DENVER | Main Development Thread #7

[gopokes21]

Apologies for being redundant, but just to recap, here is a long list of alternatives to tearing down neighborhoods for EIFS boxes and McMansions:

- Historic preservation
- Subdividing older structures
- Eliminating parking minimum requirements
- Mid-rise, small-lot infill
- Accessory dwelling units by right
- Disincentivizing land speculation with a new tax
- Developing parking lots and empty lots
- Repurposing abandoned buildings (churches, schools, offices, etc)
- Redeveloping blighted corridors (Colorado, Federal, Colfax etc)
- Consolidating public services to free up public-owned sites
- More density around train stations
- Making it easier to maximize density along major corridors and TOD areas
- Streamlining laws that effect condo sales

We CAN grow and have nice things, too! I love Denver and hope we stay "Denver" as we eventually become a city of a million people. Let Dallas be Dallas or whatever.

[The Dirt]

Originally Posted by bunt_q

My views haven't changed. When you guys stopped believing in middle ground, compromise, policy over ideology, and turned every issue, even unrelated ones, into a goddamn race war, that is what has changed. I still want to build big, build fast, and build tall. I don't think you need to declare war on white privilege to do it. Those are separate issues. Just because somebody wrote a book once on the history of redlining doesn't mean everything is about that.

Look, you want to paint us as some sort of radicals simply because one of the dozens of issues we've taken on is race-based zoning, you're welcome to that. You know as well as anyone that we've done a lot more, so don't try to paint us through the lens of an occasional Facebook notification. We're also fighting against the left NIMBYs, who think every "luxury" apartment development on a brownfield site is going to displace folks 5 miles away. Gentrification exists not due to the young white people moving to historically black and Latino neighborhoods, but because older (gasp, mostly white) people won't let them move to the neighborhoods that they want to by limiting housing supply. Their relatively deeper pockets aren't deep enough when compared to people who've had ridiculous equity gains by limiting the stock of housing in the most desirable neighborhoods.

Agree to disagree on this one. 9th and Colorado ended up with 1,100 units. If that had been 3,100 units it would be a better project, and you could have preserved 2,000 Congress Park bungalows. And the practicalities of real estate development are such that you could upzone all of Congress Park and not see 2,000 new units for decades. But you would probably see 200. And piss off a whole lot of people in the process. Who then, guess what, fight you the next time you want to rezone for 3,000 instead of 1,000.

If you guys actually focused on the substance of the issues, you would see that you are focused on the wrong things if you want to effect change. But you either lack the subject matter expertise, or you prefer the ideological "pure" battles; I am not sure which it is. But that is what I see as having changed.

Why can't we do both? 9th and Colorado are opportunities that come up once every 20 years. We get NIMBYs in those situations, whether they're worried about their pocketbooks, faux preservationists, neighborhood character pearl-clutchers, or explicitly racist. The point is it's not 3,300 units because of NIMBYs.

What I don't want to do is relegate density to certain areas only. We only have so many more hospitals left that can move out of town. What we're talking about is converting industrial land to multi-family residential. Maybe that's all that's going to work in Denver, but I don't want this city to be a split between Mayberry and Manhattan.

I actually disagree that the mass upzoning produces better results, or more housing over the long term, because it can't deliver at scale. The notion that we are going to organically redevelop our neighborhoods with gentle density one lot at a time over the years is a little bit naïve and out of touch with how the vast majority of development, even infill development, occurs today. Just look at how damned expensive it is to build a single ADU...

I see your point, but we're talking about 85% of Denver's land area. Changing SU zoning to TU or some sort of TU+ that allows triplexes or quads is not a silver bullet, but it's certainly going to help and it's going to put young families with kids into neighborhoods they want to be in. It's also going to get everyone else comfortable with the idea that duplexes aren't ruining their neighborhoods, because they fucking haven't and won't. Telling people that you can live in a highrise apartment somewhere by the tracks while you're young, but if you want to start a family, go move to Wisconsin does not make for a great city. By the way, new builds are fucking expensive, ADU or not. However, fighting the ADU rezoning fight is still worth it when you can provide folks with an opportunity to add a separate entrance to their basements and call it an ADU. It still provides value when you can clean out and plumb your literal historic carriage home at 7th and Lafayette. All individual drops in the bucket still help collectively.

