Need specifics about Colorado Springs neighborhoods for positive family move (Denver: middle-class, real estate)

[Dean-O]

Not sure if I got this posted into correct forum first time. If a repeat, sorry!

Looking for what I currently don't have where we live now. Asking for family w/ school age children, college grad parents, work for military/fed gov't.

Have read some of the forum here, looking for more specifics. Want a smaller suburb to live in near Co Spgs.

Weather: Where I am now, it's winter easily 6 months of year. Which I don't mind as long as those mnths have SNOW. Like snow. Hate grey cold w/out snow. Hate relentless wind in any season. So what is Co Spgs and various suburbs specifics like in that regard? I am aware that where I live in the mts of WA that answer can differ even within a few miles. Our home sits between 2 mts and we have constant snow on ground all winter and not much wind while in town they melt snow melt snow and yuck mud a lot. Another area gets lots of wind along with little snow because it is more open. Roughly same 20 mile radius.

Summers are hot and dry and forest fires abound and if you don't irrigate you get nada and yet frosts in Late May and early Sept. Forget growing a tomato w/out a greenhouse.

Next, here we have more or less level roads passable even in winter because it is a terminal morraine flat between mts. Is Colo Spgs like that ? Or will I be driving more mt passes and steep roads that may be impassible in winter? Roads are good year round with repairs minimal.

Traffic: We have a lot of free parking here and not too much congestion. Even malls are free open parking as opposed to paid garages. How is it there?

Culture: None here. No art or music taught in schools. No marching band. No one has heard of Shakespeare. No museums. No children's science hands on. No zoo.

Tourism and desire or ability to market themselves to create jobs: Zero. Can't even rent a canoe to go on the ubiquitous river. (And most local grads wouldn't know definition of ubiquitous) Big cattle and open range river town that hates anything that will change their fence-post-shaped family trees and probably fairly racist to boot, as mostly all white. However lots of retirees here raising their grandkids because mom and pop can't find work. Lots of big fish in small town mentality. What is Colo Spgs various suburbs like?

Neighborhoods/schools. We are aware that here we can point and say over there is the pot-head crowd living in the mts. Over there is the skin heads. Over there is the Russian speaking neighborhoods. Over there is the artsy fartsy high-end organic crowd of imports from CA. Over there is the poorer Indian Res towns that everyone here avoids like some plague. Over there is the town completely surrounded by properties owned by one man's real estate snarfing. Over there is the town that makes its money on the cop at the speed trap at the 35mph sign. Fill me in on Color Spgs neighborhood specifics.

Water: What are wells like (quantity and quality neighborhood specific) in Co spngs or water in general when looking for homes or land? Have some heavy sulfur here. some uranium problems, some heavy iron. Some 1/4 gal min wells.

Horses: can you find free shavings for stalls or do most folks not even use a barn/stalls? Or is it all buy shavings by the bag and pay big for it? (Here although timber country all the used to be free shavings go to Avista electric to make electricity from hog fuel and so none left for horse stalls)

Homes: Lots of nice land here has a doublewide plopped on it. Always on the cheap. Few 2-story homes of any kind. really don't know why. Not tornado area... What is general feel of neighborhoods in Co Spgs?

and what are home prices like? Taxes like? general overall feeling of intrusiveness of gov't in building and permitting and weed control and the like?

Trash: lots of locals dump into the woods or burn plastic because of lousy system for trash pick up (or general stupidity?). No rural dumpster sites. Must haul to landfill in rural areas.

Appreciate any and all input! Thanks.

[beezle1]

I can address the horse shavings question. I don't know of anywhere where you can get free shavings. Have to buy them by the bag here. Some places have paper shavings, but I have never used them.

Some people do not keep their horses in stalls or barn so in that case you would not need shavings, but you would probably need some sort of run-in shed to give your horse shelter from the wind and elements. However, grass is not lush here and normally a pasture will not support horses for long before it gets overgrazed, so expect to be buying hay, probably year round.

[hollyt00]

Weather wise, what you are experiencing isn't too far off of Colo Spgs, imo. We get some bad winds, but it's not relentless, all the time. We don't get a lot of snow here- lots of people complain about it, but I think General Palmer had the right idea when he settled Colo Spgs, back when a bad snowstorm really crippled the town. We are in a dry spell, so it's not going to be easy to plant this year.

I don't know if you have the right idea of Colorado Springs, simply based on your post- so correct me if I'm wrong. Colorado Springs isn't really that big of a city to warrant "suburbs". It's a very well spread out city, with various areas of urban areas. It quickly goes out to rural, however. I'm a teacher and a student brought in *her* goat to roam the hallways on Senior prank day.

