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The first Downtown Denver Area Plan was initiated in 1986. Fueled by the energy boom, office towers had been built throughout the city. The 16th Street Mall had just been completed. There was little housing or nightlife, no sporting venues and no light rail. LoDo was primarily a warehouse district, and the Central Platte Valley was a sea of rail yards. Surrounding neighborhoods were isolated from Downtown by a maze of surface parking lots.
In the end, a remarkable series of projects identified as next ste ps by the 1986 Plan came to fruition, including the historic preservation of LoDo, the redevelopment of the Central Platte Valley and the improved connectivity between adjacent neighborhoods and Downtown. The many changes that have taken place in Downtown since 1986 set the stage for a new plan—a challenge taken on by the 2007 Downtown Denver Area Plan.
Ultimately, seven transformative projects were identified. They included: energizing the commercial core, building on transit, creating grand boulevards, embracing adjacent neighborhoods, connecting the Auraria campus to Downtown, molding Arapahoe Square into a new neighborhood and rejuvenating the Civic Center. Denver City Council agreed with the vision, and in July of 2007 they adopted the Downtown Denver Area Plan.
Today our urban core has a new set of priorities that include being “prosperous, walkable, diverse, distinctive, and green”. As a document of aspirations, the 2007 Downtown Area Plan will help our city usher in a new era of development, growth and connectivity.
The 2007 Plan, managed by the City and County of Denver and Downtown Denver Partnership, focused on a highly participatory process including Technical Committee meetings, Steering Committee Meetings, stakeholder interviews, educational sessions and public meetings to gather insight and feedback from the community. In the end, nearly 2,000 voices contributed to the Plan, making the process truly a collaborative effort towards bringing our center city even closer to its fullest potential.
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