In the meantime, the high-profile fights - a parking lot here, a parking lot there - actually set the tone and the precedent for how zoning fights take place in our City. How CPD approaches them, how Council approaches them, how RNOs approach them, and most importantly, how developers approach them. I have no way to quantify this, but I assure you the legacy of that god forsaken No High Rises in West Highlands fight, in terms of political shifts, and most damagingly, risks never taken by subsequent developers to avoid long and bloody fights, has cost us more density and more housing units in this City than we would build in a decade following Minneapolis-style reform. Every project that shaves one floor here, or accepts an necessary setback there, results in dozens of units lost. You'd have to wipe out a lot of white bread single family housing stock to replace what is surrendered to neighborhoods and Council every day on projects, relative to what developers would build absent those pressures (often, even within the current zoning!). And those precedent setting fights that developers lose on are the "bigger opportunities" I am talking about.

It's not like YIMBYs have somehow managed to escape the "developer shill" criticism by wrapping themselves in a cloak of racial equity. Nobody is fooled by that. It just seems disingenuous.

We're still showing up to ever Denargo rezoning fight and contentious rezoning. We're still working with CPD and council to upzone neighborhoods to allow ADUs. You've decided that in addition to that, fighting for racial equity through creating housing opportunity to build generational wealth isn't a fight worth having and that we're dumb to do that. I disagree.

[gopokes21]

Originally Posted by The Dirt

We're also fighting against the left NIMBYs, who think every "luxury" apartment development on a brownfield site is going to displace folks 5 miles away. Gentrification exists not due to the young white people moving to historically black and Latino neighborhoods, but because older (gasp, mostly white) people won't let them move to the neighborhoods that they want to by limiting housing supply. Their relatively deeper pockets aren't deep enough when compared to people who've had ridiculous equity gains by limiting the stock of housing in the most desirable neighborhoods.

I agree with all of this. What I don't understand is we we can't find a strategic middle ground where we infill as much as possible while still keeping "desirable neighborhoods" desirable.

There's good things about every single Denver neighborhood. Why don't we keep those things at all cost, and let developers build around what we have now?

The problem is Denver has gotten itself into a technically-virtuous cycle of higher-income in-migration. In this dynamic, renters and lower-income homeowners are extremely vulnerable. The answer to this problem isn't more housing instability and development chaos.

[coolmandan03]

Originally Posted by gopokes21

And maybe we should also add mass transit (subway at some point?) to a neighborhood if we're going to double or triple its population density over a decade.

Can't afford rail to the places they already increased taxes in 2006 for - but lets plan a subway! I have a feeling you have researched tunneling cost (about $350,000 per foot)

[laniroj]

Originally Posted by gopokes21

Urban economics has this tendency to redevelop the same parcel every 20 years, because that's what the market really wants above all else, while leaving everything a mile away less dense. Planning has the opportunity to "provide clarity" and focus development forces where it actually improves the whole of the city, instead of redeveloping the same parcel every 20 years. When you provide a framework with guardrails for the private market, you start moving the ball forward instead of one step forward and one step backward all the time.

What am I missing here? Lots are redeveloping every 20 years? Where? China?Mars? Hell, depreciation is 39.5 years so if the useful lifespan of a building is only 20 years all property owners are getting hosed!

We are a long way off from a balanced medium of planning and adequate housing supply. The nature of government is to grow, thus why planning is such a hard thing to get right. All of the places that folks want to save and love the most, including all those lovely historic things you speak of, were developed BEFORE rigorous, burdensome, prescriptive zoning standards. What are people so afraid of? The current system is not working nor is it even close to working - there is ample evidence of that. We are building less interesting places and projects and segregating uses more intricately since zoning came about and it seems to me EVERYONE thinks that what is happening now is not better than what happened 100 years ago.

