Denver: Include Affordable Housing If You Want To Build Higher

Denver City Council has shown some heart and is conscientiously planning redevelopment within underdeveloped areas of the city. Incentives toward development all too often exclude those most in need, but Denver City Council voted to require affordable housing if developers want to build higher. Along with density and walkability, Denver rightfully wants some affordable housing with all this urban redevelopment.

The Denver Post reports,  “A new building heights plan adopted for the area near Denver’s new 38th and Blake transit station proposes that the city offers a deal to developers hungry to break ground in the burgeoning neighborhood: Include affordable housing, and the city would allow them to build higher — up to 16 stories.”

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Listen up to this plan, America. Condos and high-end housing spring up all around the Florida city I live in. With development and redevelopment all the time, I wonder will the less fortunate lose out. The town I live in does not house our homeless community. It’s $12 a night at The Salvation Army, so the less fortunate are sleeping on sidewalks mixed into between high-end housing. This is the landscape of America.

Walkability is good for everyone, as well as the environment. The DenverPost continues that the City Council in Denver is not looking away from those families in need. This is a “first-of-its-kind recommendation for focused, affordable housing incentives — part of the 38th & Blake Station Area Height Amendments. The City Council approved 13-0 Monday night” — unanimous and socially conscientious.

Here are some more details from The Denver Post:

  • “That plan’s intent is to foster density and walkability as redevelopment takes hold in the area surrounding the first stop out of Union Station on the University of Colorado A-Line, the commuter rail line that opened in April from downtown to the airport.”
  • Developers will build up to 12 stories in some places and up to 16 stories nearest to the station.
  • “The idea of a carrot exchanging more height for developers’ agreement to provide a certain proportion of income-qualified apartments or condos grew out of community meetings earlier this year. Commercial developers could agree to pay into an affordable housing fund for the area.”

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