With proposed tax cuts for transit and housing programs in the 2018 federal budget, Rail~volution explored the Mile High Vista transit-oriented development on West Colfax in Denver to showcase the importance – and challenges – of a successful housing development near transit. The development, which sits at the corner of Colfax and Irving, consists of 80 units of permanently affordable housing at the Avondale Apartments and the adjacent Rodolfo “Corky” Gonzales Library. The development was completed in 2014, just one year after the opening of RTD’s W Line light rail connecting Denver to Lakewood and Golden.

In their latest blog post, Rail~volution dives into the detailed and lengthy process associated with gathering funds to build an affordable housing development. In Mile High Vista’s case, financing and funding came from various sources including: Denver TOD Fund, TIGER grant, Denver Office of Economic Development, Colorado Brown-Fields loan, Low Income Housing Tax Credits, FasTracks and federal funding for the W Line. (To learn more about each individual program, please read the full article here.)

A proposed decrease in federal funding towards transit and affordable housing would be extremely detrimental to our city, as Denver faces an unprecedented lack of affordable housing. Instead of a cut to federal funds – we need the opposite. Metro Denver not only needs increased state and federal support, but a permanent source of funding to help close our affordable housing gap.