In general, I do not think most on here or the general public understand just how prescriptive zoning and design standards have become. Setbacks, height, road width, life/safety access, parking requirements and stall sizes, mandatory turn radius for a hook and ladder truck to fight a single family home fire, building opening %'s, build-to requirements, etc etc the list goes on. ALL of these (often overlapping) standards and requirements are contributing to and helping create boring and homogeneous development. Could many developers step up and do a better job, absolutely there is no debate on that, but don't for one second think that the more requirements and prescriptive standards will produce more interesting places - that will not work.

Example: I'd love to go out a build a food truck court adjacent to one of my projects and in fact have tried to do so. It's not possible in the City of Denver (unless of course the City does it on public property where they don't have to follow all of their own standards). Plus those food trucks can't be within 500 feet from an existing restaurant - so basically no where in the center city with a zoning that would accommodate restaurant use. The devil is always in the details and so much of our discussion on here is high level. The folks executing these projects and administering this zoning are dealing with hundreds of pages of standards and details, all of which effectively limit what can and cannot be done. if you don't believe me, start reading the neighborhood plans, station area plans, zoning code, building code and amendments, green codes and programs, etc...

[wong21fr]

Originally Posted by bunt_q

Nobody, nobody, thinks Cherry Creek or Douglas County schools are beneath DPS. Unfortunately.

Plenty of people think Douglas County Schools are beneath DPS- just not the one's in Highlands Ranch or Parker. Just like people in DPS look down on Montbello and Green Valley Ranch, but not schools in Wash Park, University, Central Park, etc. Can't say anything about Cherry Creek, specifically Cherry Creek HS, it's the gold standard for the Front Range. Except when you get into the Cherry Creek Schools in Aurora, then people start looking down on them.

All this swirls around whether a school is too brown/black, too white, or that nice sweet-spot of diversity fueled by upper middle class households pouring their money and attention into the school.

Once again, race and socio-economic status rears it's head. Because everything is about race at this point when you're talking about neighborhoods in Denver. Is it any wonder that YIMBY Denver is constantly virtue signalling?

[gopokes21]

Originally Posted by laniroj

What am I missing here? Lots are redeveloping every 20 years? Where? China?Mars? Hell, depreciation is 39.5 years so if the useful lifespan of a building is only 20 years all property owners are getting hosed!

Real estate development does not strictly follow MACRS accounting principles. Just off the top of my head...

1. The restaurants at 7th and Grant - how recently were those gut renovated?
2. First gen (RENT-era) "urban living" townhomes throughout LoHi and Uptown routinely get demo'd for land assembly and ultimately big boxes.
3. The Golden Triangle no longer resembles a neighborhood from any one era because it's been redeveloped cyclically.
4. Everything on Speer gets demolished every 20-30 years throughout history.
5. Cherry Creek Whole Foods, and encompassing block, is about to be demolished well before the 30 year mark. I think the City participated in building that Clayton garage like 10 years ago?
6. Breweries throughout RiNo are being torn down just 10 years after being gut reno'd from shell condition.

What you're missing is that a site's potential HBU (highest & best use) frequently dwarfs what is currently there even with depreciation tricks and high-end tenants. In fact, you viewing Denver development through the lens of sitting on a property for 39.5 years to maximize the depreciation schedule, explains the rest of what you've said.

Development pressure here isn't yet as abusive in say, Houston (or Dallas) where a row of new slot homes got demo'd before anyone even moved in, for Trammell Crow (also one of the usual suspects here in Denver) to tear them all down for a 730-unit complex.

https://www.texasmonthly.com/article...l-estate-boom/

"It was on the eastern edge of this neighborhood that I saw one of the most classically Houston real estate business phenomena ever. Not far from Yale Street and adjacent to a large vacant lot, a small-time developer bought and knocked down a few old bungalows and replaced them with a line of town houses. Before anyone moved in, Trammell Crow Residential bought and demolished them to make way for one of two upscale mid-rise apartment complexes now sprawling over the site. The 730 new units added to the already-cramped neighborhood—the city has done little or nothing to alleviate traffic on increasingly overburdened Yale Street—are renting for between $1,500 a month, for a 630-square-foot one-bedroom, and $2,860, for a plush two-bedroom."

