More than 350 units of affordable housing may be built a block from Park Hill Golf Course

The 6.7 acre site would include senior housing, income-restricted housing, open space and a possible Denver Public Schools vocational school.
3 min. read
The last vacant parcel at 4050 N. Colorado Blvd. May 31, 2023.
Kevin J. Beaty/Denverite

The Urban Land Conservancy hopes to build a massive income-restricted housing project on the last vacant property attached to the Park Hill Village West Development, a community of condos and apartments next to the Park Hill Golf Course.

The land is across the street from the 40th and Colorado A Line stop and near the planned bus-rapid-transit line down Colorado Boulevard -- a magnet for new, dense, transit-oriented development.

The Urban Land Conservancy is working with the Nashville-based Elmington Capital Group on financing at the 4050 N. Colorado Blvd. site. Shopworks Architecture has been picked as the architect.

Anna Mercurio, the director of real estate for the Urban Land Conservancy, declined to comment at length about the project.

"We typically take every chance we can to share news on our efforts to increase affordable housing in Denver," she wrote. "However, in this case, we are currently under contract, so for legal reasons, we can't share much."

Here's what we know from the plans submitted to the city.

The project would include 350 units of "attainable housing" for people making up to 80% of the area median income, or currently $80,500 for a family of three.

There would be up to 70 senior housing units, and possibly a Denver Public Schools vocational school.

At least 10% of the property will be designated as open space.

The site is located next to a strip of restaurants, including Carl's Jr., Popeyes, Starbucks and Neko Ramen & Rice.

To pull off the project, there would need to be some changes to an agreement with the nearby Park Hill Village, a development with a mix of condos and apartments, that would allow the Urban Land Conservancy to reduce the required amount of open space preserved in a new development from 15% to 10%, according to the plans.

The nearby Park Hill Golf Course, 155 acres of Northeast Park Hill, was also slated for development, but voters shot that down.

That land was protected by a land conservation easement that mandated the space be used as an 18-hole golf course and for other recreational purposes. After a heated fight, voters decided to keep that land use agreement in place.

That project could have included more than 3,000 units of income-restricted housing, 25% of which would have been income-restricted and 75% of which would have been market rate. The developers promised at least 600 affordable units on 11 acres and would have donated land to Brothers Redevelopment and Habitat for Humanity to build it.

The new 6.7 acres project will include more than half of the income-restricted housing the 155-acre project promised.

The developers of the 6.7 acre parcel hope the new project will help the Northeast Park Hill neighborhood meet the need for more affordable housing identified during the failed citywide planning process for the golf course redevelopment.

"We believe this development has increased importance and significance to North Park Hill and the City because of the recent election," wrote Alisha Kwon Hammett of Shopworks Architecture, in a note to Community Planning and Development. "Denver voters decided to maintain the existing conservation easement at Park Hill Golf Course, meaning that the site will likely not develop with much-needed affordable housing. Elmington and ULC are looking to maximize this opportunity to develop much needed affordable and senior housing."

Correction: An earlier version of this story misidentified Neko Ramen & Rice. We regret the error. 

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