Organizers of a new Colorado History Museum have narrowed their site selection to three possibilities, all within two blocks of the museum’s current location, at 13th Avenue and Broadway.
At a public meeting Wednesday, project manager Bill Mosher of Trammel Crow Inc., which was selected by the Colorado Historical Society to develop a plan to build a new museum, said the group has narrowed the sites from seven to three.
They include roughly a half-acre of grass inside Civic Center opposite the McNichols/Carnegie Library building that sits across Bannock Street from city hall; the vacant “permit center” office building that the city owns on the southwest corner of West 14th Avenue and Bannock Street; and a portion of the block on the northeast corner of East Colfax Avenue and Lincoln Street.
The permit center would have to be purchased from the city, along with other lots on the block that are privately owned and have no signs of the owners wanting to sell, Mosher said.
“No price has been given yet, but the city will want fair market value for the permit center because it needs to find more office space,” Mosher said. Earlier, he said acquisition costs for the permit center could run as high as $20 million.
Steve Turner of Historic Denver said city hall should empty out when the courts move to the city’s new justice center. But the mayor’s deputy chief of staff, Amy Miller, said that city employees in rented offices will be moved into city hall when the courts leave and that the city still needs more office space.
Architect David Owen Tryba explained that the proposed building in Civic Center would have a footprint similar to the existing McNichols building, which originally was a Carnegie Library. Much of the museum’s exhibit and storage or curatorial space could be underground, between the museum and the McNichols building.
Parking has not been included in any of the three sites. But Tryba said 4,300 public parking spaces exist within a five-minute walk of Civic Center and the permit center.
The project, if sited in Civic Center, would include rehabbing the McNichols building, which has had most of its facade covered up and windows bricked over. Civic Center is owned by the city, which would lease the building site to the Colorado Historical Society.
Staff writer Mike McPhee can be reached at 303-954-1409 or mmcphee@denverpost.com.
