That the Beaux Arts style center of the station replaced the original depot after it burned down?  It is a different style than the two wings of the building, which are original.

In the Spring of 2010 Historic Denver will begin a Historic Structure Assessment on the historic Union Station building.  This project is funded by the Colorado State Historical Fund and analysis will be conducted by Slater Paul Architects.  Stay tuned for a new blog about their discoveries and a members only tour on April 29th.

Past Discussions on Design

On February 11, 2009 the Union Station Neighborhood Company and Skidmore, Owings& Merrill LLP released draft #5 of the Urban Design Standards andGuidelines for Denver’s Union Station.

 

A meeting was held on February 18, 2009 in which SOM summarized the make-up of the document and outlined its desired intent.  An invitation to comment on thedocument was made concurrently to the members of the Union Station Advisory Committeeand other consulting parties to the process.  A deadline was set for March 5^th for the publicand advisory members to comment, while a deadline of March 16^th wasset for consulting parties’ comments based on an earlier agreement. Those comments are now in and are being analyzed.  A summary of comments from the publicand consulting parties have been compiled and grouped according to popular categories:

• Public Space
• Sidewalks/Streetscapes
• Historic Station
• Transit Architecture
• Mixed Use Building Design
• Bicycle Circulation
• Parking
• Sustainable Design
• Interim Conditions

The General Development Plan for Denver Union Station waspresented to the Land Use and Urban Design break-out group (BOG) and has nowbeen sent to the City for review. Much of the content of the General Development Plan has been craftedover the seven year run of the Union Station Advisory Committee which momentously ended its existence as of last Wednesday, March 18, 2009.  Historic Denver has had a representation on the advisory committee and participated actively in visioning efforts.The new authority taking the place ofthe Advisory Committee is named Denver Union Station Project Authority (DUSPA)and was created by Denver City Council. It has a Board of Directors with membership incorporatingrepresentatives of all the partner agencies. DUSPA will be the primaryfinancing entity for the project and will be the contracting entity for theconstruction contracts.  It is likely also to be a key component of anygovernance structure that is developed for the project.  The DUSPA Board meets twice monthly.

For more information about the Denver Union Station’s Urban Design Standards and Guidelines, visit www.denverunionstation.org.