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People say that Denver needs a healthy downtown. All I know about downtown is that I don’t like it.
Accessing suburban shopping malls is easier. I resent having to pay $8 in parking when I go to a city office. When I use the bus, it takes three times as long, even if the buses are running when I want one.
The last time I attended a show at the Denver Center for the Performing Arts, someone stripped on stage, which was not what I wanted to see.
If Denver is going to subsidize businesses and cultural activities, then nightclubs, expensive restaurants, “adult” shows and high-priced shopping areas should not be our first choices.

Yaakov “Jim” Watkins, Denver

READER COMMENTS

well go to west Texas to a town of Lubbock , a town where it is so conservative that you cannot even buy bier in town , cannot have even clothed dancers, cannot listen to loud music(not that i do these things ) but the police raided a lingerie shop because they sold sexually explicit novelties and then charges the clerk , not the owner, but the clerk as a sex offender, and it is a woman , learn to appreciate what you have here in denver , there are good things here sometimes yiou just have to look a little harder

Why does the Rocky persist in publishing nonsense like this?
Seriously, if you don't like what downtown Denver has to offer, DON'T GO THERE, fer cryin' out loud.

I think Mr. Watkins needs to go back to the U.S.S.R., where things like he mentioned were specifically prohibited...

What a fool! He can't stand having to, gasp!, PAY for parking? Guess what? It's DOWNTOWN, people WANT to go there! It's not all about shopping (Cherry Creek is much better as it is), it's about restaurants, clubs, bars, museums, sporting events, entertainment of all types! And yes, the DCPA, too! (One of the best and largest performing arts centers in the country, too!)

Mr. Watkins simply has no clue, especially when taken in context of many of his other, numerous, letters...

Aaron

Well, we might give the writer a point on parking costs when visiting city and State offices. When one has to be someplace, in order to do business, charging nearly as much - or more - to park than some governmental fees is a gouge, anyway you look at it.

And, when it comes to the Reason To Drive, it seems to me there's a point there too. But, let's not get off on all the fun there is playing with new electric train sets, while letting the rest of the works go to blazes.

As for DCPA, Mr Watkins didn't say exactly what show he went to see. Nor did he tell us who dragged him - kicking and screaming, we're left to suppose - up to the ticket booth, opened his wallet, took out the money, paid for the tickets, and went on to force him into a seat to watch the performance he "didn't want to see". So . . . ?

Sometimes it is hard to tell when someone is being satirical.

I wonder if it is because the writer is not very talented in creating satire or because the world has become so surreal.

Dave II,

So, who was being satirical?

Yaakov has a point and shouln't be dismissed so readily. While downtown Denver is far better than the ghost town environments of Oklahoma City and others, it is a far cry from the many international cities (London, Rome, Edinburgh, et al) it aspires to.

Part of the problem with downtown Denver are its merchants who patronize college-age droids whose hallmarks are curled-billed baseball caps and cutsy lower-back tattoos, ad nauseam; and rightfully so because these fad-following sheep have money to blow.

I used to patronize LoDo, but ceased after too many close encounters with the future of America puking up their trendy beers on sidewalks. Now days if I want real fun and intellectual stimulation I'll catch the non-stop from DIA to London, and from nearby Stansted fly for pennies via Ryan Air to Eindhoven, Cologne and Amsterdam where the real action is. A friend from Chicago once told me, "Denver isn't even on the map," and as a third generation Denver native and world traveller I tend to agree.

Meanwhile, I implore all the Army-aged kiddies from CU to please continue your binge drinking in downtown Denver and leave the rest of the world to Yaakov and us old geezers.

To answer my critics.

1. I don't want to make any of this illegal. I just want to stop subsidizing it. Downtown Denver was a slum. Rebuilding into it took federal, state and local tax money. I question putting more tax money into it.

2. To give "Old Grouch" his due, yes I don't go downtown except when I have to. I thought that would be obvious. The show at the DCPA was a religious play written about 100 years ago. I read the script before going. It had no strip scene. The producers, who had access to local experts on the genre and the cultural setting, inserted a purely gratuitous strip scene. After I called the DCPA, they started rating their shows as "Adult" when they deem it appropriate. I think that it is highly inappropriate for a government agency to put itself in the position where they are making decisions about whether a play is "adult." That comes dangerously close to censorship. Again, I am not asking that these shows be made illegal. I am just suggesting that we stop subsidizing them with tax money. If you want to rot your brain with garbage, you have the right to do so.

3. As for "hoimaha", I did not suggest that you move to Las Vegas, I did not suggest that we change the laws. Denver is my town also. Your suggestion that anyone who disagrees with you move out is reminiscent of McCarthyism (if you are educated enough to know what that is). All I suggested was that we stop subsidizing certain kinds of activity.

4. As for 593boat, I submit that Denver would be better off subsidizing other activities than nonstop hedonism.

I suggest that Denver has better use for tax dollars than subsidizing downtown.

Oh yes, by all means--if downtown was a slum and we transformed it to something decent, let's just let it revert to that former state. That would be a good use of the money spent.

And, we certainly shouldn't be doing anything to attract visitors to come to town and spend money. That would be silly.

Perhaps we should just appoint Mr. Watkins as head of the morality police--then perhaps his prudish sensabilities wouldn't be offended and he could stop writing stupid letters.

Good points, Mr. Watkins. I agree with you.

Perhaps, the money would be better spent on teaching todays youth manners and etiquette. And then we can work on getting kids to stop dressing like hoodlums and whores.

Yep, let's have even more right-wing nanny state policies! Legislate behavior and dress codes! Heck, let's just lock all kids up until they are 45...

John II, I'm sure that you never, ever caused any trouble in your youth, never rebeled against authority, never smarted off to anyone, never wore the latest in fashion--right? Because otherwise, you're a hypocrate. Or, perhaps just a scared little old man.

Too bad your parents didn't teach you better...

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