Community College of Denver: Student Learning and Engagement Building Update

Archive of posts filed under the Land / Building Use category.

Community College of Denver: Student Learning and Engagement Building Update

Posted by Ryan Dravitz on April 22, 2012

Back on January 12th, 2012 the Community College of Denver broke ground on their own Student Learning and Engagement building. This is a very similar idea to what Metro State did with their Student Success Center. This development will be a 4-story, 87,000 square foot building located on the corner of 7th Street and West Colfax Avenue.

Basic structure work is being completed. The elevator cores appear to be topped out. In the picture on the right you can see the steel that is lined up ready to be put in place on the building. Always a neat sight when a building is just getting off the ground.

None of the true building’s elements are showing but for only being three months in, quite the progress has been made. The rooms will also have a great view of the Denver skyline. Just from the ground you can see that there is a pretty unobstructed view.

This building is designed by OZ Architects as well as Boora Architects (renderings can be found by clicking the Boora link) with construction performed by G. H. Phipps. This will be home to Community College of Denver’s admissions, registration, financial aid, a testing center, the cashiers office, advising, and their own student success program. No details have been released about LEED certification but the college is being rewarded a $100,000 energy rebate for having ‘green’ elements such as chilled beams, radiant floors, and a green roof. They are expected to be completed with this project by summer session of 2013.

Filed under Auraria, Education, Infill.

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New Ballpark District Project: 2300 Walnut

Posted by Ken Schroeppel on April 21, 2012

From roughly the 1950s through the 1980s, when Downtown Denver’s skyline blossomed with skyscrapers, many property owners on the periphery of the Central Business District cleared their land of buildings to provide parking for all those new office workers and to have a “clean site” to entice developers to buy their land for the next high-rise project. This phenomenon occurred in the Golden Triangle, Uptown, Arapahoe Square, and Ballpark districts, leaving us with a four- to five-block wide “no man’s land” zone of surface parking lots separating Downtown from these adjacent urban neighborhoods. These rips in our city’s urban fabric are still evident today, but we have made great strides over the past two decades in knitting back together our city center districts with Downtown.

One area where that progress is quite obvious is along Market/Walnut Street through the Ballpark district, where 2300 Walnut by Mill Creek Residential Trust is ready to begin construction. Recent infill projects such as 2101 Market, Premier Lofts, 24 Walnut, and Ballpark Lofts have significantly helped transform the blocks along Market (which becomes Walnut Street past Park Avenue) from a sea of asphalt to a vibrant mixed-use corridor. But there was one big gap remaining: the full city block parking lot bounded by Park Avenue, Walnut, 24th Street, and Larimer. Now, thanks to Mill Creek’s 2300 Walnut project, that big hole in the urban fabric will be repaired. Here’s a GoogleEarth aerial where I’ve marked the project location (for all images, click/zoom to embiggen):

2300 Walnut is a 5-story, 310-unit apartment building wrapped around a 446-space parking garage. Here’s an axonometric perspective of the 24th/Larimer corner looking west back towards Lower Downtown:

The project features a multi-hued brick facade with an interior courtyard, a swimming pool and fitness center, and leasing office. Thanks to Scott Johnson and Marie McClellan at Mill Creek, here are two high-resolution project renderings. These are views of the Park Avenue/Walnut corner and the Walnut Street side of the project:

Mill Creek Residential Trust just closed on the property, so now they are ready to get the project underway. Utility relocations and other site work should begin soon, with full project construction by this summer. If all goes as planned, 2300 Walnut will open late 2013/early 2014.

Filed under Ballpark, Infill, Residential.

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New Union Station District Project: 16 Chestnut

Posted by Ken Schroeppel on April 20, 2012

Coming soon to a Millennium Bridge near you… 16 Chestnut!

16 Chestnut is East-West Partners‘ proposed office tower at 16th Street and Chestnut Place that will anchor the fourth and final corner to Denver’s Millennium Bridge.

Way back in 2000, when Denver’s Central Platte Valley was just beginning its transition from industrial wasteland to hip urban neighborhood, the Millennium Bridge’s dramatic 200-foot tall mast stood alone as a symbol of the area’s potential as Downtown’s newest urban district. Shortly thereafter, the Park Place and Promenade Lofts buildings joined the bridge as neighbors on its western corners, and now the DaVita building is wrapping up construction at the third corner. Once 16 Chestnut is built, the Millennium Bridge’s destiny as an iconic public space embraced by contemporary development will be complete. From an urban morphological perspective, the bridge will go from being the figure surrounded by open ground to being, in a way, the ground surrounded by many figures (that’s for my planner/architect geek friends!). Whatever your perspective, this is an exciting milestone for the Union Station area.

Here’s the scoop on 16 Chestnut:

It’s a 320,000 square foot, 18-story, 240-foot-high office tower located on the rectangular parcel bounded by 16th Street/Millennium Bridge, Chestnut Place, and 17th Street. The site is surrounded by the new Mall Shuttle loop at the Union Station light rail station. Here are two views of the site:

The development is currently in the concept design stage. Therefore, please note that all of the following images, provided courtesy of East-West Partners and their design partner klipp architecture, are very preliminary in nature and subject to change. Nevertheless, these renderings do give you a general sense of the mass and scale of the proposed building.

