A lot of people have asked me, “What’s going to happen with the historic station?” regarding the big Denver Union Station transit project that Rick has been covering so expertly at DenverInfill. It’s a good question, and a process is now in place to determine the answer.
With construction well underway on the transit elements, RTD is now focusing on the historic building’s reuse. RTD plans to issue a Request For Proposals (RFP) to the development community later this spring/summer that will invite qualified development teams to lay out their ideas, designs, and specific funding plans for the historic station’s restoration and reuse. Later this fall after proposals have been received, RTD will select the winning team, with renovation work on the station beginning probably in 2012.
While the RFP and proposal stage is still coming up, we know of at least two development teams that will be proposing on the historic station job, because they’ve already announced their intention to do so and have given the public a glimpse of their reuse ideas. Those two teams are the Union Station Neighborhood Company (the master developer working on the rest of the DUS project), and a group called the Denver Union Station Redevelopment Team that’s comprised of several local firms including Dana Crawford’s Urban Neighborhoods Inc., Sage Hospitality, and Tryba Architects, among others.
Both teams have kindly provided me with some images and descriptions of their plans, which I will feature in the next two posts here and here.
