Affordable housing opens at Evans light-rail station

Evans Station Lofts has opened at the Evans Light Rail Station, bringing 50 affordable housing units to the transit-oriented development.

Developed by the Urban Land Conservancy and Medici Communities LLC, the $12.35 million project features 10-foot ceilings, glass-tile accents, a community room with laptop computers and free Wi-Fi, exercise room, a rooftop barbecue area and a shared car for hourly rental. Monthly rents for the one- and two-bedroom apartments range from $380 to $850 a month.

The building also has 10,000 square feet of commercial space that incorporates the work of the Denver Shared Spaces program, with the first commercial tenant being Kim Robards Dance, a local nonprofit.

"We wanted this project to not only provide a high-quality living environment for the residents, but to be a positive catalyst for future development of the surrounding community," says Troy Gladwell, founder and principal of Medici Communities.

The Urban Land Conservancy paid $1.2 million for the land in June 2011 using Denver’s Transit-Oriented Development Fund, a loan fund created to acquire and preserve land near transit stations for affordable housing and other community benefits. Urban Land sold the property to Medici for the project, which was awarded $1 million in annual low-income housing tax credits from the Colorado Housing and Finance Authority

"This development shatters the stereotype of mixed-use affordable housing and is a powerful example of how nonprofits, the public sector and for-profits can positively incorporate new transit-oriented development into an established neighborhood," says Aaron Miripol, President and CEO of the Urban Land Conservancy.

Contact Confluence Denver Development News Editor Margaret Jackson with tips and leads for future stories at margaret@confluence-denver.com.
Enjoy this story? Sign up for free solutions-based reporting in your inbox each week.

Read more articles by Margaret Jackson.

Margaret is a veteran Denver real estate reporter and can be contacted here.
Signup for Email Alerts