18th Century BC) – King of Babylon and famous for code of laws

Akhenaton and wife Nefertiti (1375 BC) – King of Egypt and reformer

Moses – Hebrew lawgiver, Ten Commandments

Deborah (1100 BC) – a judge in Israel

Solon (5th Century BC) – Athenian statesman and lawgiver of Athens

Aspasia (470-410 BC) – Influential woman of Athens, associate of Pericles

Artistotle (384-322 BC) – pupil of Plato and philosopher

Plato (427-347 BC) – Greek philosopher

Socrates (470-399 BC) – Anthenian philosopher

Homer (8th Century BC) – Greek epic poet

Justinian the Great (483-565 AD) and Empress Theodora – Roman emperor who codified Roman law

Cicero (106-43 BC) – Greatest Roman orator and unsurpassed master of Latin prose

Tribonian (500-547 AD) – Roman jurist who directed compilation of Corpus Juris Civilis

Gaius (130-180 AD) – Second century Roman jurist known for the Institutes, a legal textbook

Papinian (142-212 AD) – Jurist, perhaps the greatest figure of Roman law

Ulpian (c. 170-228 AD) – Roman jurist and author of Libri ad edictum

Francisco Jose De Goya Y Lucientes (1746-1828) – Spanish painter and graphic artist, social satirist outraged at war and corruption

John Marshall (1755-1835) – noted American jurist, fourth Chief Justice of the United States who molded the Constitution by the breadth and wisdom of his interpretation

Alexander Hamilton (1755-1804) – American statesman, Secretary of the Treasury under George Washington, author of law papers recently published, most powerful of the Federalists

John Adams (1735-1826) – Second President of the United States, lawyer, leader in the American Revolution, and prolific writer

James Madison (1751-1836) – Fourth President of the United States, master builder of the Constitution and strong advocate of the Bill of Rights

Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790) – American statesman, printer, scientist, inventor, and writer influential in drafting the Constitution

Thomas Paine (1737-1809) – Anglo-American political theorist and writer, strong supporter of the American Revolution and author of the Rights of Man

Philip Mazzei (1730-1816) – Italian physician, merchant, horticulturist and author, close friend of Thomas Jefferson and the latter’s personal ambassador to sell democracy to Europe, may have written the first line of the Declaration of Independence

Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) – Third President of the United States, author of the Declaration of Independence, architect, scientist, philosopher and statesman

Josefa Ortiz De Dominguez (1768-1829) – Wife of the Corregidor (Mayor) of Queretaro, and sponsor of home meetings in favor of Mexican independence, leading to the War of Independence in 1810

Miguel Hidalgo Y Costilla (1753-1811) – Mexican priest and revolutionary, national hero, Creole intellectual who helped natives improve their lot but was defrocked and shot

Jose Maria Marelos Y Pavou (1765-1815) – Liberal Mexican priest acclaimed a hero, joined the revolution against Spain and assumed leadership upon Hidalgo’s execution and subsequently suffered the same fate

Benito Pablo Juarez (1806-1872) – Mexican statesman, lawyer and national hero, an Indian, Minister of Justice and acting president—the border city of Juarez bears his name

Mary Wollstonecraft (1759-1797) – English author and feminist who promoted educational equality and was close to leaders of the French Revolution—she died in childbirth; her daughter Mary married Percy Bysshe Shelley

Emmaline Goulden Pankhurst (1858-1928) – British woman suffragist, nationally revered, founded the Woman’s Social and Political Union; after World War I moved to Canada, returned to England in 1925 and died campaigning for Parliament

Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) – 16th President of the United States, the great emancipator, most memorialized American figure, savior of the Union, lawyer, statesman of noble vision, humanity and political wisdom, assassinated at close of the Civil War

Sojourner Truth (1797-1883) – A freed slave who responded to “heavenly voices” and traveled throughout the North, effectively preaching abolition, emancipation and women’s rights

Frederick Douglass (1817-1895) – American abolitionist, son of a Negro slave, editor of the North Star, author, advocate of civil rights, government officer and minister to Haiti

