FasTracks Gearing Up

If you've driven the I-25 corridor between Broadway and Lincoln Avenue lately, you've seen those small glass-and-white steel structures that signal a light rail station. Behind the obvious building of the tracks, life of another kind has sprouted and begun to take root at the stations. With service planned to start by the end of next year, many of the 14 new stations along

I-25 and I-225 already have started building out their development plans.

Consumers also have kept an eye on what's emerging at the stations. The Louisiana Station Lofts at the Louisiana station will soon be home to 29 homeowners. The project, developed by High Street Residential and marketed by Fullerton & Company, is designed to blend with the current neighborhood.

Barb Fullerton, vice president of sales and marketing for Fullerton, noted, "We don't want to reshape it; we like it the way it is and love being able to comfortably walk around here."

Of the 29 units, only four remain. The people buying these lofts - which range from under $200,000 to the $400,000s - generally fall into two categories: young professionals without children and empty-nest Baby Boomers.

Those demographic profiles mirror the national trend. The San Francisco-based Center for Transit-Oriented Development encourages transit investment to spur new development, improving housing affordability and choice while revitalizing neighborhoods.

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The Center has published a study, "Hidden in Plain Sight: Capturing the Demand for Housing Near Transit" (available as a pdf from: www.reconnectingamerica.org), which discusses housing demand around transit centers in cities throughout the country. The study reported that Echo Boomers - aged 24-34 - prefer exciting, densely populated urban areas because they are centers of innovation. The study also cited an AARP report that revealed 71 percent of older households want to live within walking distance of transit.

By 2025, the Center predicts that nationwide, more than 14.6 million households will want to rent or own housing within a half mile of transit centers. Denver could quintuple the number of households living in transit zones, and the study suggested that the demand for higher-density housing around these stations could far outstrip the supply.

Executive Director Shelley Poticha predicted as many as 88,000 households in the Denver area are or will be in the market for housing near T-REX light rail stations because the population is growing in a way that fits households who want to live near transit centers. "Most Denver households living near transit centers are smaller than the regional average; the Denver household size is getting smaller."

What is transit-oriented development?

Pauletta Puncerelli, spokesperson for T-REX, explained that the concept of transit-oriented development began with mixed use, where people live, shop, play, enjoy family time and have a transit element.

"I think Denver will be an example for the whole country down the road, in terms of what a metro area can do by working together for smart development," Puncerelli noted. "The key is for developers to maximize development by turning them into long-lasting, vibrant communities and return to the urban village feel of years gone by."

Transit centers: An economy booster

There's more than sentimentality involved; transit-oriented development can boost the economy through employment opportunities and indirect gains. As people move closer to the T-REX light-rail stations - and the upcoming FasTracks stations - they'll use their cars less and walk more. "People who did not previously work along T-REX will not only work there because of the businesses at these transit centers, but will also live there," Puncerelli explained. "Suddenly you have people who don't have to drive across town to get to work every day."

Larry Fullerton, Fullerton's president, added, "This is the wave of the future and the ultimate in smart growth. Every transit station will have its own personality, each with at least a dozen projects."

With those projects come new jobs and redirected spending. "Maybe they're not buying gas, but they're spending discretionary income," Puncerelli remarked. "It encourages people to work, live and enjoy luxury time in a given location, rather than travel distances every day."

Economic impact? Think billions

It's tough to put a solid number on the economic impact of T-REX and, down the road, FasTracks. Marilee Utter, chair of the Colorado District Council of the Urban Land Institute, said that's because each station has different uses planned. By applying national figures to the impact on the metro area's economy, she said, "look to three to five times the spin off of private development. If T-REX is a $1.6 billion project, we should look for $5 billion in private investment in the next 15 years."

The Urban Land Institute is a 25,000-member, non-for-profit that provides responsible land-use leadership to enhance the environment. Advisory panels, comprised of experts from around the world, are brought in to municipalities for just a week - as volunteers - to solve a problem.

Greenwood Village worked with the Urban Land Institute in December. George Weaver, community development director, said, "One of the outgrowths of that study was the suggestion that if we're really going to produce a coordinated village center, we need to bring all the property owners together, develop a clear understanding about their respective visions and plans, then work collaboratively to make sure development efforts are coordinated.

With 50 acres at stake around the Arapahoe station, Greenwood Village has already taken action. The city consolidated a Park-n-Ride and CDOT maintenance facility to a single parcel, in exchange for about three acres.

"It could be used as a public venue or something the city receives RFPs on to maximize our return on investment," Weaver noted. "For urban planners and designers and people interested in development around light rail, it's a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to shape the character of an urban environment."

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