Special Section

• Building a New Future, Boldly
  New Civic Center positions Commerce City for Eco-Friendly growth.
• Healthy Choices
  LiveWell promotes wide range of lifestyle improvements.
• Park It Here
  Pioneer Park offers amenities for all ages.
• Back to Nature
  Greenway offers winding tour of area’s natural beauty.
• They’re back!
  Bison home on the range again thanks to repopulation program.
• Derby Days
  City’s push to revitalize historic area brings results.
• Home Field Advantage
  New stadium complex draws locally, internationally.
• Still Popular After all These Years
  10-year-old Buffalo Run Golf Course keeps drawing a crowd.
• Proximity to Denver Airport Primes Commerce City for Growth
  Airport brings business home.

Building a New Future, Boldly
New Civic Center positions Commerce City for Eco-Friendly growth.

The Civic Center’s unique architecture is designed to connect the building with an adjacent wildlife refuge.

In the spring of 2007, Commerce City unveiled its bold, new Civic Center, ushering in a new era of environmentally friendly, tech-savvy buildings.

The 90,000-square-foot building houses the city’s gov­ernment operations, police department and courts, and also acts as an entry point to the Prairie Gateway area, which is adja­cent to the Rocky Mountain Arsenal National Wildlife Refuge.

The $31 million building is a testament to the city’s com­mitment to a sustainable future. The Civic Center is seeking LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certification, meaning it has incorporated multiple envi­ronmentally friendly, green-building features into its overall construction.

City Manager Jerry Flannery hopes the building’s green status will serve as a template for other new construction in the area, both private and public. Flannery brought his green building experience to Commerce City when he moved to Commerce City from Flagstaff, Ariz., in the summer of 2007.

“The city and its economic development department want to look into attracting green industry, green buildings, that can all tie into what we’re trying to do going forward,” Flannery says. “We want to encourage that type of building as part of the area’s attraction, so that we create a niche with regard to those types of building uses, and to the green industry. It’s the wave of the future.”

Indeed, the future was a big part of the discussions when the structure was being planned, according to Tom Hootman, director of sustainability for RNL Designs and project manager for the Civic Center.

“It was really about the big picture,” Hootman says. “They needed a place that could accommodate their future, and the environmental angle was embedded in the idea of it being a prominent, important civic building. They wanted to be accountable to their citizens, but Commerce City is really growing and changing its image as just an industrial area, and city officials wanted to change the way they’re looked at as well.”

With a population of 45,000 and growing around 5 per­cent annually, Commerce City is the 16th-fastest-growing city in the United States. That also was a factor in the new center’s design.

“This area is really primed for growth now,” Flannery says. “Our hope and expectation is that you’ll see a lot of commercial development around the Civic Center while it serves as a very modern identity for Commerce City.”

Photo by Michael W. Bunch

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