Lincoln Park, Denver

Lincoln Park: The park from where the neighborhood is named

Lincoln Park is a neighborhood and public park close to downtown Denver, Colorado and the location of the Art District on Santa Fe.

The neighborhood, which has about 7,000 residents, is one of Denver's oldest and is just to the south of the area where Denver was first settled in the 1850s. Many houses date from about 1900. Based on data from 2000 for the combined Auraria and Lincoln Park neighborhoods, the racial makeup of the neighborhood is 32.38% White, 7.23% African American, 3.97% Asian, 1.51% Native American. Hispanic or Latino of any race is 52.47% of the population.[1] The crime rate and poverty rate are also much higher than city and national averages. The crime rate is 196 incidents per 1,000 people and a poverty rate of 37.64%.[2]

Interstate 25 runs north-south through the western part of the neighborhood. The RTD's light rail line also runs north-south through the neighborhood and includes a station located at 10th Avenue and Osage Street. The neighborhood is sometimes called "La Alma/Lincoln Park"[3] or the West Side.[4]

The Art District on Santa Fe between 6th and 12th Avenues (its primary retail and commercial corridor[4]), includes more than 40 galleries, restaurants and shops. The "First Friday Art Walk" and the "Collectors' Night" are monthly events in the district.[5]

The Denver Civic Theater on Santa Fe Drive was opened in 1921 as a cinema house, one of Denver's first silent movie theaters.[6] The building was later used for various purposes (even as a meatpacking plant), before it was eventually renovated in 1993 as a neighborhood arts center containing two theaters (one with 332 seats, another with 134) and an art gallery. The venue has been used by local playwrights and a resident performance company for dramatic productions,[4] and in 2010 became the new home of El Centro Su Teatro.[7]

Institutions in the neighborhood include Museo de las Américas on Santa Fe Drive, the region's first museum dedicated to the art and culture of Latinos; Center for Visual Art, Metropolitan State University of Denver's contemporary art gallery and learning lab; Denver Health hospital complex; Denver West High School, the Asian and Hispanic Chambers of Commerce; Buckhorn Exchange, a 105-year-old restaurant that holds the state's first liquor license; and Sunken Gardens Park along Speer Boulevard. A former courthouse and district attorney's office at the intersection of Speer Boulevard and Colfax Avenue was renovated into a Latino cultural and business center.[4] Venerable Boulder, Colorado based community radio station KGNU opened a studio at 7th and Kalamath in 2006, when they began broadcasting in Denver on 1390 AM, located together with noncommercial media partner, Open Media Foundation.[8]

Within the neighborhood is Lincoln Park itself, located at Mariposa St. and West 11th Avenue. The park has a basketball court, football field, lighted football field, horseshoe pit, outdoor pool, recreation center, softball field, grass infield, lighted softball field, tennis court, and a sand volleyball court.[9] Across from the park is the Denver Inner City Parish, a nondenominational non-profit agency providing community services, including an emergency food bank and a school for at-risk youth, to area residents since 1961.[10]

Housing in the neighborhood includes many single family detached houses, including two-story brick Victorians, row houses, duplexes, brick bungalows and one-story stucco houses. Prominent housing developments include the Parkway Center apartment and condominium complex, with 1,050 units, at 12th and Galapago Street, Denver Tower Complex with condos, supermarket and offices (both fronting on Speer Boulevard from 14th to 12th).

The North Lincoln Park public housing facility, completed in 1996, replaced a dilapidated housing complex built in the 1950s. A more extensive update is planned for the remaining South Lincoln Park Homes starting in 2010, using a grant from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. This new project will create 900 units of mixed-income housing, and provide space for an open-air farmer's market.[11][12]

Geography

Lincoln Park is just southwest of downtown Denver. The boundaries of the neighborhood are:

References

  1. ↑ http://www.piton.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=CommunityFacts.Summary&Neighborhood_ID=861#Youth
  2. ↑ http://www.piton.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=CommunityFacts.Summary&Neighborhood_ID=861#Economic%20Well%20Being
  3. ↑ La Alma/Lincoln Park neighborhood assessment.
  4. 1 2 3 4 Web page titled "Neighborhood: La Alma/Lincoln Park" at the Downtown Denver Partnership Inc. website, retrieved September 29, 2008
  5. ↑ Home page for the Santa Fe Arts District, retrieved September 29, 2008
  6. ↑ Web page titled "About Us" at the Denver Civic Theater website, retrieved September 29, 2008
  7. ↑ El Centro Su Teatro About Page, retrieved Oct 31, 2011
  8. ↑ KGNU
  9. ↑ Web page titled "Lincoln Park", City of Denver Website, retrieved September 29, 2008
  10. ↑ Web page titled "About DICP" at the Denver Inner City Parish web site, retrieved November 18, 2009
  11. ↑ Renewal set for Lincoln public housing project, Denver Post, August 12, 2009
  12. ↑ Denver's South Lincoln -- The Future Looks Bright Thanks to Recovery Funds, by Denver Councilwoman Judy Montero in the Huffington Post, September 21, 2009

External links

Coordinates: 39°44′07″N 105°00′14″W / 39.73514°N 105.00396°W / 39.73514; -105.00396

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the Saturday, January 30, 2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.