DenverInfill Blog

In keeping with Ken’s tradition of looking back over the previous year of Denver projects, he and I thought you might enjoy a retrospective of the Union Station project.

If you are new to this website or new to Denver, you need to know that there is a new bus terminal behind Union Station. Really! It’s there. And here’s the story of it so far.

The two photos below are from Update #48 on January 7, 2011. As you can see in the first one, much work on phase one of the bus terminal had been accomplished in 2010: the giant hole was excavated; the four-foot thick floor was laid; the walls were built; and the roof beams were being installed. Notice that three cranes were at work.

In the second photo above, the canopy over the light rail platform was completed, and finishing touches were in progress on the mall shuttle canopy.

So that’s the way it was at the beginning of 2011. The day after returning from a long road trip in late February, I met with Hunter Sydnor at Kiewit’s office to get an update on seven weeks of progress. And there was plenty for us to talk about.

By the end of February, the bus terminal roof was nearly complete (first photo below), the vertical walls of the skylights had been built (second photo), and the foundations for the three air inlet/outlet towers were in place.

Still in February, finishing touches were being made on the light rail tracks, and the Amtrak station had  moved to its temporary quarters on February 3.

By mid-March, the bus terminal was water-tight so the dewatering system was dismantled and the filtration system was hauled away. Work on the light rail overhead catenary system was underway (see photo below) and backfilling behind the bus terminal walls was nearly finished.

In Update #58 on April 10, I showed the following contrasting photos of the scene immediately behind Union Station. The span of time between the two photos was a mere five weeks. The tracks were gone, and the Amtrak passenger platforms had been demolished. However, the mall shuttle platforms remained for a while longer.

Backfilling on the roof of the bus terminal began in early April. In the photo below, you can see early backfilling and the waterproofing material being applied to the roof.

On April 26, excavation of the second half of the bus terminal began. It wasn’t long before the mail and baggage tunnels were revealed for the first time in many decades. Here’s a photo of the mail tunnel near 16th Street.

On April 28, I got my first tour inside of the bus terminal and wrote about it in Update #61. I remember being struck by the immensity of the space.

Moving along, the month of May saw the construction of streets. The mall shuttle loop was being built and Chestnut Place was being rebuilt, crossing over the bus terminal roof.

If there is a sad part of this story, it’s the loss of the beloved, historic passenger tunnel. In several posts throughout 2011, I gushed about the historic significance of that tunnel and my personal attachment to it: my Dad’s passing through that tunnel upon his return from the war in the Pacific in 1946 en route home to Medina, New York, to see his four month old son (me) for the first time. Here’s a photo of the beginning of the tunnel’s demolition in May 2011.

I like the following photo. It’s a wide shot of the area behind the station at mid-year. Phase 2 excavation was well underway; the mall shuttle station was still in operation, all three of the tunnels were gone; Wewatta Street was still open.

It’s exciting when a project gets to the finishing-touches stage. Lots of highly visible stuff happens. In mid-July, the Chestnut Pavilion started to take shape, and the new light rail station passenger platforms were completed (first photo below). Also, streets were completed, and the three air intake/outlet towers were built. The second photo is a good reminder of the appearance of the towers since they have been wrapped in blue plastic for the past several months. They are due to be unwrapped soon.

The Central Platte Valley Light Rail Line was shut down on July 22 in preparation of connecting the tracks at the new light rail station to the main line. Also in late-July, 16th Street and the light rail tracks embedded in it were torn up.

The lights were turned on for the first time on August 2 at the newly completed light rail station. This is another of my favorite shots.

The month of August was huge. Everything to do with the new light rail station was coming together: tracks, lighting, sidewalks, signage, railings, even light rail tests rides. The place was ready for action.

Then it finally happened. The new light rail and mall shuttle stations opened on August 15, 2011. This photo is from 5:50 that morning. I think it was the arrival of the first train. A VIP train following a couple of hours later. Go to Update #82 to see several videos of the celebration.

The first photo below is the scene at 8:00AM on August 22. The second one is 2:00pm on August 25. Nuff said.

By mid-September,the Chestnut Pavilion canopy was finished, the tear-drop planters started to show up, and a new pile of dirt was growing.

After a delay of several weeks due to a water contamination problem that was difficult to remedy, phase two excavation resumed by late-October. At the same time, there was plenty of activity constructing the tear-drop planters near the new light rail station.

Phase two excavation was nearly complete in November. Work began and continued into December on foundations for the eight sets of tracks (commuter rail, Amtrak, and Ski Train) that will be place over the roof of the bus terminal immediately behind Union Station.

