They used to be centers of economic and social activity. But today, they are characterized by older housing stock, deteriorating infrastructure, increasing numbers of immigrants, and loss of jobs. With their populations aging, they are seeing declining school enrollments, faltering commercial areas, and tax bases that are shrinking or barely holding their own.
They are the “first-tier suburbs,” those closest to the core city. The problems are more severe for such suburbs in the East and Midwest. But Colorado has them, too. The prestigious Urban Land Institute, which recently held its annual meeting in Denver, names Arvada, Lakewood, Aurora and Englewood as first-tier suburbs.
The numbers are surprising. Nationally, 20 percent of the U.S. population lives in first-tier suburbs. Here, the combined population of Arvada, Lakewood, Aurora and Englewood is more than 569,000 residents, or almost 25 percent of the 2.4 million people in the Denver metro area.
Seeing the challenges, first-tier cities have joined together at the National League of Cities to share information and lobby for federal legislation that will help them redevelop. Lakewood Mayor Steve Burkholder was an early participant. He says, “I thought we should see what others are doing and adopt their best practices.”
Burkholder points out that as metro- area cities spread and run together, decline in one community has a negative effect on its neighbors. “Whether it’s Arvada, Thornton, Sheridan, Littleton or Wheat Ridge, we are all facing the same challenges,” he says.
Yet despite those challenges, first-tier suburbs have assets from which they can build, according to ULI. They tend to have neighborhoods featuring sidewalks, established parks, and mature trees and landscaping – the very things that developers are working to replicate in New Urbanist developments. Unlike inner cities, they usually don’t have high concentrations of poverty. In addition, they are close to jobs in the core city as well as in suburban job centers, a factor that may become a plus as people grow weary of increasingly long commutes from the outer-ring suburbs.
Nationally, no single “magic bullet” has yet emerged to overcome the multiple problems of first-tier suburbs. But in Colorado especially, first-tier cities are fighting back vigorously against decline. In Lakewood and Englewood, failed shopping malls have been replaced by large mixed-use housing and commercial developments. Aurora is shepherding the redevelopment of the old Fitzsimons Army Medical Center into a major bioscience park. And Arvada is involving citizens as it plans mixed-use development around its three light rail stops on the Gold Line.
The National League of Cities lists a number of suggested options that first-tier suburbs can take to encourage revitalization. These include supporting regional decision-making strategies, conducting joint planning and working closely together to streamline and share services.
Aurora seems to have taken this message to heart. It is partnering with Broomfield and Denver to urge the development of a law enforcement and fire training center that could serve the needs of the entire metro area. According to Aurora Police Chief Daniel Oates, such a facility would provide “economies of scale.” It could include both common and specialized training, as well as a state-of-the-art driving track and “cells” for training officers in a simulated detention center.
Partnerships with community colleges could provide college credit for those taking training, Oates says, and there’s even the potential for the facility to become an “incubator” for developing and testing new police, fire and emergency medical products.
There are many questions about such a facility, of course, including cost, where more than 100 acres of land could be found to build a facility, how it might be funded, what kind of shared ownership and governance structure it might have, and so on. At this point, however, the three cities are asking only that other jurisdictions become involved in planning, so that any facility that might eventually be built would meet the diverse needs of law enforcement and fire departments of all sizes.
The development of such a major training facility may be a long shot, but it seems worthwhile for metro-area leaders to at least give it a look. Because the bottom line remains: Whether inner city, first-tier suburb or outer-ring suburbs, we’re truly all in this together.
