Notice the great arched windows and the TRAVEL BY TRAIN sign marking Denver's front door for more than a century. Union Station opened in 1881 when Denver was barely twenty years old and the railroads were the arteries of the American West. The current Beaux-Arts building, with its great arched windows and the iconic TRAVEL BY TRAIN sign, was rebuilt in 1914 after fire destroyed the earlier structure.
At its peak in the 1940s, the station handled eighty trains a day, connecting Denver to Chicago, San Francisco, and Los Angeles. Then the automobile and airplane gutted rail travel, and by the 1980s the station stood nearly empty. The transformation completed in 2014 is one of the most celebrated adaptive reuse projects in the West: the terminal building became a hotel and restaurant hub, the train shed was rebuilt as a light-rail nexus, and the surrounding blocks became Denver's most ambitious transit-oriented development.
The Great Hall has been restored close to its 1914 grandeur. Notice the timber ceiling, the chandeliers, and Colorado light spilling through the arched windows.