We are a long way off from a balanced medium of planning and adequate housing supply. The nature of government is to grow, thus why planning is such a hard thing to get right. All of the places that folks want to save and love the most, including all those lovely historic things you speak of, were developed BEFORE rigorous, burdensome, prescriptive zoning standards. What are people so afraid of? The current system is not working nor is it even close to working - there is ample evidence of that. We are building less interesting places and projects and segregating uses more intricately since zoning came about and it seems to me EVERYONE thinks that what is happening now is not better than what happened 100 years ago.

It's not very novel to say something has changed for the worst, coinciding with an expansion in government. What's changed isn't the size of government or extent of urban planning, but rather the advanced-stage commodification of real estate. I'm not saying "housing as a commodity" is good or bad, but it's undeniable. There is a very sophisticated commercial real estate industry here in Denver that just does things differently than in Denver of old.

We've had highly-prescriptive city plans before. In fact, Denver is one of the best examples of the "City Beautiful" movement. Those prescriptive plans required less bureaucracy to implement than permitting some out-of-state REIT's (who will eventually sue everyone who touches their transaction) latest $150 million boxy beast. Gee I wonder why.

I abhor that "City Beautiful" coincided with redlining and abject racism in housing, but today we have an opportunity to achieve similar progressive advancements with an added focus on racial equity.

In general, I do not think most on here or the general public understand just how prescriptive zoning and design standards have become. Setbacks, height, road width, life/safety access, parking requirements and stall sizes, mandatory turn radius for a hook and ladder truck to fight a single family home fire, building opening %'s, build-to requirements, etc etc the list goes on. ALL of these (often overlapping) standards and requirements are contributing to and helping create boring and homogeneous development. Could many developers step up and do a better job, absolutely there is no debate on that, but don't for one second think that the more requirements and prescriptive standards will produce more interesting places - that will not work.

I disagree that the problem with development is setbacks, road width, life safety, fire department access, etc. Call me old fashioned, but I'd say those are all good things.

I agree that parking minimums should be eliminated city-wide. I still happen to believe that handicap spaces and other stall "attributes" (not just size) should be regulated.

Example: I'd love to go out a build a food truck court adjacent to one of my projects and in fact have tried to do so. It's not possible in the City of Denver (unless of course the City does it on public property where they don't have to follow all of their own standards). Plus those food trucks can't be within 500 feet from an existing restaurant - so basically no where in the center city with a zoning that would accommodate restaurant use. The devil is always in the details and so much of our discussion on here is high level. The folks executing these projects and administering this zoning are dealing with hundreds of pages of standards and details, all of which effectively limit what can and cannot be done. if you don't believe me, start reading the neighborhood plans, station area plans, zoning code, building code and amendments, green codes and programs, etc...

Maybe we don't need a food truck court. It's not a great use of space, aside from Friday nights when it's busy.

[gopokes21]

Originally Posted by coolmandan03

Can't afford rail to the places they already increased taxes in 2006 for - but lets plan a subway! I have a feeling you have researched tunneling cost (about $350,000 per foot)

Sorry, nobody (except Gov. Polis and other Boulder leaders) cares whether Boulder has a low-ridership train or not. I can think of infinitely better uses of $2-3 billion (subway to under-served parts of the urban core).

[wong21fr]

Originally Posted by gopokes21

I agree with all of this. What I don't understand is we we can't find a strategic middle ground where we infill as much as possible while still keeping "desirable neighborhoods" desirable.

There's good things about every single Denver neighborhood. Why don't we keep those things at all cost, and let developers build around what we have now?

My bargain on this would be a city-wide upzoning coupled with design overlays. Let neighborhoods determine what materials and building forms are best suited to maintain their respective characters while allowing additional density and living situations. You'd end up with costlier developments due to the design review, but you'd (hopefully) set a generational change in motion to allow neighborhoods to move from a single family dominant model to a more diverse mix while still maintaining that collective design sense that people associate with certain neighborhoods.

The problem is Denver has gotten itself into a technically-virtuous cycle of higher-income in-migration. In this dynamic, renters and lower-income homeowners are extremely vulnerable. The answer to this problem isn't more housing instability and development chaos.

Even doing nothing is going to create more instability and chaos. Congress Park will be gutted for McMansions because a) people want to live there and b) those people have the budgets to wipe out/remodel every single bungalow in the current environment and get rid to the lower-class individuals who are not homeowners. Something does have to change.

