Weaving Parks and Trails Through the Aerotropolis

Residential development came to northeast Denver, around Tower Road, beginning in the early 1980s, nearly a decade before ground broke for the new Denver International Airport. Amid the prairie and former farms, the idea of an Aerotropolis took shape: a hub of aviation-related industry, technology, and transportation, along with some residential areas.

During 30 years of market ups and downs, changing preferences, and thinking about land use, the Far Northeast Denver neighborhoods have evolved along with the airport’s growth. The Aerotropolis has reemerged, but now in the context of a vast, largely built-out area with a suburban development pattern — owed to multiple eras of zoning codes — and a large, highly diverse population estimated to grow to nearly one-seventh of Denver’s total population.

Despite, or maybe because of, the lack of a clear “Main Street,” Denver Parks and Recreation and Community Planning and Development have forged community and connectivity by creating a parks, open space, and trail network. Challenged with providing a comparable level of access to parks as found within the rest of Denver, the city used a variety of development tools, partnerships, and creativity to bring forth this developing network.