As most big construction projects near completion, they rise up to highly visible structures that can be admired from near or far.  Not so with the Union Station project; progress results in its disappearance. I can’t wait for that first bus ride from the shining, new terminal that is someplace underground.

At the end of almost every blog, I remind you to take a look at JobSiteVistor.com for a more thorough visual tour of the project. By now, I have posted hundreds of photos on that site. You may enjoy a complete tour as I have done while writing this year’s retrospective.

Work on the project has concentrated on one relatively small space for the past several weeks. Gone for now are the days of having activity scattered throughout the project area: light rail tracks, new stations, new streets, new sidewalks, etc. All of those have been completed. Now the work is confined to excavating the second portion of the bus terminal and building infrastructure inside the first portion.  Below is a photo from earlier this week that I took through a window inside Union Station.

It appears that the excavation work is nearly completed. Foundations are being built for the second set of elevators, stairs, escalators, and for the train tracks that will lay on the roof of the bus station. In the center of the background of the photo just below and slightly to the left of Glass House, notice the large sheet of vertical plastic with bright lights behind. You are looking at the lights inside of the first portion of the bus terminal. The vertical steel beams in the foreground support the shoring wall that is immediately behind Union Station.

It’s difficult to get a perspective from the photo. I’ll try to help. The scale of the hole is similar the first section: the same dept (about 28 feet), the same width, but a little shorter. I’m guessing that the first section is about 75% of the total length of the bus terminal.

caisson [kā-sän] noun. A watertight chamber used in construction work under water or as a foundation.

The pieces of equipment in the photo above are building caissons for the train bridges that will be part of the roof of the bus terminal.  (I had to look up the definition of a caisson.) There will be eight sets of tracks (Amtrak, Ski Train, commuter rail) requiring four bridges. As we know, trains can be pretty heavy so the bridges will require deep, sturdy foundations. Therefore, the caissons.

Don’t forget tonight’s event at the convention center. See Ken’s post below.

There is good news to report. The hole is drained and excavation work on the bus terminal has resumed. A variety of factors caused long delays in getting the pumping and filtering systems in place. The ground water is contaminated with substances in addition to those found in the first phase, the clean water standards have gotten more stringent, and very few labs in the country are equipped to perform the required testing. The delays are not expected to impact the Spring 2014 completion of the project. Here is a shot that I took on Tuesday before the snowstorm.

The walls/seats are being installed around the planters near the light rail station. Here’s another photo from Tuesday. It appears that the walls are being installed along the inside edges of the foundations to maximize clearance between the planters, as suggested in some DenverInfill comments.

Water, concrete, more concrete. That’s the short story of the current situation at Union Station.

First, let’s look at the water situation. Digging phase two of the bus terminal is being held up by ground water. Pumping out the ground water is being held up for analysis of the contaminants in the water, finding an effective method for filtering out those contaminants, and getting approval for the process. In the meantime, I have a good view of a not-so-good reflecting pool.

Now for concrete story number one. The concrete borders for the tear-shaped planters are being poured. Those borders will double as seats for passers-by.

Concrete story number two is about the other half of 16th Street between Chestnut Place and Wewatta Street.  As you will recall, the street was torn up during the removal of the light rail tracks that served the light rail station of yesteryear.  The new street is in but not quite ready for use. Utility work is still underway at the intersection of Wewatta and 16th. Here’s how it looks from that intersection.

Please check out more current photos at JobSiteVistor.com.

Last week in Update #86, I wrote about the start of landscaping work near the new light rail station. More has happened since then.  On Friday, about 50 trees arrived via two tractor trailers (see the first photo below).  Today, the first tree was planted, and it’s on the west side of Chestnut Place between 18th and 19th streets (second photo).  The other 49 or so trees are also destined for Chestnut.

Also referring to Update #86, the DUSPA renderings that I posted were not the best representation of the future landscaping. Ken was kind enough to find some better ones including the two below (courtesy of Hargreaves Associates).  You can find a couple more on our Denver Union Station page at JobSiteVistor.com.

Still more news.  Work has resumed on the section of 16th Street along the front of the building at 1900 16th Street.  Here is a day-old photo of that part of the project.

In answer to Corey’s question on September 16 about the mall shuttles, the prototype mall buses are due to arrive in October.

Finally, as you know, from time to time I like to post interesting, downtown photos unrelated to the DUS project. You may remember the fog last Friday (September 16). I took three photos that morning, one follows and the other two are at JobSiteVistor.com (go to last week’s “Weekly Photos” to find them). To enjoy the following one which is my favorite, you need to click on it to enlarge it. Then strain your eyes to see the top of the Four Season Hotel in the center of the frame. (I flirted with an idea of playing “Where’s Waldo” but thought you might be tiring of silly games.