Sloan's Lake Citizen's Group

THE WEST COLFAX PLAN

By Dennis Cox

There is no secret to the revitalization of West Colfax. The street’s image is poor because of a lack of investment. The lack of investment is due to the lack of a buffer between vehicles in the street and pedestrians on the sidewalk. The solution is to create that buffer with either a bicycle lane or a parking lane. So far, the parking lane is recommended by the West Colfax Plan.

The next revitalization ingredient is investment money to create the kind of development needed to change the street’s image and integrate it into the surrounding residential neighborhood without the residential neighborhood being destroyed to accommodate short-sighted reinvestment.

At the July SLCG meeting, I summarized the contents of the West Colfax Plan. That summary follows for those who could not attend the meeting.

The map on page 7 (of our newsletter) shows the Villa Park and West Colfax neighborhoods from Lakewood Gulch on the south to 18th Avenue on the north and from Federal to Sheridan Boulevards where the neighborhoods are titled according to the subdivisions shown. The purpose of subdividing the neighborhoods, as stated in the plan, is to create a stronger neighborhood identity and to distinguish the unique attributes of distinct parts of the neighborhood. It is a way to use important community markers or references to heritage as building blocks for a more coherent set of niche environments.

The Town Center Districts are Cheltenham Heights and the St. Anthony Hospital Redevelopment (Holy Tony’s on the map). The recommendations for these areas are to create a dense center core surrounding a community gathering place that tapers from medium intensity structures in height, mass, and scale to the periphery where it blends with the surrounding neighborhoods. The mix of uses is service and product retail, restaurants, entertainment, civic uses, and multi-family housing for rental and ownership accommodating all income categories.

The Residential Districts, also referred to as Urban Neighborhood Districts, are shown on the map as Pleasant Hill and Tuxedo Park East and Tuxedo Park West. These neighborhoods are protected residential areas and are identified as Areas of Stability in Blueprint Denver. The recommendations are to promote design and development standards for additions, infill, and redevelopment that are consistent with the existing design styles, material usage, mass and scale, but allow some variation for visual interest and for a mix of architectural styles from traditional to contemporary where safeguarding design character is less of an issue.

The primary recommendation for the Main Street Districts of Ostrover, Tobin’s Row, Pig ’n’ Whistle is to rezone to a newly adopted zone district called Main Street which would replace the current B-4 Zone that predominates West Colfax. Avenue. Of course, the rezoning will have to go through the process of landowner approval and neighborhood notification. Main Street is subdivided into MS1, MS2, and MS3. The maximum height of buildings in MS1 is 38’, in MS2 it is 65’, and for MS3 it is 100’. While the B-4 Zone District is not limited in height, it is limited in building area to twice the size of the zone lot. With the current zone lot depths available, which zone district allows the largest building is dependent on the size of the property on which the building sits. Eliminating the building area requirement in B-4 allows a developer to size more flexibly a building according to market variables and especially to land and construction costs. The Main Street Zones also allow for about a 10% reduction in parking requirements with the reduction increasing as the size of the project increases. Each of the Main Street Zones has a different bulk plane, which is an outline that a building must fit within wherever it abuts a different zone district. But because the zone districts on both sides of Colfax are residential and primarily R-2, the bulk plane is the same as it is for B-4. Another area of similarly between B-4 and Main Street is in the Uses-By-Right. Uses-By-Right is a list of allowable uses that are assumed to be desirable for each zone district. The lists for B-4 and Main Street are almost identical. However, Main Street has a very tightly defined window area requirement for the Colfax and side streets of the first floor of buildings that heavily favors product retail and general office businesses. Other desirable businesses would be challenged to meet the requirement for reasons of privacy, security, material durability, and energy conservation. To meet the window area decree means that a business would have to have sufficient general office and lobby areas and then have the freedom to cluster them in such a way to avoid design prohibitions. Both sides of Colfax from Irving Street to Sheridan Boulevard are a total of 2.6 miles. Assuming that the proposed parking lane on both sides of the street can provide the necessary pedestrian buffer to attract unprecedented investment activity, the absorption rate for 2.6 miles of product retail and general office may take decades if it happens at all. The zoning solution to West Colfax likely will not be to choose one zone district exclusive to Colfax. As the rezoning process proceeds, property owners will have to evaluate which is more advantageous. The neighborhood will have to decide what variety of uses a city must have to maintain human contact sufficient to make the sidewalk active enough to inhibit criminal activity. The latter goal is what the Main Street window requirement intends to achieve while discouraging other uses the neighborhood needs.

The Urban Neighborhood Transit Stations are shown on the map as Maple Grove and Pleasant Hill. The station references are for the West Line RTD light rail loading platforms at Decatur Street, Knox Court, Perry Street, and the Transit Oriented Development at Sheridan. The recommendation for Male Grove Station is redevelopment of Avondale Shopping Center, the Overlook Apartments, Westridge Homes, and other nearby obsolete and dated public housing into higher density, mixed-income communities. Redevelopment in Pleasant Hill Station is likely near light rail stations and along 10th Avenue where residential structures are standard. Where single-family areas are stable, reinvestment must be done without altering the character of the area. Other recommendations are to improve pedestrian connections from the stations to Colfax, the St. Anthony Redevelopment, the Avondale Shopping Center, and residential districts. Included is implementation of the Lakewood Dry Gulch Master Plan. Other recommendations are to discourage park and ride behavior at the light rail loading platforms by limiting off-street parking and preserving on-street parking for surrounding residential uses.

A plan element that has generated much controversy is a study to reopen Meade Street between 16th and 17th Avenues that separates Centura Senior Life Center and its west parking lot. This street section has been vacated for at least 30 years and provided a previous owner with the design flexibility to create a Planned Unit Development (PUD) 20 years ago. The plan does not substantiate Meade Street’s reopening and promises continued controversy if the issue ever resurfaces. Of course, the issue may be moot if the new owner has building plans for the street.

Another key element of the plan is a raised median in the center of Colfax that would eliminate left turns except at six locations and contradicts the traffic dispersal and connectivity that the plan recommends elsewhere. Eliminating the current level of traffic dispersal the neighborhood enjoys to cross Colfax north-to-south would funnel more traffic onto adjacent residential streets without providing the benefits the plan assumes.

City Council will approve the plan after a public hearing scheduled for September 18. The plan is 180 pages and can be accessed online at
denvergov.org/westcolfaxplan.

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www.denvergov.org/westcolfaxplan