sidewalks

During December’s snowstorm, Denver’s Public Works and Parks and Rec departments dispatched 96 snow plows that worked overnight to clear major roads of snow and ice. The response to the storm, which dropped as much as 10 inches on the Mile High City, was necessary to make streets safer for buses, cars, and bicyclists. Which makes the city’s … Continued

The fresh coat of snow that covered Denver last night may be pretty to look at, but if you’re walking to, say, a bus stop on Hampden Avenue, you’re actually breaking the law. That’s because some sidewalks on Hampden Avenue, a state highway under the Colorado Department of Transportation’s jurisdiction, are closed during icy conditions. Yep, next to … Continued

When voters approved financing for the National Western Center project last week, they gave Mayor Michael Hancock’s administration the go-ahead to create a new neighborhood in northeast Denver. The investment in a long-neglected part of the city is overdue, according to its supporters, who say the National Western Center will anchor economic development there. At the same time, state officials have … Continued

Denver voters decided on a number of ballot measures yesterday. One of them, which partially funds a $1.1 billion National Western Center project by extending a hotel and rental car tax, will affect how people get around in northeast Denver. The National Western Complex has been the setting for the country’s premiere stock show for more than 100 years, … Continued

As Denver spends millions to widen streets and highways for multi-ton vehicles, many people are still deprived of sidewalks in their neighborhood. That’s because walking is considered an “alternative” way to get around in Denver. It’s an absurd (if common) way to frame the original, most basic form of transportation. This peculiar mentality is also the reason Denver has no … Continued

By all accounts, Denver is experiencing a cultural and economic renaissance that has made it the Millennial Mecca of the West. You’d think its streets would reflect that. Yet despite its status as Colorado’s urban center, some of Denver’s suburbs have a better grip on how to fund safe streets than the city itself. Last week’s report from Mile High … Continued

Denver’s transit network is growing, but no government body has taken responsibility for improving access to train stations and bus stops — not RTD, not Denver Public Works, not the Colorado Department of Transportation, not Denver’s elected officials. It’s the city’s low-income residents who bear the brunt of this failure. Those are the findings from a report released today by the transit advocates at Mile … Continued

Chaffee Park is a north Denver neighborhood scrunched between three highways. Like a lot of neighborhoods in the city, it suffers from street designs that prioritize the movement of car traffic over the safety of people. People who walk in the neighborhood know it’s a terrible and dangerous pedestrian environment. Now a new study maps out those problems block-by-block. … Continued

The City and County of Denver doesn’t have a dedicated funding stream for building and maintaining sidewalks, but WalkScope, a crowdsourcing tool that maps and rates Denver’s walking infrastructure, could be the springboard the city needs to change that. WalkScope allows anyone with access to a smart phone or computer to map the quality of … Continued