Harriet Tubman (1820-1913) – Negro slave, “conductor” on the Underground Railroad, friend of the principal abolitionists, confidant of John Brown, nurse and spy for the Union forces

Susan B. Anthony (1820-1906) – American reformer and leader of the woman-suffrage movement, organizer of temperance movements, historian, foremost advocate of women’s rights to franchise

Elizabeth Cady Stanton (1815-1902) – Reformer, woman suffrage leader, organizer of women for equality, writer, orator, editor of a militant feminist magazine published by Susan B. Anthony

Abigail Scott Duniway (1834-1915) – Editor, lecturer and an unceasing champion of women’s rights, recognized as leader of the women’s movement in the Northwest

Jane Addams (1860-1935) – Social worker, founder of Hull House in Chicago, active reformer, leader in suffrage and pacifist movements, author, influential in civic affairs, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize

Alice Paul (1883-1977) – Social reformer, one of the founders and later chair of the National Women’s Party, sponsor of the first equal rights amendment introduced in Congress in 1923

Sarah Winnemucca (1844-1891) – A woman of the Paviotso, daughter of the Chief, interpreter and scout, teacher, lecturer and author, advocate for her people

Joseph (1840-1904) – Nez Perce chief, intercedes with President Rutherford B. Hayes (1822-1893) and two Congressmen. Chief Joseph was a symbol of the heroic Nez Perce retreat which has been compared to that of Xenophon’s ten thousand. President Hayes, a lawyer and Civil War general, served in Congress and as Governor of Ohio. After the presidency, he was noted for efforts in prison reform

Mandarin Sun Yat-Sen (1866-1925) – Physician, student of Western political theory, Chinese revolutionary, first provisional president of the Chinese Republic (1911) and later president of a self-proclaimed national government at Canton (1921)

Soong Ching-Ling (1893-1981) – Wife of Mandarin Sun Yat-Sen, political activist, writer, recipient of the Stalin Peace Price, Vice-Chairman of the People’s Republic (1949)

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (1869-1948) – Indian spiritual and political leader, successful lawyer, leader of civil disobedience, prominent in achievement of independence for India, assassinated by Hindu fanatic—accompanied here by an unnamed disciple

Clarence Seward Darrow (1857-1938) – American lawyer, renounced lucrative corporate practice to defend the “underdog”, most famous for the Leopold and Loeb defence and Scopes evolution trial

Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1882-1945) – 32nd U.S. President, Assistant Secretary of the Navy, Governor of New York, lawyer, reformer, father of the New Deal, influential international figure in World War II

Eleanor Roosevelt (1884-1962) – American humanitarian, active in social betterment, leader in women’s organizations and youth movements, promoter of consumer welfare and civil rights

Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968) – American clergyman and civil rights leader, organizer of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, recipient of Nobel Peace Prize, killed by an assassin’s bullet

John Fitzgerald Kennedy (1917-1963) – 35th U.S. President, World War II naval hero, congressman and senator from Massachusetts, eloquent advocate of social justice and international accord, assassinated in Dallas.

Earl Warren (1891-1974) – 14th Chief Justice of the United States, Attorney General and Governor of California, liberal and dynamic leader in the area of landmark decisions in civil rights and individual liberties

========

These last three photos show the artist’s name, the names of his assistants, and the mural’s center design:

Let’s hope the mural finds a new home soon.

Filed under Civic Center, History, Public Spaces.

20 Comments

#1: Downtown Denver Infill Boom

Posted by Ken Schroeppel on February 9, 2010

We have finally reached #1 on the Denver’s Top 10 Urbanism Achievements of the Aughts countdown! It came down to a toss up between Downtown Denver’s infill boom and the whole FasTracks/Union Station thing, but, in the end, I had to go with what had inspired my website and blog in the first place: urban infill development.

