OT: A few questions for Denver Area Residents
I was hoping to just pick the brains of some of the Denver-based members because I'm thinking about relocating to the area. Skiing is a huge factor in this move. Any info you can give is appreciated.
-How feasible is it to drive from Denver (downtown or western suburbs) to the local ski resorts (A Basin, Breck, Winter Park, Vail) on a typical winter Saturday or Sunday? Is Google traffic remotely close or does it turn into gridlock more often than not?
-I haven't done much research yet but I'm wondering if I'd be restricted to the downtown area. Just curious if any of you are in the mechanical/aerospace engineering field by chance and know of jobs outside of downtown.
-How bike-friendly is Denver? Are there enough bike lanes to get around easily enough?
-How is Denver life in general (comparing to Ann Arbor)? How are the western suburbs (I hear Golden smells like a frat house 24/7)?
Thanks in advance.
February 11th, 2015 at 6:39 PM ^
My son just moved to Denver (near Red Rocks) Greenwood I think; about 15 min outside Denver. He says says ski resorts are close, lots of bike trails, dog parks, hiking, tons of outdoor activities. He has lived in Bend Oregon and Phoenix but seems to like Denver pretty well.
February 11th, 2015 at 6:43 PM ^
... He has a cabin near Copper mountain. Traffic gets gnarly on Sunday nights. Sometimes we'll just sleep there and drive back in early Monday morning. I've missed flights twice planned for Sunday night due to gridlock. On the way out, we've never had problems. Always seems to be Sunday afternoon driving back.
February 11th, 2015 at 6:47 PM ^
1. Skiing on the weekends can be brutal in terms of driving and traffic. From Denver, it can take upwards of 2-3 hours just to reach the Eisenhower Tunnel on I-70. Keystone and A-Basin are much closer than Breckenridge, Vail, Snowmass etc. Don't let that discourage you as I've left for ski trips on Friday morning with 0 traffic and had little coming back. Weather is also a huge factor.
2. I teach environmental education for the South Metro area but my roommate is an engineer who works right in LoDo. There are many opportunities outside the area as well. Lockheed is one of the largest firms right in Ken Caryl Ranch area at the foot of the mountains. Beautiful area.
3. Bike-friendly? Please. Denver has a top 5 bike-friendly city with most streets in the city with bike lanes and designated bike streets to accomodate that means of transportation. I live in the Cheesman Park neighborhood and you can't drive anywhere without being stuck behind a hipster on a bike smoking an american spirit and a cup holder for his PBR. Great bike city!
4. Golden smelling like a frat house? Doubt it. It's at the base of the mountains. As in fresh mountain air more than 5,280 ft above sea level. Denver does smell like dog food sometimes on windy days as there are processing plants in the north parts of the city.
-- Overall, Denver is gorgeous, the weather is the best I've ever been exposed to (Also lived in L.A. for a while) and it's a young virbrant population of people from everywhere else. I rarely meet people "from" Denver or Colorado for that matter. It's a great place to live and if you ever get homesick, you can watch UM games on Saturdays at Lodo's or Lions games at the Candlelight Tavern in Wash Park.
February 11th, 2015 at 6:54 PM ^
Not the reply content - the picture.
February 11th, 2015 at 7:18 PM ^
I actually like this one better:
February 11th, 2015 at 6:57 PM ^
February 11th, 2015 at 7:00 PM ^
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February 11th, 2015 at 7:02 PM ^
February 11th, 2015 at 7:15 PM ^
Pretty sure that's not sarcastic. Why would you think it is? Those statements all seem pretty accurate from what I know about Denver.
February 11th, 2015 at 8:01 PM ^
February 11th, 2015 at 9:38 PM ^
February 11th, 2015 at 11:00 PM ^
The Vermont State Car is a Subaru as well :)
February 11th, 2015 at 10:58 PM ^
Where *exactly* have you been in West Denver? I'd really like to know because your experience doesn't jive with mine and I've seen you post the same thought a few times here.
