Denver Bits and Pieces

* The Highland Bridge over I-25 will be dedicated Saturday, well behind schedule. It will still not have handrails complete, but at least it will be useable, reuniting downtown and Highland after a decade and a half of separation. Still, I'm looking forward to attending the festivities.

* The new FasTracks West line won't have a stop at Colorado Mills/Denver West. There is dispute over whether this is another case of mall owner recalcitrance or whether this is RTD's doing. At least one owner in the area says he's currently interested in a stop at the mall (which since it is a failing mall is a prime candidate for a Belmar style transit oriented redevelopment). Even though it is planned for 2013, a stop there has pretty much definitvely been ruled out because the stop wasn't included in the environmental impact statement. Bastards! Do we really need a repeat of the County Line stop fiasco? They need to amend the environmental impact statement to make this work, even if local government or the owners have to chip in money to do it. Maybe Governor Ritter or Speaker Andrew Romanoff can knock some heads together to get this rail line back on track.

* Looks like we will have a city vacancy election in Denver on January 30, 2006 for Rodriguez's post, now that she is being appointed to a national commission on improving how elections are conducted, in addition to the ordinary city elections in May. Districts 7 and 8 will have contested city council races with some good candidates already declared in each race. There may be a vote on the future of the election commission at the January election as well, so that the voters know what they are voting for in the May election. Decisions on what will be on the ballot in January will start to be made as soon as today.

* Square State notes that the pastor of Grace Churh (a megachurch that is the only place you can get to from the County Line stop on RTD light rail on foot), is following in Haggard's footsteps and resigning because he is a gay man whose spent his life preaching gay hate. Maybe gay guys make better pastors or something? Also, I wonder if the increasing acceptance of homosexuality is causing people like that to admit to who they are in a way that the wouldn't have in earlier eras.

* The building boom is over. I just heard that MDC aka Richmond Homes, a major new home builder has laid off something like 25% of its employees.