Neighbors in Clayton celebrated a little win recently: The opening of a gate in a chainlink fence between York Street Yards and Schafer Park.
Why were they so pleased? Because people who live nearby want to spend more time at York Street Yards’ bakery, brewery and doggy playground. The walk around the fence added a solid 30 minutes to some peoples’ round trips.
The new gate let them waltz right in, with a promise from the property manager that it would be open from 7 a.m. to “dusk.”
But Alex Weltman, who lives nearby and once ripped a pair of jeans jumping that fence, discovered “dusk” was a possibly too-loose metric.
He’d gone into Cohesion Brewing at 5 p.m., he told Denverite. It was still light out when he left, just after 7 p.m.
“I got locked in,” he remembered. “And of course the first thing I do is Google, ‘When is dusk?’ Because isn’t dusk sunset?”
When is dusk?
“It’s actually after sunset,” Weltman learned. It was also a moving target. “Are they adjusting that time by 10 seconds every day? Probably not.”
So he walked around, disappointed and a bit late to a social call. He asked us to ask York Street Yards how they defined dusk, for future reference.
“My wife also got locked in,” he added. It was a separate incident.
Greg Pauly, senior real estate manager with the SKB development company that owns the property, said he’d come to a similar conclusion by the time we reached out.
“I can see how ‘dusk’ is a little problematic and will move throughout the year,” he wrote to us on June 13. “We are changing the closing time to 10 p.m., effective tonight.”
He added his colleagues were working on a new sign, and that they’d monitor the gate’s use and make adjustments if necessary.
“Security and safety are of the utmost importance for tenants and visitors,” he said.
Weltman was gleeful when we told him.
“Incredible,” he said.