There are really nice, safe, affordable (I'm talking in the low 200s) places in Arvada, Wheat Ridge, Lakewood for example.
February 11th, 2015 at 11:24 PM ^
I think he means West Denver-proper. I.e., the actual city of Denver. West Denver north of Colfax, more or less, is very gentrified now, and very expensive. Between Colfax and 6th will probably be similar now because of the light rail running right there.
February 11th, 2015 at 11:42 PM ^
Ahhhh... thanks!
February 11th, 2015 at 11:04 PM ^
Nah... buy a CPO Audi and go in with some research ahead of time. If you know the wholesale price, you'll take dealer leverage away.
I bought one in September with 28K miles on it and saved $15K over new. Since I knew the markup as well, I didn't pay the $8K dealer profit. We settled for $2K over wholesale.
Otherwise, I wouldn't own an Audi... you could buy two cars for the price of one new.
February 11th, 2015 at 7:23 PM ^
Sadly, that's how many people talk around here.
February 11th, 2015 at 9:45 PM ^
The only thing you may miss is not being near nice lakes, although there are some in the mountains, but different.
To clarify - the one thing I really missed was beautiful, clear, sandy bottomed lakes like Higgins and around TC, especially in the summer. The rockies are great and Michigan is great in the summer. I prefer the golf courses in Mich.
February 12th, 2015 at 1:09 PM ^
But if mountains are your calling... :)
February 11th, 2015 at 7:04 PM ^
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February 11th, 2015 at 7:08 PM ^
It's easier to ride a bike than it is to drive anywhere on the Front Range.
Since you're an engineer please come here and build the north-south train system that is so badly needed. Colorado's only growing and I-25 is already gridlock half the time.
February 11th, 2015 at 7:07 PM ^
February 11th, 2015 at 7:07 PM ^
I've lived in Denver for 3.5 years.
The traffic to the ski resorts can be bad on Saturday mornings or coming back on Sunday afternoons, but if you leave early enough you miss the traffic. In general, I don't find the traffic too terrible, but I moved here from Chicago where the traffic is absurd. The traffic is definitely getting worse, though as everyone figures out what a great place to live it is.
There are plenty of bike paths/bike lanes. It is a very bike friendly city, plus the traffic is accostomed to cyclists, so they are pretty respectful most of the time (it only takes one yahoo though).
For jobs, if you are an engineer, you might find jobs in the Denver Tech Center area, which is on the southern end of Denver. [I'm not an engineer so it isn't gospel].
Life in General -- Denver is definitely bigger than Ann Arbor, so you have more options. The downside is that there is more traffic than Ann Arbor (excluding Game Day). Another negative, I have found it difficult to connect with people out here, they all seem to be in to their own thing. I am a massive introvert (so take my comments with a giant grain of salt), but I have heard others complain of the same thing. The weather however, is fantastic. It has been 70 degrees for the better part of the week, while the midwest/east coast seems to be continually digging out from snow storms.
On the whole I would definitely recommend moving out here, especially if you are the active type. Good Luck, I hope things work out.
February 11th, 2015 at 7:40 PM ^
Being a Midwesterner, I sometimes find it disconcerting living in a place where it NEVER rains.
February 12th, 2015 at 12:46 PM ^
It rained at 11,800 feet in January. I was there.
Unprecendented. Crazy.
February 12th, 2015 at 6:06 PM ^
And we had 4 inches of snow on 12 September 2014. It all balances out. :)
February 14th, 2015 at 1:19 PM ^
I would not want to experience what truly balances out rain at tree-line in January. :) It was not a trivial event. It was unprecendented.
February 11th, 2015 at 10:49 PM ^
I lived in Aspen for three years a while back and have had a vacation place there for quite some time. It is too far from Denver to go for a weekend unless you like to drive, but as others have mentioned, there are many options way closer......Vail, Copper, Keystone, Breckenridge, Arapahoe Basin, etc.