I'm not sure what you are looking for, as it seems you are looking for a bit more rural? With land? Do you want to live in the mountains (Divide/Woodland Park and south) or do you want to live on the plains?

Roads are passable if people actually plow them. Only a handful of mountain passes impassable in the winter, and that's deeper into the mountains off the Continental Divide.

We base ourselves off of tourism, but the ability to effectively market ourselves is quite in question. Just ask any local about the attempt at "Live it up!"

I think you'll find quite a bit more cultural things here as far as schools, but it isn't anything compared to what you'd find in a bigger city, like Denver or larger.

A lot of the things you are frustrated with will be echoed here in the Springs, and I'd even say anywhere, honestly. Pockets of neighborhoods stereotyped and ragged on, that's here too. Students who graduate who have no clue how to write sentences, that's here too. Colorado has one of the lowest per-pupil spending in the country.

HoAs have a ton of power here. If you are going to move into one of the multitudes of new developments in town, you'll be stuck with a HOA, and I've heard some doozies of stories around some of them.

Traffic would be a lot worse than what you're used to. Still, traffic here is much better than a lot of other places in the country.


Neighborhoods in Colorado Springs range from multi-million dollar estates that sprawl, to small shacks. You can get a house on any size plot you'd want, really, and you can get old houses that were made turn of the century or build your own. Lots of people build their own in the sea of houses on the east/northeast side of town. Lots of prairie with pockets of closely packed in houses. Pricing depends on size of lot, so I'd just look on zillow or some colorado real estate page to get an idea of houses available.

[Ripleyrose]

Really? That's a lot of questions. Some of them are very subjective but I'll add my perspective. It sounds like you might be happy living up the pass, maybe in Green Mountain Falls, Cascade, Chipita Park, or Woodland Park. They are up Ute Pass a bit. The pass is four lanes and well maintained. We do have some killer wind but mostly not. You will not find year round snow here. It's actually a good thing. The sun comes out and melts the snow so it never piles up and looks dirty.
Colorado Springs has so much to do. We have a zoo, museums, Pikes Peak Center, and on and on. It's easy to find out about all of them.

You might also like Cheyenne Canon area. It's close to the Springs and it's beautiful and generally gets more snow. It is in school district 12 which is very good.

I'd stay away from the way east part of town. IMO ugly, windy, not much for vegetation, cookie-cutter houses.

For trash pick-up you have to pay private company. There are several to choose from and they're good.

We are classified as semi-arid. Low humidity. I love it.

Good luck to you. I think you'll be happy here.

[SheridanL]

Turkey Canyon area on highway 115 just minutes to the south of COS sounds like a great fit!!!!

[scratchfive]

Stay away from the southern end of COS, unless you go more southwest into the Broadmoor area but that's expensive. A lot of people might recommend Fountain which is more or less a suburb of the Springs, but unless you stay a bit east along the Hancock Expressway, then Fountain isn't really that nice. Lots of industry, old neighborhoods, and decrepit strip malls. The places around B St, anywhere on Academy south of Platte, Chelton, Fountain Blvd, S Circle-These should all be avoided. East Platte isn't that great either (along Galley Rd, Powers, etc). There's some nice newer developments near the airport out on the Proby Parkway, and anything in North COS is very nice. The further north you go the better, as a general rule.

Traffic is fast compared to a really big city, but there's still highways that can get very congested. I-25 during rush hour, Fillmore is almost always crowded, Nevada Ave, CO-21 is probably the most crowded freeway in the Springs, Acadamy gets crowded at its ends, and Platte can get congested, highway 29 is down to one lane these days so it's very slow. Various other highways and major roads can get congested. Starting next year, I-25 is going to be widened so it will be very crowded and slow during that time.

Parking is free throughout the city until you get into the direct downtown area of course. There's parking meters and many lots and garages. You can get monthly passes and reloadable cards that can be used in any city regulated parking center though which might be good if you live in or near downtown.

[otowi]

Hancock Expressway is not in Fountain at all? You seem to be thinking of the southern boundaries of Harrison District 2?
Fountain has older and newer areas, some very vibrant and some more run down, but it is a normal middle-class/ working-class neighborhood - nothing fancy, but plenty of people really like it. Some of the shopping centers in Fountain are pretty old, but they are actually mostly full of real, live, open businesses these days. The same said above would apply to the Security/Widefield area which is just north and/or east of Fountain (depending on where you are).