Traffic ebbed and flowed through downtown Denver on Sunday as crowds began to surge and roads opened and closed accordingly.
Sections of Speer Boulevard, Bannock Street and Colfax Avenue were closed for hours Sunday to accommodate marches, while some routes clogged briefly by impromptu gatherings that police quickly disbursed.
Downtown streets largely will remain open during the convention, with periodic closures. Updated traffic information will be posted online at , and .
The city’s 3-1-1 customer-service line also has set up a DNC hotline to answer the public’s questions about city services during the convention. The hotline will operate from 8 a.m. to 11 p.m. each day through Friday.
Speer Boulevard from Interstate 25 to Lawrence Street will be closed from 9 a.m. Monday through midnight on Wednesday, except during morning rush hour, from 6 a.m. to 9 a.m.
Auraria Parkway from I-25 to Speer Boulevard will remain closed through midnight on Wednesday, when festivities wrap up at the Pepsi Center.
On the final day of the convention, Thursday, a 5.5-mile stretch of I-25 from U.S. 6 to Interstate 70 will close at 5:30 p.m., as well as portions of Federal Boulevard and Colfax Avenue near Invesco Field at Mile High will be closed for marches though the end of the speeches.
At a pre-DNC ceremony at City Park last week, Mayor John Hickenlooper urged Denvervites to set aside their concerns about the traffic and crowds and come downtown to help make Denver appear a vibrant city to the visiting media.
“If you’re all up in the mountains, I’ll be very disappointed,” the mayor said.