Over the span of a century, we built a city that was urban and dense and thriving. Then, around our 100th birthday, we lost our way and started abandoning what we had built. We moved on to “greener” prairies beyond the city limits and left behind deteriorated buildings that were eagerly converted into weedy vacant parcels or barren surface parking lots. We were not the only big city in the country to do this, but we were particularly good at it.

Around our 130th birthday, we rediscovered the value of our original urban places. We started restoring and rehabilitating old buildings and renewing and revitalizing old neighborhoods. Old became the new new and places like Lower Downtown and the Highlands were getting hip again. By Birthday #140, we were running out of historic buildings to convert and yet the demand for being in or near Downtown Denver was stronger than ever, so “infill” became the the “in” thing. One by one, weedy vacant parcels and barren surface parking lots were transformed into condos and hotels and offices and apartments and shops and everything in between, and by the time our big Sesquicentennial rolled around, infill was everywhere. Recently the Great Recession has slowed Denver’s infill boom, but most political, demographic, and socio-economic indicators suggest that once the economy picks up again, Denver’s urban infill boom will continue.

So just how big was Downtown Denver’s urban infill boom from 2000 to 2009? As Thomas Jefferson would say, let facts be submitted to a candid world:

1127 Sherman, 1135 Broadway Residences, 1200 Delaware, 1200 Elati, 1400 Wewatta, 1515 Wynkoop, 16 Market Square, 1740 Franklin, 1755 Blake, 1800 Larimer, 1870 Vine Street Townhomes, 1890 Wynkoop, 1900 16th Street, 2100 Uptown Lofts, 2101 Market, 2245 Blake, 24 Walnut, 2428 Champa, 25th & Tremont Townhomes, 2999 Lawrence, 3040 Zuni, 450 E. 17th Avenue, 816 Acoma, 920 E. 17th Avenue, Adair Group Offices, Ajax Lofts, Alexan Prospect, Alfred A. Arraj US Courthouse, Antares Urban Townhomes, Argonaut Liquors, Art House Townhomes, Auraria Science Building, Ayr on 29th, Ballpark Lofts, Bank of Denver Headquarters, Blair-Caldwall Library, Blake 27 Brownstones, Blake Street Apartments, Boulder Street Townhomes, Broadway Plaza Lofts, Brownstones at Riverfront Park, Brunetti Lofts, Campus Village Apartments, Capital Grille, Capitol Heights Apartments, Central Court, Champa Square, Chroma Town Homes, City Park Residences, City View Townhomes, Cityscape Townhomes, Clay Street Residences, Colorado Convention Center, Confluence Heights, Corona Park, Creekside Lofts, Denver Art Museum Hamilton Building, Denver Art Museum Residences, Denver Justice Center, Denver Newspaper Agency Building, Denver Square, DHMC Pavilion, Diamond at Prospect, Diamond Lofts, DMHC Parking Garage, East Village Redevelopment, Embassy Suites Hotel, Emerson Uptown Lofts, EPA Region 8 Headquarters, Fire Clay Lofts, FirstBank at Colfax & Franklin, Flats 15, Flour Mill Lofts II, Four Seasons Hotel & Residences, Franklin Square, Frontview 40, Garden Factory Lofts, Gates Corporates Headquarters, Gilpin Grove, Glass House, Glenarm Place Condos, Golden Row, Grant Park, Hampton Inn Highland, Highland Bridge Lofts, Highland Court, Highland Crossing, Highland Lofts, Highland Square Lofts, Highland Terrace, Highlands Vista, Hilton Garden Inn, Humboldt Gardens, Hyatt Denver Convention Center Hotel, Inca 29 Urban Brownstones, Italianate Townhomes, Jack Kerouac Lofts, Jefferson at CityGate, La Villa de Barela, Lofts at Downing Street Station, Lombard Gate, Luxe Modern Row Homes, Marais Uptown, Merchant’s Row, Metro State Parking Garage, Metroview Urban Living, Monarch Mills, Museum of Contemporary Art, Off-Broadway Lofts, One Lincoln Park, One Riverfront Park, Park Avenue West Residences, Park Place Lofts, Pearl of the City, Pearl Street Victorianan, Piranesi, Portofino, Premier Lofts, Promenade Lofts, Quality Hill Townes, Rail Yark Marketplace, Renaissance Riverfront Lofts, Residence Inn by Marriott, Residences at 1882 Race, RiverClay, Riverfront Tower, Shoshone Heights, Shoshone Lofts, Speer Lofts, Spire, St. Joseph’s Medical Offices, St. Lukes Lofts, State Capitol Parking Garage, Steelbridge Lofts Annex, Strada Flats, SugarCube, Swallow Hill, TAXI, Tejon Square, The Bartholomew, The Beauvallon, The Dakota, The Delgany, The Edge at City Park, The Ellington Lofts, The Gathering Place, The Manhattan, The Mansion, The Metro, The Milan, The Park One Riverfront, The Point, The Proado, The Renaissance, The Station at Riverfront Park, Titanium Lofts, Tower on the Park, Townhomes at Riverfront Park, Umatilla Townhomes, Upper Larimer Lofts, Uptown Apartments, Uptown Lofts, Uptown Square, Urbans @ Curtis, Urbans @ Glenarm, Urbans @ Stout, Urology Center of Colorado, Villa Riva, Villages at Curtis Park, VOA Bob Magness, Walker’s Row, Washington Square, Waterside Lofts, Wellington Webb Municipal Building, Welton Place Townhomes, Wyandot Overlook, Zi Lofts, Zocalo Condos… and many more I’m sure I’ve missed.

