18 hours in Downtown Denver (Part II) - 56k bad

plinko · #1 Posted **Apr 27, 2007, 11:38 PM**

With that lovely Nor'Easter screwing up air traffic all over the country last Monday, my girlfriend and I wound up stuck in Denver without any way to get ourselves home to the West Coast (we got into the city way too late to connect). So instead of a 6AM flight home and a night in a shitty suburban Aurora Comfort Inn, we changed our flights, booked a downtown hotel and enjoyed the city for a day.

Denver was clean, new, suprising, dense, and basically everything a suburbanite could want in a downtown. Now that's not a slight at all, I think they've done a wonderful job in creating a core that would be attractive to just about anybody. This is a great thing. My girlfriend remarked before even I did how similar the layout is to downtown Sacramento and how similar the two feel. Obviously Denver is much larger, but I think the point is valid. If in 10 years Sacramento has the vibrancy that DT Denver has to offer, then they are likely on the right track. Denver's skyline gets knocked as being brown and boxy, but I found it fairly pleasant and with a decent amount of interesting architecture. I'm sure the newer towers UC and about to start will add much to that (from renderings I've seen, they should). I'd like to point out that Denver seems to have gotten where it is with small piecemeal projects that collectively have improved the area, not banking on MEGA-projects like their larger more bloated neighbor to the SW.

Just my 18 hour opinion. Definitely a city I'd go back to visit again (though I'd like to get out into some of the neighborhoods and to Boulder next time).

See Part I here

The night shots are little fuzzy. I blame shaky hands and vodka.

mile hi

evil raindrop

old school ma bell

creative

my anaconda don't want none...

public art gone right

Denver

Front_Range_Guy · #2 Posted **Apr 28, 2007, 12:19 AM**

Incredible photo's Plinko. I never get tired of Denver photo threads.

ltsmotorsport · #3 Posted **Apr 28, 2007, 12:32 AM**

Don't think I've seen Denver in the wet. I like.

pablosan · #4 Posted **Apr 28, 2007, 2:47 AM**

Great photo thread.

dktshb · #5 Posted **Apr 28, 2007, 3:28 AM**

Yep Downtown Denver does have a similar feel to Downtown Sacramento.

I love that convention center. Denver looks good gloomy and it looks good in the snow. Great pictures.

glowrock · #6 Posted **Apr 28, 2007, 4:04 AM**

Plinko, those photos are simply incredible!

Aaron (Glowrock)

Jularc · #7 Posted **Apr 28, 2007, 11:41 PM**

18 hours of photos!

Anyway, how would you like to be the person working in there and have to have a face to face with this thing out your window... Just looking at you.

soleri · #8 Posted **Apr 29, 2007, 12:21 AM**

Plinko's got a good eye.

Downtown Denver didn't need to do the mega-projects (unlike the "bloated neigbhor to the SW"), but it went ahead and did them anyway. All the sports venues are here, along with an aquarium, an amusement park, and most of the museums (of the heavyweights, only the natural history museum is elsewhere). My only wish is that they could find a way to lure serious retail back downtown. They've got some decent stores in the Pavilions and LoDo, but it's still feels weak.

Denver's spectacular location next to the Rockies makes it sui generis. Sometimes I wonder why it isn't as priced up as San Francisco or Seattle. I suspect that day is coming.