GES Safer Streets

Thank you for all your feedback this spring and summer on possible street improvements in your neighborhoods! Based on what we heard, 13 corridors in Globeville and Elyria-Swansea are moving into design. We also heard that we need to do more work on the following corridors in Globeville to meet your needs: 

• E 45th Ave between Broadway and Washington St
• N Broadway between E 52nd Ave and E 47th Ave
• N Lincoln St between 52nd Ave and E 44th Ave
• E 44th Ave between Broadway and Pearl St 

Over the next few weeks, we want to hear the types of safety and mobility improvements you prefer and where you would like them placed.

Explore Safety Improvements

• Thursday, October 23, 12:15pm – 1:45pm, Garden Place Academy Pop Up, 4425 Lincoln St.
• Sunday, October 26, 9am – 1pm, Drop By Office Hours, Prodigy Coffeehouse Globeville, 4500 Broadway

Review Preferred Safety Improvements

• Thursday, November 6, 12:15pm – 1:45pm, Garden Place Academy Pop Up, 4425 Lincoln St.

• Public Open House
• 5:30 p.m. - 7:30 p.m.
• Argo Park
• 4700 Logan Street, Denver, CO 80216  

Thursday, July 10, 2025

• 3:00 p.m. - 5:00 p.m.
• El Tepetate Market
• 4555 Thompson Ct., Denver, CO 80205

Saturday, July 12, 2025

• 10:00 a.m. - 2:00 p.m.
• People's Market at the Center (UCAN/ CSU Spur) River Festival
• 4797 National Western Drive, Denver, CO 80205

Thursday, June 12, 2025

• Special in-person GES CAG workshop to provide feedback on transportation improvements to the Globeville Elyria-Swansea (GES) Safer Streets project team.  
• 6:00 p.m. - 7:30 p.m.
• Johnson Recreation Center
• 4809 Race Street, Denver
• Light refreshments will be served

Friday, June 13, 20, 27, 2025

• 2:00 p.m. - 5:00 p.m.
• Huerta Urbana Farmers Market
• 2501 East 48th Avenue; Denver, CO 80205

Wednesday, June 25, 2025

• 6:30 a.m. - 9:00 a.m.
• Bike To Work Day
• South Platte River Trail (between 51st & 52nd Avenue)
• We will have food, beverages, and give away items

Tuesday, March 4, 2025

• 12:00 p.m. - 2:30 p.m.
• Mobile Food Market, We Don't Waste
• Bruce Randolph School
• 3955 Steele Street, Denver, CO 80205

Thursday, March 6, 2025

• 5:30 p.m. - 7:30 p.m.
• Mayor's Bicycle Advisory Committee
• virtual meeting

Saturday, March 8, 2025

• 10:00 a.m. - 2:00 p.m.
• CSU Spur Girls and Science
• 4817 National Western Drive, Denver, CO 80216

Monday, March 10, 2025

• Swansea CASR design meeting

Tuesday, March 11, 2025

• Mayor's Pedestrian Advisory Committee Meeting

Thursday, April 3, 2025

• 5:00 p.m. - 7:00 p.m.
• Public Open House
• Johnson Rec Center
• 4809 Race Street, Denver, CO 80216

• Monday, February 24, 2025
• 2:00 p.m. - 4:30 p.m.
• Birdseed Collective weekly food box distribution
• Globeville Community Center
• 4496 Grant Street, Denver, CO 80216

• Thursday, February 27, 2025
• 6:00 p.m. - 7:30 p.m.
• GES CAG Meeting
• Virtual Meeting on Zoom: Video Recording Here

The project team provided an update on the project to the Globeville Elyria Swansea Community Action Group (CAG) at a virtual meeting on January 29, 2025. 

 Click below to watch the virtual meeting and hear which projects the team has identified as priority investments and how community members can get involved in the project. The GES Safer Streets (formerly NDSS) presentation begins at timestamp 1:10:32.

• Meeting Recording (YouTube)

The project team provided an overview of the project to the Globeville Elyria-Swansea Community Action Group (CAG) at a virtual meeting on October 24, 2024.

