Lakewood, Colorado October 2013
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Preliminary Feasibility Study Lakewood, Colorado October 2013 Prepared for SC SUSTAINABLE COMMUNITIES INITIATIVE DENVER REGIONAL COUNCIL OF GOVERNMENTS City of Lakewood 40 West Arts Denver Regional District Council of Governments ARTSPACE 250 Third Avenue N., Suite 500 Minneapolis, MN 55401 612.333.9012 www.artspace.org Introduction he City of Lakewood, Colorado, owes its name to a railroad man, W. A. H. Loveland, who platted its first lots in the 1880s. But it owes much of its mid-20th century T growth to America’s love of the automobile and the commercial activities that support the “love of the open road” lifestyle. Before the interstate system was built, U.S. Route 40 was the main drag between Denver and Salt Lake City, and it passed right through the heart of Lakewood on West Colfax Avenue. Although I-70 has supplanted U.S. 40 as the path of preference through the Rockies, West Colfax Avenue remains a major thoroughfare, and much of its historic character has survived. Indeed, to drive along West Looking west along Colfax Avenue in the late 1960s (Photo: Wikipedia Commons) Colfax Avenue today is to be reminded of an era when gas stations, roadside diners and indie motels were staples of the American landscape. But Lakewood itself has moved far past the 1950s. Today it has more than 140,000 residents and is the fifth largest city in Colorado, trailing only Denver, Colorado Springs, Aurora, and Fort Collins. A measure of its status is the new W light rail line, which opened earlier this year, connecting Union Station in downtown Denver to the Jefferson County Courthouse in Golden. Seven of the W line’s 13 stations are in Lakewood. For much of its route, the line runs beside West 13th Avenue, two blocks south of Colfax. In 2011, with the W line under construction, the City began to explore opportunities for creating an arts district in the vicinity of the Lamar Street station. Lamar is not a major street, and the station itself is a simple platform – a far cry from The Lamar Street light rail station the spectacular two-story station that 1 bridges Wadsworth Boulevard, one stop to the west. But Lamar has something that Wadsworth can’t match: the Rocky Mountain College of Art and Design (RMCAD), a private four-year institution with more than 500 students. The east end of the 24-acre RMCAD campus is four blocks straight north of the station, and if you were to draw a line between them, Colfax Avenue would cross it at the midpoint. Out of this geographic propinquity was born the 40 West Arts District, an area centered, as its name suggests, on the historic West Colfax Avenue corridor, which still bears the U.S. 40 designation. Recently recognized as an “emerging creative district” by Colorado Creative Industries, a division of the Colorado Office of Economic Development & International Trade, 40 West is administered by a volunteer nonprofit organization whose mission is “to enrich the community and support the creative, cultural, and economic vitality of the region.” Its office, near the intersection of Colfax and Teller Street, contains a gallery and an 80-seat black box theater with a resident ensemble, the Edge Theatre, that is mounting eight shows this season. Although it is young, 40 West has already established itself as a force in the area. It has sponsored a variety of low-budget arts activities, including the painting of a colorful mural on the side of a building that is visible to eastbound traffic on Colfax. It has established strong relationships with the City of Lakewood, the West Colfax Community Association, and the Lakewood-West Colfax Business Improvement District, whose Executive Director, Bill Marino, also serves as Chair of the 40 West Board. Earlier this year, in partnership with 40 West and with financial support from the Denver Regional Council of Governments, the City of Lakewood invited Artspace to conduct a Preliminary Feasibility Visit to assess the potential for an affordable live/work project for artists in the 40 West Arts District. The visit took place Aug. 21-23, 2013. Artspace was represented by Wendy Holmes, Senior Vice President for Consulting and Strategic Partnerships; Roy Close, Vice President for Special Projects; Felicia Harmon, an Artspace consultant based in Loveland, Colorado; and Matthew Rucker, an artist who resides in the Northern Warehouse Artists Cooperative, an Artspace mixed-use project in Saint Paul, Minnesota. This report contains our findings and recommendations for next steps. 