What's the closest real-life analog to the city Boulder *should have been*?

[Cirrus]

By all natural/market accounts, Boulder should be a much bigger city of maybe 300,000ish people. Instead, thanks to decades of NIMBYism that's pushed growth out to more and more suburban/car-dependent places, Boulder has stagnated around 100,000 for a long time. Of course the growth came anyway, it just didn't happen in Boulder.

Let's do a little thought exercise. Hypothetically, had Boulder taken its fair share of growth and managed it responsibly, what would the city look like today? Are they any real-life analogs out there?

[Cirrus]

The first thing that comes to mind for me in Madison, Wisconsin:

• 250,000 people in the city limits, 400,000 in the urbanized area.
• College town
• Nicely planned, walkable downtown. A "nice" city.
• It even has a height limit.

Seems pretty close, but on the other hand there are definitely some big differences: It's a state capitol and is 80 miles from Milwaukee, so it's a lot more independent than Boulder ever would have been from Denver. Plus, y'know, lakes instead of mountains. And I've never been to Madison so I don't really know much about it except for what I see online.

Any others?


Ryerson Aircraft

[EngiNerd]

I would say Portland would be it's closest peer city if it were allowed to grow more naturally, albiet the scale of the city is obviously larger in Portland, but the feel and density is very similar.

[Cirrus]

You know, even though Portland has like 2 million people in its metro area, I *did* really think the Pearl District felt a lot like a naturally-bigger Boulder. That's a great answer IMO.

[bunt_q]

On the other end of the spectrum, looking slightly smaller than where Boulder is today. I think Fort Collins is on a trajectory, maybe 10-20 years earlier on its growth curve, that is not unlike where Boulder would have been headed had they not flipped the switch on growth. Boulder is denser now by virtue of decades of slow growth within a very constrained area. But give Fort Collins 20 years, looking out to 2040, and it's projected to be at right about 500,000 people. I think they will be denser than Boulder by then, and probably will have struck a balance between good infill and greenfield growth that represents what Boulder could have (and should have) been.

[austingood]

Interesting thoughts- Fort Collins is planning toward a 250,000 population upon build out in the city proper. Pretty much all of that growth will come from infill, there's only one part of the gma (named Mountain Vista NW of town) that has the capacity for a lot of greenfield development. For reference we're about 160,000 people at this point.

[bunt_q]

So with those numbers (250k city, 500k metro), Fort Collins is basically going to be where Madison is today, based on what Cirrus posted above. Neat.

[seventwenty]

I looked at various college towns (and Denver) with about 100,000 people, many with a larger city nearby with 100 miles or so. It's only a "off the top of my head" search, but what I found is interesting. A bunch of these places really don't have the growth I thought they would. https://www.google.com/publicdata/ex...l=en&ind=false

[seventwenty]

And here's a Google population growth chart for just Boulder County and its various municipalities. Some places--like Gunbarrel, Niwot, and Valmont-- aren't included on Google. So I couldn't include them.