My wife and I went for a walk last night downtown. Our purpose was two-fold.

1. get some fresh air, and see what 16th st looked like. Talk about a police presence. Man they were everywhere! i wasn’t sure I should feel safe, or trapped.

2. we had to mail a book for my wife’s paperback exchange.

We headed down to where we thought we remembered some Blue boxes being. Nothing.

Then we headed over to the Downtown Post Office, where we KNEW there were blue boxes… nothing.

What? We looked around and sure enough, there were cut bolts in the sidewalk.

Anyone else seen or heard anything about removing the blue mailboxes? I’m guessing it’s a DNC thing, but jeez. They coming back?

I gotta say, after posting my little twitter-bit, I got to thinking, someone at the DDP is no dummy.

They didn’t set up an SMS system complete with ‘Charges will be incurred’ warnings.

They didn’t set up a email list, well they might have, I’m not sure.

They didn’t do nothing.

They set up a twitter account. How 2008 of them. How insanely useful of them.

I certainly hope they make use of it, and I may even have this one sent to my phone (yes, I know I’ll be charged per message fees by my carrier).

Good on ya DDP, for being progressive and ‘with it’ enough to see value in new platforms!

Now don’t let me down, update this thing often. I’ll be seriously angry and may have to take it out on a… i dunno, whatever physical representation I can find of the DDP, if you leave this twitter account with exactly two tweets in it.

And I promise to be a better Metroblogger!

So this will be short and hopefully informative. If you use twitter (who doesn’t?) follow DDPTransport for traffic updates this coming DNC week.

Hey, all. Just thought I’d give a shout since it’s been a while since I posted here.

I’m going to be covering the DNC for The Metropolitan, and a lot of the protests surrounding it. I’ve got a feeling the DPD won’t be putting up with anything, if this CBS4 report is any indication. Hopefully cooler heads will prevail, but I’ve got a respirator rated for CS gas in case (can’t take photos with tear gas in my lungs, right?).

And Rage is coming to town! All things aside, that should be a good show. So what are you all doing to get ready for the traffic nightmare that will be the convention?

Laura Dean, a resident of the Metro Denver area for the past 8 1/2 years, loves to network and connect people. This is why she started The Dean’s List, a weekly email, distributed on Thursdays, that provides a free way for people to share community information. Laura originally started The Dean’s List when she lived in Dallas. Lucky for us, she decided to continue her efforts here in Denver.

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My wife pointed my to this last night. Very handy information to keep around come DNC-time.

Road Closures and re-routes during the DNC

“Downtown parking at lots, garages and meters will be “largely accessible,” with “the majority” of downtown meters available.”

So the limited and usually full parking will be “mostly” available. I’m sure glad I don’t park down town!

“Light rail going into downtown — including the D, F and H lines — won’t be disrupted during the convention, but there will be no light rail service to and from the Pepsi Center and Denver Union Station stops.

Light rail C and E line passengers going downtown will need to switch to the D, F and H lines. C and E line passengers will have to get off at the Invesco Field at Mile High light-rail stop.”

Wouldn’t closing stops and making people change trains, be a disruption? Maybe my dictionary isn’t up to date :)

Read the whole thing for details, but definitely keep in mind, getting to, from, and around Downtown, is gonna be the epitome of teh suck come DNC-time

This is mainly aimed at you A-holes on Park Ave that get in the turn lane for Market, and then hold up the lane, while you sit there with your right blinker on, to cut in line and continue on.

Some of us, want to turn left on Market, so stop being a prick!

Just about every morning on my way home, I have to honk at some one who gets in the lane that is left turn only, then puts their right blinker on to cut into that lane, and get a few cars ahead of everyone else.

It’s one thing when you don’t hold the rest of us up, and just cut into an opening. It’s still prickish, but at least you’re not actually impeding the rest of us. But when you just stop and wait for some one to let you in, holding us up. You’re gonna get an irritated honk, and possible a one finger solute, for your self centered-ness.

Which brings me to road rage. My wife was telling about our morning hassles and a friend warned her that in Denver (maybe elsewhere) you can be cited for road rage for honking.

What a bunch of love-dovey crap! Road rage would be me hopping out of my car, walking over to the person and beating the crap out of them for holding dozens of people up, because he/she (It’s actually women more often than not) can’t be bothered to wait in traffic or get up earlier. That would be road rage. Honking is the established norm for letting an idiot know you disapprove. Honking at people to let them know you’re coming, let them know to move when they sit at a light, etc. is what horns are for. Road Rage would be me using my car to plow them into traffic. Honking is not road rage!

I’ll have to research this one, but I’ll be damned if I’m gonna stop honking at you losers that think you’re time is more valuable than the rest of us.

Thoughts? Are you one of the offenders? Care to tell us why holding up a lane of traffic is an acceptable social behavior?

…and not for the reasons you might be thinking! Minds out of the proverbial gutters y’all. :)

My new job has me working in and around the University of Colorado Hospital over at Colfax and I-225.  I love this new job for many reasons but one of them is that I have found myself drawn to the street that is one of the longest in the country.  For the longest time it was known as a bad place and people would drive miles around it to avoid touching or looking at Colfax.

To those people I say…whatevah!  To me, there are dangerous parts in any city you go.  Slide on over to Detroit and tell me there are places that you’d like to walk down in the dark of night flaunting and taunting.  Here’s the thing.

Denver is beautiful.  And not just because of those Rocky Mountains and the sunshine and the amazing parks and great trails.  No, our city is beautiful because there is still character left within her.  There are still places that exude the culture, the love and the ideas of what has made Denver and the metro area that unique.  Colfax is just a piece of that.  There are so many points in Denver and the metro area that create the character of our city that seem to be moving to lukewarm territory it’s a little saddening.  And maybe even scary.

And so tonight I did the unthinkable.  I drove from Colfax and 225 all the way to Race Street at around 30 miles an hour windows down and playing my music softly from my speakers.

I loved this journey as the neon lights blazed on on the darkness.  The closed storefronts with unique facades.  The streets littered with the random walker and talker.  The old signs  that evoked the neighborhood of old with the stark comparison of newfangled buildings and business.  As I voyaged deeper down Colfax there were parts where my nervous soul skittered a bit but regained composure.  I passed icons (“Pete’s” numerous Restaurants anyone?) and fading memories throughout this drive.  I passed the dying and the thriving as the darkness consumed the path behind me.

There’s a drive underway to bring Colfax out of the red light days and into something bigger and better…and yet somehow manage to retain the identity.  Urban change and renewal is a complicated beast and the longest street in America.  As a new transplant from A-Town (Aurora, woot!) I’m venturing outside my mild comfort zone in an attempt to get to know my city that I love.  There are also others who love Colfax and they’re really into the street.

There’s even business working at it too.  As time goes on and I get used to driving Colfax I’ll try and do some photo reporting and posts about it.  It’s a great part of Denver (and the side street journeys are also fun to do) and you should check it out…although I’d say daytime would be better for first timers.

Came across this little gem on another blog I read.

I wasn’t planning on being one of the many wing nuts penned in in the protest pits, but if I was, I’d be thinking twice for sure!

Mud Butt!!

Maybe they’ll deploy from those kick ass black hawks we all saw the other week? that’d be cool. Well not for the those it was used on, but for those of us watching :)

Be careful you protesting lot, August is a hot month to have dirty breaches.