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Trip ideas  /  6 days in Denver and Rocky Mountain National Park  /  Denver Union Station
Denver Union Station, Denver, Colorado
Historic site · Denver, Colorado

Denver Union Station

A fire in 1894.The Mizpah arch.A Beaux-Arts hall in 1914.Over 80 trains a day.

Photo: Darkshark0159 at English Wikipedia, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

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The depot

A station opened on the site in 1881 and a fire ended its centre in 1894

Four railroads agreed in February 1880 to build one central station at 17th and Wynkoop Streets. It opened on June 1, 1881. A fire that started in the women's restroom in 1894 destroyed the central portion of the depot.

The arch

An arch outside the station said Welcome on one side and Mizpah on the other

A large arch was dedicated in front of the station on July 4, 1906. The face toward 17th Street was changed to Mizpah, a Hebrew word expressing an emotional bond between separated people. The arch was torn down in 1931.

1914

The central portion was rebuilt in the Beaux-Arts style and opened in 1914

The owners decided to rebuild the central portion of the station to handle the growing traffic. Designed by Denver architects Gove & Walsh, it opened in 1914. By the 1920s and 1930s, over 80 trains served the station daily.

80trains a day by the 1920s and 1930s

Decline

Airport traffic passed the station in 1958 and Amtrak was left with two trains

For the first time in 1958, passenger traffic at Stapleton International Airport passed that of Union Station. Amtrak was left operating two trains daily. The station house reopened in the summer of 2014, hosting the 112-room Crawford Hotel.

Day 1, morning

Next is Larimer Square.

More stories from this trip idea

The words are a retelling of the Wikipedia article Denver Union Station, and are shared under CC BY-SA 4.0. They are checked against those articles, and a fact that is not in them is left out.

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