As you may have been able to tell, I enjoy living car free. Sure, I know it’s good for the environment. I know I leave a small carbon footprint, use less resources, and the world is a better place because of it.s you may have been able to tell, I enjoy living car free. Sure, I know it’s good for the environment. I know I leave a small carbon footprint, use less resources, and the world is a better place because of it.
That may be all well and good, but I also do it because I LOVE it. After doing a nearly $100 fill up at the pump, spending far too much timeThat may be all well and good, but I also do it because I LOVE it. First here are the reasons I love it.
- My last fill up at the pump was almost $100 for my car. My last fill up for my scooter was $2. My last fill up for my bike was lunch at Sushi Sasa. I pick the latter two.
- People are downright crazy on the roads. My last drive was like some post Armageddon Mad Max journey… and I was just going to Wash Park.
- When I ride public transportation I read, I write, I observe the world. Biking, Scooting, Walking are all ways to get outside, get some fresh air, and it’s fun. Traffic jams in a car… UGH.
- I don’t deal with parking. Sure I have to find a bike rack or a very small spot for a scooter sometimes.. but nothing like when I drove. And of course light rail means NO PARKING.
- I live more locally and enjoy my neighborhood. From restaurants to farmers markets I am learning all the great specials, events, and activities in my own back yard. I really love where I live and getting around by bike and by foot puts me more in the moment for where I am. Of course it helps that Denver is a great city.
Being a fan of living car optional may have directed some of the construction of our DenverUrban.com website. It was built to calculate how close each property is to the things homeowners want to know about. The site calculates the closest restaurants, bistros, dog parks, and more. We don’t rely on an automated feed, but enter these features individually so we can try to provide really valuable content for our clients.
Light rail factored into this a great deal. Every property has information about the closest 5 light rail stations. In addition, for those who are seeking a light rail friendly home, we created a light rail based search. As transit oriented development becomes more popular we want there to be tools to help in that search.
And today I asked the question.. how much of the available Denver inventory is Light Rail Friendly. Since we already have the database I created a new page called the Denver Light Rail Report. This measures how many properties are within 500 Feet (what I called Super Duper Light Rail Friendly) or up to a mile from a light rail station. This report is now a web page you can visit anytime for real time info.
As of this blog here are the statistics for today’s Denver Inventory.
Total Active Properties: 9,960
Light Rail Friendly Properties (within 1 mile of a station): 1,020 – 10.24%
Of those Properties within 1 mile of a light rail station, here is how they break out in what we like to call our Light Rail Friendly Report.
SUPER DUPER FRIENDLY: Within 500 Feet: 48 Properties 0.48%
SUPER FRIENDLY: Within 1/4 Mile: 182 Properties 1.83%
VERY FRIENDLY: Within 1/2 Mile: 500 Properties 5.02%
FRIENDLY: Within 3/4 Mile: 773 Properties 7.76%
CONVENIENT: Within 1 Mile: 1020 Properties 10.24%
This is pretty amazing if you think about it. over 10% of all the listings in the Denver MLS are within one mile of a light rail station. WOW! I seriously doubt most people realize they could be commuting by light rail so easily. Once I realized this I quickly modified our property detail pages so now any property that is within a mile of a light rail station will have a flag on it in the property details. Pretty cool huh?
For those who want to stay updated via social media we created Light Rail Twitter and Facebook feeds for you to stay updated. These accounts will track new light rail friendly listings PLUS news and updates from RTD or local news channels about our growing Light Rail System.
Best of all is our Light Rail Map based search. Check it out and pick any station and then see the closest available homes. Good luck with your car free lifestyle search and feel free to contact us at info@denverurban.net with any questions or to schedule a showing.
Enjoy!