Historic Downtown Golden: New Urbanism the Old Fashioned Way

Panel Discussion, April 16, 2010

Small cities and towns located on the fringe of bigger cities are now part of the urban growth areas and share the planning issues and challenges of urban development in the metropolitain area scale. When well planned and well executed, the development in the centers of these cities and towns provides a good alternative for suburban living. Denver’s metropolitain area is no exception. A good example for successful development in this type of setting is the development in last ten years in Downtown Golden, Colorado. The following panel tells the story of Downtown Golden along with the challenges of investing in complex projects and the merits of encouraging urbanity and quality of life. Our host Mark Heller, Executive Director of Golden Urban Renewal Authority (GURA), not only provided an attractive space for the event but also picked the projects and arranged the three presenters for the panel. CNU Colorado expresses deepest gratitude to Mark Heller and GURA. The texts provided here are shortened and edited versions of the presentations provided on April 16, 2010

Korkut Onaran, President, CNU Colorado

Urbanism and Cohousing Panel

Cohousing: An Introduction

by Jim Leach

Introduction: Panel and Their Communities

by Bryan Bowen

Living in Nomad Cohousing

by Zev Paiss

Living in Hearthstone Cohousing

by Hariett Stobel

Living in Silver Sage Cohousing

A Quick Review of the Golden Urban Renewal Authority and its Projects

Mark Heller

Executive Director, Golden Urban Renewal Authority

by Henry Kroll

Living in Wild Sage Cohousing

by Zev Paiss

Historic Downtown Golden: New Urbanism the Old-Fashioned Way

A Quick Review of GURA and Its Projects

Let me start with telling you things you already know. Urban renewal authorities catalyze redevelopments by sharing back sales and property tax. We are able to use that revenue stream to fund public-private partnerships, public infrastructures, even marketing and business development as long as we can couch it in terms of the prevention and elimination of blight. Blight is a statutory word and I won’t bore you with the definition. In other words, urban renewal works by leveraging property and sales tax increment revenue through direct reinvestment or by facilitating and partnering in private development.

Here is the GURA Boundary (figure 4). This is where we receive our tax money from and this is where we are required to spend it. GURA was formed in 1989 by the City Council, because then Downtown Golden was suffering from high vacancy rates and deteriorating infrastructure. There were literally broken down vehicles and dogs lying in the street. We tore the complete street out from building face to building face and put in all new utilities, widened the sidewalks, added the brick pavers and decorative lighting, changed it from angled to parallel parking, began a façade program, and added other kinds of street furniture. The most important improvement was adding color to the downtown. It looks much better now than in 1989. In the 1990s and early 2000s we did a number of building and public infrastructure projects totaling over four million dollars, which added hundreds of new workers to the downtown.

Now I would like to go through some of these projects quickly. This is Clear Creek Commons (figure 1). It has a strong presence on the street. Here is Golden Gem, an old cinema building (figure 2). Starbucks was one of the original tenants. There is an important balance in a small downtown area between chain stores and independent stores. That was controversial when it went in, but it has been successful for them as well as for the mix of businesses downtown since. Here are the Clear Creek Square (figure 3) that we will talk about soon. Recently we’ve taken on quite a bit of debt to fund the Gateway Station project which Bob West will tell you about that added 35 luxury condos, 10,000 plus square feet commercial, new parking for the residents and a new parking garage, and also to help fund a smaller mixed-use commercial building, Jackson Court, that Brad will talk about.

by Mark Heller

Clear Creek Square: An Urban Mix Use Case Study

by Len McBroom

Living in Hearthstone Cohousing

by Hariett Stobel

Jackson Court Experience

by Brad Haswell

A Short Story of Gateway Station

by James Hale

Figure 4: Golden Urban Renewal Boundary, GURA’s service area and revenue base.

Figure 5: Washington Avenue Bridge

Figure 6: Before the facade improvements

Figure 1: Clear Creek Commons

Figure 7: After the facade improvements

Let me introduce the three projects we will overview today. Len McBroom was involved with the Clear Creek Square PUD. It is a redevelopment of an elementary school site. The school was 1930s or 1940s construction. The school was still functioning. The school district decided to close and relocate it a half mile out of the downtown area but the closing was constroversial It was a significant site for historical preservationists, for people who were teaching at that school, and who had kids going to that school. It was also the first major redevelopment in the downtown area – involving buildings that were a different scale than what we had seen before even though they were architecturally tied to it. It was a big shock to folks. I think the combination of losing of the school and the massive new development were two big pills for the community to swallow especially for those who prided themselves on the small historic feel of Golden. However, it was done and I think we are better for it. That set the stage for the downtown area to be able to grow and change. The PUD created another smaller mixed use project, Jackson Court, that Brad will talk about.

The third project is Gateway Station and Bob West will talk about it. The site it occupied was Hesteds. The property manager was happy to sit on it. He knew eventually someone would pay what he wanted. The building was part of 3 or 4 parcels that he owned. There is a dry cleaning business behind the Gateway Station site at the corner of 13th and Washington. The property owner was a wise guy. He knew if he ever sold the big parcel separately from the small parcel that was contaminated, he’d never sell the small parcel. That together with a high purchase price left it undeveloped for twenty years. It wasn’t until Nexcore decided to put ego aside and give the old man his money, which was an epiphany. Let’s not get too wrapped up in why this guy is asking too much for his property; let’s see if we can make money at his purchase price. GURA was not going to condemn it because of prior history he had with the city. So our only choice was to work with Nexcore and give him his exorbitant price. We got it redeveloped after decades and now we have a great new corner.

Figure 2: Golden Gem Building

Figure 3: Clear Creek Square

We also do all kinds of smaller things that people don’t notice as much. For instance, we have decorated one of the brand new parking structures with banners based on work by Golden artists or Golden themes. If you haven’t been to downtown Golden for the holiday lights, you really should (figure 5). It’s brilliant. We also developed some pocket parks. We redid the street pole banners with a photo contest featuring local photographers. We have all sorts of minor projects – streetscape, power-washing, parking enforcement, resource efficiency, business development, including websites and e-commerce. Facade improvements are an imporant part of what we finance as well. Here are the before and after pictures of redoing facades right next to our welcome arch (figures 6 and 7).