For me, the best reason to live in Denver is summertime in the Rockies. It is fun to go skiing or boarding, but I and many friends discovered after a couple of years on the slopes, summer in the Rockies was the real Rocky Mountain high. We do lots of hiking and there is so much to do in many of the ski towns, that you can easily fill your days and nights with fun entertainment and good food, and summer is often way less expensive than winter. Denver has Red Rocks and sports venues, including the Rockies and the Broncos. Denver would certainly be high on my list of cities if an outdoor lifestyle was a priority. Boulder, another fun town, is about an hour away.
Good luck with your decision.
February 11th, 2015 at 7:13 PM ^
I assume the comment about the smell in golden is related to the smell of hops coming from the Coors Brewery right in the middle of town, which isn't always awesome, but that's the price you pay for having a brewery. You can go in and have free samples pretty much everyday, as I did as a student.
Denver itself is a great city, and the traffic up to the resorts can be god awful at times. You'll usually miss the brunt of the traffic if you get on the road early enough on the weekends (out of the city by 6 or 6:30am), but it's tough to miss the traffic coming back unless you come back from the mountains after 7pm or later.
Boulder is probably the closest you'll get to an Ann Arbor setting, although for a large city, I don't think you could do much better than Denver.
February 12th, 2015 at 6:04 PM ^
Good Lord, could you imagine if Coors was in AA and the 21+ crowd went in nearly every day for free samples?
February 12th, 2015 at 6:04 PM ^
Good Lord, could you imagine if Coors was in AA and the 21+ crowd went in nearly every day for free samples?
February 11th, 2015 at 7:17 PM ^
5 years in Breckenridge and the last 10 in Boulder/Longmont
On a normal day with no traffic/weather I have made it from downtown Denver to Frisco (Summit County) in one hour. Ski weekends are a different matter. I have been on several 4 plus hour expeditions in either direction. Your best bet if you want to ski a lot is to leave very early on weekend mornings and head home midday or wait until after 6 or 7 to return.
Assuming you are a new graduate you could also try to make some friends in one of the Mountain towns (recent grads are a huge percentage of the population) so you have a place to stay for the weekend. This would allow you to head up on Friday evening and avoid the crowds. Another option is to try and find a job with some flexible hours (may be tricky in the engineering field) where you can get a weekday off. You will have a far superior skiing experience if you are able to ski one weekday as opposed to two weekend days.
There is one slightly more crazy option if you really want to ski a lot and still want a good engineering job. I commuted from Frisco to DU for graduate school for a year. The drive took about an hour to an hour and ten minutes. Get a really fuel efficient car and move to Dillon or perhaps Georgetown for a year. You can then get the experience of living in the mountains while still starting your career. Once you get sick of it just move to Denver.
On the other stuff Denver and Colorado in general is very bike friendly. You should be able to find a number of engineering opportunities (aerospace will be more limited) across the length of the Front Range. In terms of life in general, Colorado is the greatest state in the nation (in my clearly biased opinion). Also while you, and most who move to Colorado are focused on the skiing, Colorado summer in the Mountains is incredible. Come for the winter, stay for the summer.
February 11th, 2015 at 7:20 PM ^
Denver native and resident here. Here are some answers:
1) Traffic can be brutal going up to the mountains Saturday and Sunday morning, and it's also bad on Sunday afternoon/evening. It is hard to predict how bad it will be from weekend to weekend. But I'd say that more often than not, you're looking at least double the time it would take without traffic to get up there. I've heard that traffic can even be bad on Friday mornings, too. You can avoid the traffic by going super early (I mean before 6am) and by staying late or leaving by about 1pm. I personally never drive Saturday or Sunday mornings to go ski, and I also try to avoid coming back Sunday night. Honestly, the best way to get around traffic is to have a place in the mountains. You can go Friday night - no traffic - and leave Sunday mid-morning - also no traffic. If that's not feasible, you're going to be stuck with traffic.
2) I think it would be possible to get jobs outside of downtown in that field. I'm in a different field, so I don't know for sure. Someone mentioned Lockheed. They're out of downtown. I'd imagine you could also find a gig in the tech center, which is about 10 miles south of downtown. Most of the jobs will probably be downtown though.
