Colfax Avenue is the longest commercial strip in America, cutting east-west through the center of the Denver metro area. My project interweaves studies of public policy and public perception to track the development of the street from Denver's founding through the 1980s. I argue that locally popular \"rise and fall\" narratives in Denver capture the commercial history of Colfax, but fail to consider the strip's exclusivity at its \"peak\" and the community building that thrived in the face of poverty as businesses later failed. I approach Colfax as not a singular, static place, but a collection of evolving and sometimes divergent experiences, which both shaped and were shaped by Denver. In the early twentieth century, Colfax became Denver's primary tourist route and a hub of local retail and nightlife. In the process, the strip evolved into a source of local power and pride, and a primarily white, wealthy landscape. In the 1960s, suburbanization and the construction of Interstate-70 drew traffic and investment away from the strip. To revitalize Denver, city leaders undertook a decades-long urban renewal project, which did not include Colfax and further diverted resources from the strip. As renewal made downtown spaces and several residential neighborhoods intentionally uninhabitable for poor residents, the now-desolate Colfax emerged as a gathering place for Denver's disenfranchised. In the 1970s and 80s, the new Colfax became a dynamic landscape of fear, resistance, solidarity, and community. The street's inhabitants struggled against developers, violence and containment tactics from police, and public perceptions which frequently either exoticized or moralized perceived \"vice\" on Colfax.
"},{"label":"Degree","value":["Bachelor of Arts with Departmental Honors"]},{"label":"Author-supplied Keywords","value":["Denver","Urban history","Streetscapes"]},{"label":"Administrative Note","value":"Drupal Node ID: 23977