Neighborhoods: Historic Downtown Louisville

A piece of Louisville's past greets folks driving into downtown.

Zipping through the bulk of modern Louisville, with all its bedroom-community developments (it took first place in Money Magazine's Best Place to Live: Top 100 in 2009), you'd think that most of the Boulder County berg's Italian coal-mining heritage has all but disappeared. But once you find yourself in the heart of Louisville -- its historic old downtown neighborhood -- that perception is gone in a blink: Incorporated in 1882 along the great Northern Coalfield of Boulder and Weld counties, the original Louisville sports an old-time charm that lives on in the Victorian frame buildings still lining much of Main Street and its environs.

Louisville's ode to the coal miner.

That's not to say it isn't modern. Downtown Louisville is lined with eateries of every stripe, along with eclectic shops and galleries, making it prime location for a Saturday stroll, any time of year. We were lucky enough to visit on one of those spectacular sunny days in the dead of winter, when skaters were catching a few last spins on the town's WinterSkate rink at Steinbaugh Pavilion, and downtown was hopping in its quiet way.