Not too bad for a 1.5-mile radius of Downtown, huh?

The Aughts were a pretty darn good decade for urbanism in Denver. Let’s hope for an even better decade in the Tens… there are a lot of surface parking lots to go!

Filed under History, Infill, Urbanism.

9 Comments

Denver Union Station: Portal to Progress Film Premiere

Posted by Ken Schroeppel on February 2, 2010

Havey Productions, one of Denver’s leading film production companies and producers of several historical and cultural documentaries of significance, will premiere their new film, Denver Union Station: Portal to Progress this Friday, February 5, at the Hyatt Regency Denver – Convention Center Hotel. You are invited!

At Union Station Advocates, we’ve been working for over a year to help raise funds for the film’s production. Along with many other community groups and contributors, we are thrilled that this feature-length movie on Denver’s Union Station is now ready for its big debut. General Admission tickets are $15 and available at 6:00 PM. Patron Level tickets are $100 and include a hosted bar and hors d’oeuvres reception at 5:30 PM. To purchase tickets in advance or to check out a trailer of the move, click here.

Denver’s Union Station redevelopment has been a long time in the making. First, Lower Downtown blossomed in the 1990s. Then, the Central Platte Valley emerged in the 2000. Waiting patiently in between those two vibrant districts has been our historic Union Station and its neighboring parcels, which is now poised to be the star of the 2010s.

The excitement about this project is palpable. This past fall, 800 people packed Union Station for a party the likes of which the old station hasn’t seen in generations. Fundraising is underway to bring back the Welcome/Mizpah Arch to the Union Station site. New projects like the relocation of IMA Financial’s headquarters to the Union Station site are being announced. Design work for the massive project is nearing completion and the project authority, DUSPA, has a new website with all the latest renderings, plans, and diagrams. And now… Denver Union Station-The Movie… is set to premiere. Please join us this Friday to celebrate not only a movie, but the launch of Denver’s most important civic project since Denver International Airport.

Filed under Events & Meetings, History, Media, Union Station.

5 Comments

#3: The Amazing Denver Voter

Posted by Ken Schroeppel on January 30, 2010

Cheers! to Denver voters for coming in #3 on our Denver’s Top 10 Urbanism Achievements of the Aughts countdown. Frankly, Denver voters should probably come in #1 for not just this past decade, but for all 15 of Denver’s decades, considering their record of voting for civic projects of every kind.

