Union Station parking disappears: Lots of luck parking your car in LoDo in 2012!

Big photo below.

Now that RTD has chosen the Union Station Alliance to revamp the facility, the project to turn the area around the station into a multi-modal mainstay by 2014 is moving full speed ahead.

Already, a mountain of dirt behind Union Station testifies to all the excavation and construction work of the past year that will return the station area to its status as a true transportation hub; the Union Station Neighborhood Co. is supervising that job. The latest sign of the times? As of today, the two parking lots flanking the front of Union Station are off-limits, permanently -- as this photo proves.

This isn't the first transformation of the space in front of Union Station -- even if it promises to be most monumental. See more in our "Remaking Union Station Plaza" slide show.