[wong21fr]

Originally Posted by gopokes21

Sorry, nobody (except Gov. Polis and other Boulder leaders) cares whether Boulder has a low-ridership train or not. I can think of infinitely better uses of $2-3 billion (subway to under-served parts of the urban core).

Boulder, Longmont, and Polis care. Those three have enough power to make sure it happens before a subway in low-density streetcar neighborhoods can happen.

[The Dirt]

Good God, we just got another TakeFive clone who thinks their opinion stacks up against professional developers, planners, and reams of research and articles because their gut makes them feel a certain way.

[gopokes21]

Originally Posted by The Dirt

Good God, we just got another TakeFive clone who thinks their opinion stacks up against professional developers, planners, and reams of research and articles because their gut makes them feel a certain way.

Sorry, you're obviously talking about me, so I suppose I've overstepped. I'll step back.

Proceed with bemoaning every policy and plan in a city that's main problem is being too desirable.

[coolmandan03]

Originally Posted by gopokes21

Sorry, nobody (except Gov. Polis and other Boulder leaders) cares whether Boulder has a low-ridership train or not. I can think of infinitely better uses of $2-3 billion (subway to under-served parts of the urban core).

I see. So we need to tax them (because they're in RTD), but we should only spend money on the inner city core and close surrounding neighborhoods. That'll work.. Just like it does for Parker

[gopokes21]

Originally Posted by coolmandan03

I see. So we need to tax them (because they're in RTD), but we should only spend money on the inner city core and close surrounding neighborhoods. That'll work.. Just like it does for Parker

Newsflash: Everyone is looking to leave RTD

We spend hardly anything on mass transit serving the inner city - I guess the outdated Welton Street light rail, and the MallRide (which is RTD's best service). Most of Denver's core is a transit donut hole, with ever-increasing traffic, pedestrian safety and parking issues. We just spent $6 billion on mass transit that skips the inner city, serves the Airport and some suburbs, which upsets all the other suburbs who then blame Denver.

We're operating buses and trains across thousands of square miles, from Longmont down to Castle Rock, and nobody is particularly happy except for the 9-5 commuters in a few important suburbs.

We've had the RTD debate for pages upon pages on here so I should really let it go, but that's a very baiting comment.

[TakeFive]

Originally Posted by bunt_q

Nobody, nobody, thinks Cherry Creek or Douglas County schools are beneath DPS. Unfortunately.

Now that was hilarious!

Originally Posted by wong21fr

Plenty of people think Douglas County Schools are beneath DPS- just not the one's in Highlands Ranch or Parker. Just like people in DPS look down on Montbello and Green Valley Ranch, but not schools in Wash Park, University, Central Park, etc. Can't say anything about Cherry Creek, specifically Cherry Creek HS, it's the gold standard for the Front Range. Except when you get into the Cherry Creek Schools in Aurora, then people start looking down on them.

All this swirls around whether a school is too brown/black, too white, or that nice sweet-spot of diversity fueled by upper middle class households pouring their money and attention into the school.

I like your more nuanced perspective.

Schools tend to be judged primarily by academic performance and/or athletic performance. But the better (if impossible) way to evaluate school districts is by how well they serve their total student population.

Cherry Creek Schools
Not counting Boulder, CCSD is far and away the Best Run school district. They can check the academic box as well as athletics box but they are also well regarded by parents of "Special Needs" children as well as more basic 'learning disabilities'. Their breadth of educational services for their total student profile is outstanding.

CCSD hasn't lost an election for more funding since the 1960's. This not only allows for 'capability' but provides for better planning and efficiency. CCSD is right at 50% 'white' from a low of 26% at one HS to a high of 66% at another HS.

Aurora certainly an has ample supply of subsidized housing (etc) but I have a warm spot in my heart for the many parents who work two jobs so that their children can attend Cherry Creek Schools.

DougCo Schools
Aside from the political dissonance, the schools benefit from good demographics, good funding, good teachers etc so yeah their school are quite good.

JeffCo Schools
If you want to predict the outcome of an election for needed funding - flip a coin. One could say the schools are efficient (out of necessity); not really the best way to run a school district. Schools themselves are fine.