Click below to watch the virtual meeting and learn more about the team's approach and goals. The GES Safer Streets (formerly NDSS) presentation begins at timestamp 11:09.

• Meeting Recording (YouTube)

Denver's Department of Transportation and Infrastructure (DOTI) is responsible for all public improvements in the City — including everything from streets to sewers, sidewalks to traffic lights.

DOTI is leading a new effort called GES Safer Streets, which will build improvements along priority streets to make them safer and more accessible for everyone in the Globeville and Elyria-Swansea neighborhoods. DOTI will use a community driven process that co-creates solutions and build projects that improve safety and access for people walking, bicycling, scooting, rolling and driving — between now and 2028.

DOTI has heard and understands traveling in GES is challenging — options for getting around are limited, major barriers exist, and travel can be uncomfortable, especially on busier streets or streets with lots of truck traffic. Making travel better in North Denver can help address historical inequities, environmental and public health challenges, and traffic safety concerns. Projects built through GES Safer Streets will enhance access, support economic development, improve quality of life, and promote equity by prioritizing safer streets, better public transit, and make cooler streets that also drain water better.

Transportation improvements that the GES Safer Streets project will bring to North Denver include slowing speeds, reducing cut-through traffic, adding crosswalks and making crossings safer, providing space for bicyclists/scooter riders, making bus stops accessible, and adding more greenery to our streets.

Some of the project goals include:

• Co-creating and building solutions that address the most pressing travel needs in collaboration with the GES community.
• Building on community feedback in North Denver to address transportation priorities, improve connectivity and find creative solutions to local needs.
• Building smaller improvements that meet the North Denver community's travel needs within three years.
• Starting bigger projects, such as exploring a new bus route, that will be built later.

Projects will be built within the GES neighborhoods, bounded by an area that runs north to south along Inca Street between East 52nd Avenue and Park Avenue and East 54th Avenue to East 40th Avenue, and west to east along I-70 from Inca Street to Colorado Boulevard. GES Safer Streets is seeking to focus investments along the streets prioritized by the community in recent years that need changes most (highlighted in blue in the map below) - though we will be collecting feedback about the travel around the entire area, as well as travel in-and-out.

Some of the other DOTI projects that GES Safer Streets will tie into include:

• Denver Vision Zero
• Denver Moves Everyone (DME) 2050
• Denver Moves: Safe and Slow Streets with Bikeways
• Washington Area Connectivity and Prioritization Study
• Globeville Neighborhood Transportation Plan

The GES Safer Streets project is one of several active DOTI projects in the GES area. The City is doing a lot of construction work in GES and has grouped information about these projects into a bucket called the GES Program of Projects. This will help make it easier to learn about all the city project happening now in the neighborhood, in one place. Projects in this program include:

• 48th Avenue Greenway and Outfall
• 51st Avenue: Logan Street to Emerson Street
• Globeville Levee Improvements
• Carpio-Sanguinette Park and Heron Pond Open Space
• Lincoln/I-70 Underpass Pedestrian Improvements Project
• Pedestrian/GES Sidewalk Improvements
• Washington Street Final Design: 47th Avenue to 52nd Avenue

To learn more about the GES Program of Projects and to view a map, visit bit.ly/gesprojects.

Thank you to everyone who shared feedback on priority streets and your specific travel needs with the GES Safer Streets project this spring (February-April 2025)! With support from our Community Based Outreach Partners, the GES Safer Streets project team attended a total of 14 events (see Public Outreach section below) and spoke with more than 250+ individuals. We received 675+ unique, location-specific responses that will directly inform the design of safety improvements that grounded in the community's real-world experiences.

What we heard from Phase 1:

• The top three concerns identified through the feedback map account for 58% of all feedback received:
  • 25% Speeding
  • 17% Traffic
  • 16% Pedestrian and Bike protection
• Only 11% of responses mentioned hot/icy conditions and flooding
• 10% of responses did not fit into existing categories
• The NDSS Safer Streets project name could be revised to improve clarity.