The reasons for Denver’s enthusiasm for approving civic projects are complicated but discernible. Part of it has to do with Denver’s inferiority complex. Since our city’s founding (relatively late as big cities go—the late 1850s), we’ve tried to overcome our new-kid-on-the-block, dusty-outpost-in-the-middle-of-nowhere insecurities (the “cowtown syndrome”) by proving to the world that we can do all the stuff bigger and older cities do—and then bragging about it. When that fails to earn us the respect we believe we deserve, we try even harder. Next, Denver seems to draw people who are seeking a better place to live or who are looking to make a fresh start; so upon moving here, many newcomers are predisposed toward community improvement. Denverites are also known to be an optimistic bunch (due to the ubiquitous sunshine and stunning mountain vistas, no doubt), so one way people here express that optimism is through investing in their city. Finally, Denver has been fortunate over its history to have had a municipal government that has been relatively competent and corruption-free and that generally delivers civic projects as promised. Along with our strong-mayor system and the dynamic, effective leaders it has produced, a sense of trust exists between the citizens and the city that perpetuates an environment of collective civic ambition. That’s my take on it, anyway. Now, back to the voters:

November 1999 (just a few weeks from the start of the new decade): Denver voters approved (55%) an increase of the city’s lodging and car-rental taxes to raise $261.5 million toward the expansion of the Colorado Convention Center, a $62.5 million general obligation bond for expansion of the Denver Art Museum (61%), and a $62.5 million bond for upgrades at the Denver Zoo (66%). Denverites also voted in favor (66%) of the state’s TRANS proposal which authorized the $1.7 billion T-REX light rail and highway reconstruction project. Denver voters also approved TABOR exemptions for both RTD and Denver Public Schools.
November 2002: Denver voters approved (68%) general obligation bonds totaling $25 million for the renovation of the Denver Auditorium (creating what is now the Ellie Caulkins Opera House at the Denver Performing Arts Complex).
May 2003: Denver voters approved (65%) general obligation bonds in the amount of $148 million for the expansion of the Denver Health Medical Center.
November 2004: Denver voters approved (65%) an increase in the sales tax of 0.4% for RTD’s FasTracks program. Also, Denverites voted in favor (74%) to extend the 0.1% Scientific & Cultural Facilities District sales tax for another 14 years.
May 2005: Denver voters approved (56%) the issuance of $378 million in general obligation bonds for the construction of the new Denver Justice Center courthouse and detention facility in Downtown and other improvements at the existing County Jail on Smith Road.
November 2005: Denver voters approved (66%) increasing the city’s lodging tax by 1% to pay for Denver tourism and convention marketing programs, and a 10-year exemption from TABOR for the City & County of Denver (64%). Also, Denver voted in favor (63%) of Referendum D, which would have authorized the state to spend $2.1 billion for transportation and other capital improvements. Referendum D failed, however, statewide.
November 2007: Denver voters approved all eight of the Better Denver bond issues by margins ranging from 52% to 67% for a total of $550 million in capital improvements for health and human service facilities, libraries, transportation/public works projects, parks and recreation projects, public office buildings, public safety facilities, existing cultural facilities, and new cultural facilities (expansion at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science and the reconstruction of Boettcher Concert Hall). Denver voters also approved (55%) a permanent 2.5 mill property tax increase for regular capital improvements and infrastructure investments.
November 2008: Denver voters approved (68%) general obligation bonds in the amount of $454 million for renovations and new construction for Denver Public Schools.

The only Denver ballot item for a civic project that I could recall that failed during the decade was in November 2001 for the Denver Justice Center—then planned to be built at I-25 and 6th Avenue—which was controversial mostly due to the location and was approved a few years later after the switch to the Downtown site.

Denver’s legacy of supporting civic projects and investments in the city’s infrastructure continued to flourish this past decade, which is why I’m including it in our list of Denver’s Top 10 Urbanism Achievements of the Aughts.

Filed under Economic Growth, History, Infrastructure, Politics.

3 Comments

North by Northwest

Posted by Ken Schroeppel on September 28, 2008

In an issue directly related to my recent “Highland or Highlands?” blog, today let’s talk about… Does the Downtown grid point north or west?

