Greenwood Village – Critics have called it a city with little soul – a glob of glistening office towers and fancy suburban houses strewn around an amphitheater and bisected by Interstate 25.
But city leaders say they are patching together an identity for this city of 14,000, laying a final framework for a new Village Center that officials hope will be a focal point along the future FasTracks transportation corridor that draws visitors from across the Denver area.
“Right now we don’t really have a center, a place that people identify Greenwood Village with,” Mayor Nancy Sharpe said.
Along with four major property owners, the city is planning urban-style development that will be a mixed use of residential, retail stores, office buildings and cultural and entertainment facilities around the soon-to-be Arapahoe Light Rail Station.
“Whether you want to dine at a nice restaurant, see a show, visit a museum or go out to some kind of club, we’ll have it all here within our city,” Sharpe said.
The Village Center is expected to be built out in stages over the next few years on 45 acres of mostly undeveloped land south of Orchard Road. Groundbreaking is expected to take place on some portions near Coors Amphitheater early next year, city officials said.
“We’re just beginning to work with the developers to put the whole thing together and right now, there are still more questions about how it will look than there are answers,” City Manager Jim Sanderson said. “But it’s a great vision.”
The Village Center will cross I-25, and could feature two additional bridges connecting both sides in addition to the newly built pedestrian bridge that will connect the rail line to the RTD park-n-Ride lot.
The city owns about 10 acres of the proposed Village Center site.
On the property near the newly built pedestrian bridge, city officials envision a cultural center, possibly a museum, and a city square surrounded by buildings housing offices and retail shops.
It’s too early, city officials say, to tell how much Greenwood Village will have to invest to develop its parcel.
“Light rail is the engine that’s drawing this development,” Sanderson said.
The property owners involved are Koelbel and Co., the Denver Technological Center, John Madden Co. and representatives of the Plaza Tower Building in Greenwood Village.
John Madden, whose company developed the Greenwood Athletic Club and Fiddler’s Green Amphitheater (now known as Coors Amphitheater), envisions a towering residential building and a boutique-style hotel on his roughly 11 acres.
“The corridor around the light rail stations is becoming more dynamic as we move forward,” Madden said. “The real estate around our station will be valued as highly as anything around the Denver area, and I think this project has a good future.”
Staff writer Manny Gonzales can be reached at 303-820-1173 or mgonzales@denverpost.com.