The general building program includes a level of underground parking, ground floor retail and entry, a second-level lobby that includes a cool walkway that spans across the mall shuttle lane and connects to the Millennium Bridge (a pedestrian bridge to a pedestrian bridge!), a few more levels of parking, and about a dozen or so floors of office space. Here’s a conceptual ground-floor site plan and building section/stacking plan—again, very much subject to change:

Finally, how about a couple of building concept renderings:

First, the view from 17th and Chestnut, showing the building’s unique helical parking garage ramps:

Next, the view from 16th and Chestnut, showing how the building spans across the Mall Shuttle lane plus the pedestrian connection to the Millennium Bridge:

East-West Partners is now actively marketing the building to prospective tenants, and the design will be refined as marketing efforts continue. More information on this exciting addition to Denver’s Union Station district will be forthcoming.

Filed under Infill, Office, Union Station.

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Denver Union Station Update #97

Posted by Ken Schroeppel on April 17, 2012

By Andy Vuong

Sorry for the long delay in updating the Union Station project… I’ve been out of the country for several weeks and didn’t have time to take some new pictures for a little while after I returned.

Let’s start by checking out the progress of the pavers near the light rail station and Chestnut Pavilion. At the time this picture was taken, the crew had laid down almost all the preliminary pavers between the station, Chestnut Street, and the 16th Street Mall Ride access road. I say preliminary because cause after the general pattern of varying colors is laid down, the crew goes back and makes the necessary cuts where two or three colors meet to make the curved patterns you see below.

Also, check out the trees that have been added to the large tear drop planters! I counted three large trees in the planter closest to the 18th Street Pedestrian Bridge, and about 15 smaller ones in the planter directly next to it. While the trees were bare when the picture was taken, they have already started to green up a bit since they were planted.

Staying on the same side of the project, work continues on the remaining half of the bus box directly behind Union Station. In our last post, I mentioned that the floor of the bus box was completed–connecting the bases of both halves of the box. Currently, crews are pouring the side walls of the box, with what appears to be about 30% of the work complete at the time of this posting. I wasn’t able to get a good picture of the walls this time around, but will try to get a good shot in the next couple of days.

The other major areas of progress to report are the public works related projects taking place next to and in front of the station. After installing new pipes and wires, crews have started to rebuild the lane of 16th Street between Wynkoop and Wewatta. Once that section of 16th Street is completed, crews will begin to work on the other side of the street–eventually widening 16th Street in that block to match the width of the street between Wewatta and the Millennium Bridge.

Unfortunately, I was not able to get a good picture of the work being completed on 18th Street. The street, which formerly ended at Wynkoop, is being extended into what was part of the parking lot next to the Ice House lofts. This will allow for car access to the upcoming IMA Financial building that will flank the Station, as well as bus access to the underground bus terminal.

Finally, crews have started to excavate a large section of land in front of the Station entrance. This will eventually house a water overflow tank that will collect water from around the station during a heavy rainstorm–reducing the chance of any sewage overflow issues.

Andy Vuong is a management consultant who lives and works in the Union Station neighborhood and is an avid proponent of urban density. Andy will be providing updates on the Union Station project as a back-up to Rick, our regular Union Station project blogger. DenverInfill’s Andy Vuong is not the Denver Post writer of the same name.

Filed under Government & Civic, Infrastructure, Union Station.

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RiNo Rising: Part III

Posted by Derek Berardi on March 30, 2012

As many of you may have already heard or noticed, yet another residential project has broken ground in the RiNo area. Since there have been bits and pieces of information regarding “RiNo Center”, it’s time to present a quick rundown on the highlights of the project. Located at 32^nd and Brighton Blvd., RiNo Center is the latest project in that part of town to throw up a chain link fence and start pushing around the fresh spring soil. The 4-story building will include 205 units and 262 parking spaces. Also notable, the development will include a clubhouse and a 15,000 square foot courtyard.

Though the project is located in a section of the city that most would consider cut-off, or lacking in amenities, future residents may beg to differ. Those new to RiNo Center may actually find that they have lifestyle options which are unavailable in most other neighborhoods throughout the city. As a TOD (Transit-oriented Development), RiNo Center will be within walking distance from a commuter rail stop, offering alternative transportation options for its residents. In addition, the one-of-a-kind urban market “The Source” will be literally next door to offer a variety of services sure to boost quality of life in the neighborhood.

Paired with Denargo Market a mile or so down the street, these projects are helping to form a critical mass northeast of downtown. As services, residences and support functions continue to fill into the neighborhood, it will only become more liveable and energetic.

(Renderings provided by developer Scott McFadden, who is principal of Prospect, LLC.)

Filed under Residential, River North, Transit-Oriented.

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A New Lincoln Street

Posted by Ryan Dravitz on March 22, 2012

Every once in a while I will walk against the grain on Lincoln Street on my way home from work. As I approached 14th Avenue I had to stop and stare at this amazing project in our Civic Center district. The Ralph Carr Judicial Center has a massive presence and changes the entire feel of the Lincoln Street / Broadway corridor. When you’re driving down the one way street towards the North, it’s hard to notice the boldness of this development but I encourage you, if you’re on foot, to walk against traffic on Lincoln Street and observe this project. From its Neoclassical architecture to some contemporary touches, what do you think of this overall development?

Not to mention, just down the street is the History Colorado Center which is another huge part of the new Lincoln / Broadway streetscape. Kudos to these two projects in making the gateway into downtown just that much better.

UPDATE: The hoist elevator has also come down on the office tower and they are starting to seal it up. This is a great step in the visual completion of this development.

Filed under Civic Center, Government & Civic, Infill.

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