3) Very bike friendly. But it's also a fairly sprawling city. If you live downtown or near downtown, you'll be able to get anywhere you want on bike. If you like in a suburb, it's tough. There are plenty of great bike trails, too. Great for recreational biking, if that's your thing. That said, I'd recommend a car almost no matter what. You could probably get away without one in certain areas of downtown. But there aren't a ton (read: any) of grocery stores beyond Walgreens downtown.
4) You basically find anything you want. It's a fairly big city. Nightlife is good in the LoDo area. Bars and clubs are packed there. It's not New York or Chicago, but it certainly has everything Ann Arbor does outside of obvious things like football. Incidentally, I live in Golden, and it does not smell like a frathouse. The Coors brewery does have a smell in the square mile it occupies, but outside of that it smells fine. None of my friends have ever complained about the smell at my house in Golden, and I'm maybe 3 miles away from the brewery.
February 11th, 2015 at 7:27 PM ^
I beg to differ - your house definitely smells terrible. Although I'm pretty sure that's not a result of the brewery.
February 11th, 2015 at 7:35 PM ^
Smells better than your house.
February 12th, 2015 at 1:57 PM ^
This reply is pretty on point. I would say that it's not as bike friendly as D.C. where I lived previously, but still very bike friendly depending on your location and travel needs.
In aerospace, check out Ball (the glass jar company). Turns out they make their actual money off of aerospace. They're located in Broomfield which is between Denver and Boulder.
In short: you should move to Denver. It's the best city I've ever lived in and it gets better every day.
February 11th, 2015 at 7:20 PM ^
My favorite part about Colorado is the extra distance I get with my driver.
February 11th, 2015 at 7:25 PM ^
Yes, if you like golf, there are tons of good and inexpensive golf courses in the area. And those extra 10-20 yards are nice.
February 11th, 2015 at 8:20 PM ^
I second this. It's a VERY golf-friendly town. Tons of very nice courses for reasonable prices. And you can golf year round!
February 11th, 2015 at 11:46 PM ^
High altitude does not make your driver longer ... Oh wait, you're talking about golf.
February 11th, 2015 at 7:26 PM ^
Denver restaurants are good and getting better, with lots of brew pubs and beer related activities. The climate is very agreeable, mid 60s this week. Lots of good music to be heard. Red Rocks is a world class venue. There are plenty of seasonal outdoor activities in Denver and the mountains. Boulder is close by. Rocky Mountain National Park is as well. Weed is legal. 300 days of blue sky. There's a lot to like. I wouldn't live anywhere else.
February 11th, 2015 at 7:37 PM ^
+1 for the beer. So much good beer in Denver area. And I'm obviously not talking about Coors.
February 11th, 2015 at 7:53 PM ^
I'll take a Founders over any of them.
February 11th, 2015 at 7:55 PM ^
February 11th, 2015 at 8:06 PM ^
I went back home to GR over the summer. The new patio deck is tops for summer drinking in the city. It comes back to quality everytime with a hint of nostalgia.
Don't get me wrong though. I'd never turn down anything from Great Divide, Odell, Left Hand, etc...
February 11th, 2015 at 8:25 PM ^
I live in Ft. Collins. O'Dell's and New Belgium everywhere, obviously. And so cheap too.
February 11th, 2015 at 8:36 PM ^
Odell, Funkwerks and Equinox are all great breweries there. I used to visit Ft. Collins once every month or so, and would usually hit up these breweries and make a stop at Wilburs to stock up on all the great brews available in CO.
February 11th, 2015 at 8:37 PM ^
I did my undergrad at CSU from 2007-2010. Back when you got 4 free samples from NB brewery. The taproom used to be a party haven on Fridays after classes. Wall to wall packed with professors, pretty TAs, and granolas. Best of times!
February 11th, 2015 at 10:51 PM ^
Twisted Pine PEOPLE!!! Learn it. :)
February 11th, 2015 at 8:33 PM ^
Crooked Stave, so very good.