  

In our second phase of outreach (June 2025), the GES Safer Streets project team will ask for your feedback on proposed improvements to your streets based on the most common concerns we heard and safety data we gathered. Proposed improvements range from adding speed cushions to slow traffic, making crossings safer, adding greenery along the streets, and more. Construction of these improvements is expected to occur in 2027 and 2028.

New name. Same objective.

In Phase 1 of our outreach, we heard feedback that the project's name, North Denver Safer Streets, was leading to confusion and didn't align with how the community refers to itself.

The City is dedicated to communicating with GES neighbors on their terms, which is why we are changing the name of the project to GES Safer Streets.

Thank you to everyone who shared feedback on safety and mobility improvements proposed through the GES Safer Streets project this summer (July-August 2025)! With support from our Community Based Outreach Partners, the GES Safer Streets project team attended a total of 12 events and spoke with more than 100+ individuals. We received 500+ unique, location-specific comments that will be directly integrated into project designs. 

What we heard from Phase II: 

• 63% of comments were made in support of the proposed network of street improvements, particularly: 
  • Proposed corridors matching top community priorities 
  •  Speed reduction measures 
  •  Increased comfort for walking and biking
•  14% of comments had concerns about proposed improvements, particularly: 
  •  Some improvements suggested along corridors in Globeville 
•  23% had other comments, focused on addressing: 
  •  Stop sign running 
  •  Freight cut-through traffic 
  •  Inadequate street lighting 
  •  Speed management 
  •  Better connections to Argo Park 
  • Unhoused population 
    
    

 

 

     

 

Key takeaways about possible improvements include: 

• Support for speed mitigation, crossing improvements, and improved connectivity 
•  In Globeville along Lincoln St, 45th Ave, and 44th Ave, concern regarding curb extensions and pedestrian refuge islands 
•  Support for an improved bicycle network, particularly with connections into and out of the neighborhoods 
•  Desire for vehicle drag racing and freight cut-through traffic to be addressed 
•  Support for green infrastructure so long as it is well-maintained 
•  Desire for improved personal safety, such as street lighting, and concern regarding unhoused populations in the neighborhoods A range of preferences for the potential Local Bus Rapid Transit alignment through GES, with no specific alignments strongly preferred or opposed. 

What next? 

The project team is incorporating feedback heard during this phase into refined project designs, particularly: 

The images below show the types of street safety and access improvements that will be built through GES Safer Streets. These changes will be prioritized along specific streets to create a network of routes that make it easier to walk, bike, access transit, and drive across the neighborhoods.

Full Size Image(JPG, 295KB)

GES Safer Streets project improvements are being paid for through different funds. These include:

• Capital Improvement Program – Funded via taxes in Denver to improve transportation, these funds will be used to build street safety improvements, pedestrian crosswalks, make bus stops more accessible, and plan transit improvements along 48th Ave.

• Bond Funds – A portion of the 2021 RISE bond – voted on by Denver residents – will be used to build improvements in GES that make streets slower and safer for everyone.

• Federal Grant Funds – The City was awarded Federal Grant Funds – via the Transportation Improvement Program (TIP) – will be used to build improvements in GES that make streets slower and safer for everyone.

• Wastewater Enterprise Fund – A fee properties are assessed will be used to build green infrastructure improvements.

The City is combining these funds so that we can rapidly build projects in the community all at one, as well as start bigger projects so that we can move them forward to being built.

GES Safer Streets is starting with a map of priority streets, identified by the community through past planning efforts. Using this map, GES Safer Streets will first seek feedback about which of these streets – or portions of streets – are most important to make changes to, or if there are any streets not highlighted in the map that represent priorities.

Since we have limited funds – the streets, or street portions, that are identified through community outreach as the most in need of changes will be prioritized for improvements. The types of changes made to streets will vary based upon the diverse street types in the neighborhoods – and will be co-created with the community once the street locations to improve are identified.

DOTI will engage North Denver residents to verify and prioritize the planning and design of improvements through public meetings, neighborhood events, surveys and community conversations.

For questions, email DOTI.GES@denvergov.org or call the project hotline at (720) 865-2806.