Lowdown on LoDo
Clip and save: After the shootings early Sunday morning, June 22, there's lots of talk about violence in LoDo -- and if people can't be clear about what they're talking about (and judging from the conversation so far, they can't), at least they can be clear about where they're talking about.
LoDo started as a nickname coined in the early '80s by then-Denver Post columnist Dick Kreck to describe the warehouse district of lower downtown, between Larimer Square and Union Station. The city made LoDo an official historic district in 1988 with these boundaries: from the alley between Market and Larimer streets to Wewatta Street (with a bite out of the district so that Union Station is not included), 14th to 20th streets. This means that Coors Field, which didn't exist in 1988, isn't in LoDo proper, and neither is the corner at 15th and Arapahoe where a mother and two children were killed by a drunk driver in November 2006 (an incident lumped into the Rocky Mountain News' "LoDo violence" roundup on June 23) -- nor is 16th and Stout or so many of the other downtown spots that have been labeled "LoDo" in recent crime reports.
LoDo, with all its preserved warehouse buildings and its restaurants and clubs, is a real asset to this city -- but the problems caused by the mass exodus when those clubs let out is real, too. As we talk about those problems, let's at least keep boundaries clear.-- Patricia Calhoun
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