Adams Co Schools
may work with the tightest budget and demographic challenges but it appears they have a good collection of dedicated educators.

Denver Schools
I would use a different lens to evaluate Denver Schools. With the largest student population and being an urban district their challenges run the gamut. I am impressed with their support of public charter schools. Despite various controversies, their effort to provide for a large and very diverse population is impressive IMO. The schools are generally well funded and generally liked and appreciated by the parents.

[TakeFive]

You want to know what's wrong with me... I'll tell you what's wrong
"You can't handle the Truth" - Jack Nicholson

Originally Posted by The Dirt

Good God, we just got another TakeFive clone who thinks their opinion stacks up against professional developers, planners, and reams of research and articles because their gut makes them feel a certain way.

Non-Urban Alert; It is said that:

"You can take the boy out of the country but you can't take the country out of the boy."

So for those times when I get into a nostalgic mood of Colorado I'll dial up an old favorite of mine.

John Denver ♥ Take Me Home

Country roads, take me home
To the place I belong
West Virginia, mountain mama
Take me home, country roads

On other occasions I'll have a different Colorado/country mood.

Some have called "This Land Is Your Land" an alternative national anthem. A product of the Great Depression, Woodie Guthrie's song dates back to 1944. Bruce Springsteen covered the song in 2018.

Bruce Springsteen - This Land is Your Land (Woody Guthrie)

When the sun come shining, then I was strolling
And the wheat fields waving and the dust clouds rolling
The voice come a-chanting and the fog was lifting
This land was made for you and me

Don't take life so seriously that you fail to smell the (country) roses or enjoy the music-videos.

[bunt_q]

Originally Posted by coolmandan03

I see. So we need to tax them (because they're in RTD), but we should only spend money on the inner city core and close surrounding neighborhoods. That'll work.. Just like it does for Parker

You're kidding, right? Such typical Boulder arrogance (We deserve a train...wahhh.) Boulder literally has its own entire bus network, funded and operated by RTD. Draw me a circle around another patch of 95,000 people anywhere in the metro area that has that same concentration of service. You won't find one.

Originally Posted by wong21fr

Plenty of people think Douglas County Schools are beneath DPS- just not the one's in Highlands Ranch or Parker. Just like people in DPS look down on Montbello and Green Valley Ranch, but not schools in Wash Park, University, Central Park, etc. Can't say anything about Cherry Creek, specifically Cherry Creek HS, it's the gold standard for the Front Range. Except when you get into the Cherry Creek Schools in Aurora, then people start looking down on them.?

I am genuinely curious which you think are the acceptable DPS high schools these days (as I plan out the future...wondering my options...wanting to tee it up so they can follow in their fancy mother's footsteps; obviously not their father's). We are in East so I figure we are good to go. I am interested in the direction South is heading. I'd move to Cherry Creek schools before I move to Stapleton, but I assume they are on the list too (Northfield, is it?).

[Sam Hill]

Originally Posted by Ich

people in the most current generations

Everyone alive on this earth is current.

[gopokes21]

Originally Posted by bunt_q

You're kidding, right? Such typical Boulder arrogance (We deserve a train...wahhh.) Boulder literally has its own entire bus network, funded and operated by RTD. Draw me a circle around another patch of 95,000 people anywhere in the metro area that has that same concentration of service. You won't find one.



I am genuinely curious which you think are the acceptable DPS high schools these days (as I plan out the future...wondering my options...wanting to tee it up so they can follow in their fancy mother's footsteps; obviously not their father's). We are in East so I figure we are good to go. I am interested in the direction South is heading. I'd move to Cherry Creek schools before I move to Stapleton, but I assume they are on the list too (Northfield, is it?).

I'm definitely staying close to East so that my kids can go there. Very impressed with their culture.

I think North is also becoming somewhat like East, maybe a little more diverse, which is great. I think most families in DPS value diversity which is obviously a totally different planet than the suburban districts. Study to ace a test vs. study to ace life.

[bunt_q]

I'd be somewhat content for them to ace the test. Ivy still opens doors... you don't have to be any good at life with that on your resume.