2 Findings: Project Concept uring a Preliminary Feasibility Visit, Artspace gathers information about six main issues: project concept, artist market, site feasibility, financial feasibility, local Dleadership, and sustainable community impact. Of these, the starting point – and the most all-encompassing – is the project concept, the vision that the community hopes to bring to life by means of an Artspace development. If the project were a train, the project concept would be the engine. Some communities are clear about what they hope to accomplish. It may involve preserving a specific building, or it may involve a broader concept such as economic revitalization of a neighborhood. Other communities, however, look to us to guide them through the process of determining whether an arts project makes sense for them – and, if so, what kind of arts project it should be. Still other communities have a general idea of what they would like to achieve but seek professional advice about how to proceed. In Lakewood, the project concept is Davies Chuck Wagon Diner, a stainless steel relic from clearly defined. It revolves around the 1950s, is on West Colfax Avenue. Its 36-foot-high three main goals: cowboy sign is a Lakewood icon. (Photo: Pam Moris- Dorrance) • Revitalization of the West Colfax Avenue corridor West Colfax Avenue is a long street with multiple challenges. It came of age in an era when long-distance travel by car meant slower speeds and more frequent stops for fuel, meals, and lodging. But those days are long gone, and so is the cross-country traffic that used to keep Colfax Avenue humming. Today the street looks old and tired. Many of its storefronts are empty, many of its surviving businesses are barely hanging on, and it is far from a pedestrian-friendly environment. In the twelve-block stretch between Harlan and Teller Streets, the unofficial boundaries of the 40 West Arts District, far too much space is occupied by used car dealerships, budget motels, fast food restaurants, and above all by parking lots. In the five-block stretch between Kendall and Pierce Streets, the north side of Colfax is given over to the JCRS Shopping Center, a large, aging, underutilized1960s-vintage shopping center that is 3 famous as the home of the popular Mexican restaurant Casa Bonita, a Lakewood landmark, and a few other businesses, but has little else going for it. And because the shopping center is set well back from the street, its contribution to the streetscape is essentially that of a mammoth, unkempt parking lot. Across the street, the south side of Colfax is a mix of small stand-alone commercial buildings – an archipelago of bricks, steel, and glass in a sea of asphalt. Revitalizing the corridor will be a huge undertaking, but the City appears eager to tackle it. The arrival of the W light rail line and the Lamar Street station, which is two blocks south of the shopping center’s eastern end, appear to have focused the City’s attention on this part of the corridor. We repeatedly heard the JCRS Shopping Center described as “ground zero” or the “epicenter” of the City’s redevelopment efforts in the corridor. A new Colfax-Lamar intersection, with traffic lights and dedicated bicycle and pedestrian lanes, is already in the works, as is a roundabout with improved pedestrian and bicycle crossings and public art sculpture at 14th and Lamar, and a large piece of public art for the Lamar Street station. • Establishing a permanent population of artists in the 40 West Arts District Not yet two years old, the 40 West Arts District has already made its presence felt in the corridor – witnessed not only by the colorful mural that now enlivens the north side of Colfax Avenue between Reed and Saulsbury Streets, but also by an impressive list of less visible accomplishments, including the aforementioned state designation as a creative district; more than a hundred artist members; productive partnerships with the City of Lakewood, the local business improvement district, RMCAD, and adjacent neighborhood associations; establishment of a fully This colorful mural, designed by Lakewood artist Johanna Parker and painted by volunteers in a funded Artist in Residence program at weekend, is an early 40 West initiative. Lamar Station Crossing; active public relations and social media support for other galleries and arts-related activities in the area; and an ambitious schedule of 10 exhibitions per year at its own gallery. Area artists appear solidly lined up behind the new organization. Establishing a permanent population of artists in the corridor will enhance the efforts already underway to transform the Colfax corridor into a true arts district destination with the power to catalyze redevelopment. 4 • Transit-oriented development that relates to the Lamar Street station. The City of Lakewood has made transit oriented development (TOD) around the Lamar Street light rail station a major priority. Indeed, the first TOD housing project on the W line, Lamar Station Crossing, is under construction at 6150 W. 13th Avenue, almost directly across the street from the station. It is a 110-unit Low Income Housing Tax Credit project with an 80%-20% mix of affordable and market rate units; it will also have five live/work spaces for creatives on the ground floor – with one unit already dedicated to the 40 West Artist in Residence Program.