The definitive expert on all streets Denver is Phil Goodstein who wrote the book Denver Streets in 1994. It traces the etymology of every street name in the entire metro Denver and Downtown street grids and provides insight into many other aspects of Denver’s physical development. It’s a must-have for anyone with an interest in Denver’s history and evolution as a city.

From his book, I quote: “Moreover, while downtown streets are diagonal, Denver also defined their directions. The named streets, which run northeast away from Cherry Creek, are said to be going ‘east,’ i.e., into old East Denver as the area on the downtown side of Cherry Creek was known after the merger of Denver and Auraria in 1860. The named streets heading southwest are defined as going west since the entire section of town the other side of Cherry Creek was West Denver. Numbered streets that go northwest across the Platte River are said to be heading north into the heart of North Denver where North High School is located near Speer and Federal boulevards. The numbered roads which run southeast toward the Capitol are south bound.” Because of Mr. Goodstein’s authority on the issue, throughout my DenverInfill website, I refer to the Downtown numbered streets as running north-south, and the named streets running east-west.

Fast forward to the recently completed 2007 Downtown Area Plan. In that document, wherever directional references are mentioned, the numbered streets Downtown are described as running east-west and the named streets as running north-south. While I was relatively involved in that planning process, I didn’t spot the error until near the end, and even though I brought it to the attention of the planning team, the final Downtown Area Plan document today still describes the Downtown grid as running counter to what Phil Goodstein states is the City of Denver’s policy on the direction that our diagonal Downtown grid officially points. The Union Station redevelopment planning process that’s currently in full swing repeats the Downtown Area Plan’s error, as it describes the Wynkoop side of Union Station as the “east” side and the Central Platte Valley side of the historic station as the “west” side.

The argument in favor of what is apparently the recently forgotten “official” position of the city on this issue is that the neighborhoods northwest of Downtown have been known for over a century as North Denver, as documented in my “Highland or Highlands?” blog and as anyone who grew up in North Denver, like my buddy Joe, knows from personal experience. If northwest Denver is “North Denver” then that means the numbered streets run north-south, not east-west, otherwise we’d refer to Highland as “West Denver.”

The argument in favor of the opposite perspective is that the numbered east-west avenues on the metro grid were originally designated to roughly align with Downtown’s numbered streets. As Denver continued to grow and the city switched the platting of streets to the more logical north-south-east-west grid, it decided to name the new east-west avenues south of Downtown in a manner that would associate them to Downtown’s numbered streets. Consequently, the avenue that ran east from the southern terminus of 17th Street was named East 17th Avenue, the avenue that ran east from the southern terminus of 16th Street was named East 16th Avenue, and so on. Following that system, the east-west avenues to the south were named in descending numerical order until the “zero” avenue was reached—Elsworth Avenue—which became the dividing line between north and south on the metro decimal street address system. Because the numbered avenues run east and west and they were associated with the numbered Downtown streets, there is some logic then in saying that the Downtown numbered streets also run east and west.

Our Downtown grid is aligned at almost a perfect 45-degree angle to the cardinal directions, not for an intentional mathematical reason, but because the Downtown streets were laid out to be parallel to Cherry Creek and the South Platte River, which just happen to intersect each other at roughly a 90-degree angle in a 45-degree rotated setting. So whether we say Lower Downtown is the “north” or “west” end of Downtown is really an even judgement call. Historical precedence points one way, recent usage points another. From my 20 years of living in Denver, it seems to me there is no consistency among locals as to a directional preference. We somehow manage to understand each other regardless, and as for the tourists and the newbies—they’re baffled by the diagonal Downtown grid anyway, so it doesn’t really matter.

After 150 years, we apparently still haven’t come to any consensus. Perhaps that’s a good thing. The confusion of direction only adds to the uniqueness and intrigue of Downtown Denver.

Filed under History, Streets.

9 Comments

DenverInfill Blog

News and information about urban infill development in the Mile High City