Denver Business Journal
Group wants more community benefits from Union Station project
April 14, 2008

The Campaign for Responsible Development delivered roughly 1,800 postcards, asking for more community benefits at the multimillion-dollar Union Station redevelopment, to the Denver city and county building on Monday.

Because the Union Station redevelopment includes public tax-increment financing, the group wants to make sure the project includes things such as affordable housing and uses union labor. Group members include business, union, religious, environmental and community leaders.

Union Station is located in Lower Downtown Denver, on Wynkoop Street. The train station is being redeveloped by Union Station Neighborhood Co., a joint venture between East West Partners Inc. and Continuum Partners LLC, as a 1.4 million-square-foot multimodal transportation hub for the entire metro Denver area.

Four governmental agencies -- the city and county of Denver, Regional Transportation District, Colorado Department of Transportation and Denver Regional Council of Governments -- also are partners in the project.

The developers expect the project to cost $477 million.

East West and Continuum were chosen to oversee the redevelopment in 2006, and infrastructure work is expected to be finished between 2009 and 2012. Several thousand square feet of office and retail space, housing and possibly a hotel are scheduled to be finished between 2010 and 2014.