Suburban area where kids can bike/walk to "stuff" (Colorado Springs: homes, neighborhood)

[jennykay]

My family is considering a Colorado Springs relocation. We work from home and have two kids: 12 and 9. We are attracted to Colorado Springs' access to nature, relatively affordable housing, and climate.

I know that if we target suburban areas, we won't be getting a traditional walkable area. However, I would love to find a neighborhood where our kids could have some freedom to roam. Perhaps being able to bike to the local recreation center, park, a library, and/or a frozen yogurt or burger place.

Do you have any suggestions of where we may look? We will be in town for a few weeks in August and can also contact a Realtor to get some insights. Thanks for any ideas you may have!

[abcdefg567]

There's probably quite a few.

We live (well, not as of Wednesday) in Springs Ranch and from our neighborhood on North Carefree we can walk to the First & Main center which has a movie theater, dining, shopping, etc. and across the street is a Target and more.

[hollyt00]

I live in the Old North End and I'm seven blocks from an ice cream shop/hot dogs, about a mile from downtown library, monument valley park... I'd consider it if you want to look at older homes. If not, there are good pockets around the city. Definitely come by first as some places on the east side (and downtown, don't get me wrong) will require the kids to cross pretty busy roads to get to the recreational centers.

[TCHP]

Except for the immediate downtown area, Cos was built as an constantly expanding ring of suburbs from after WW2 to now. So knowing the age and type of housing you are after will help narrow things down a bit. If by suburb you mean construction <20 years old, then that will limit you to the north, east, and south areas of the city.

Some that immediately come to mind west to east are Pleasant Valley, lower Skyway, Cheyenne Hills, Holland Park, Mountain Shadows, Bonforte, Garden Ranch, Village Seven, Old Farm, Sundown, Briargate, Stetson Hills, Springs Ranch and points south and east of Fountain may also qualify.

The bolded locations above will have the greatest amount of newer construction.

[otowi]

There are quite a few areas in Security/Widefield and Fountain that would meet that description.

[abcdefg567]

Originally Posted by abcdefg567

There's probably quite a few.

We live (well, not as of Wednesday) in Springs Ranch and from our neighborhood on North Carefree we can walk to the First & Main center which has a movie theater, dining, shopping, etc. and across the street is a Target and more.

*ETA. A YMCA is being built in the First & Main area too, however COS is not like many cities with traditional rec centers. You have the YMCA and private clubs. There is a Cotton Wood Creek rec center, run by the YMCA.
Our nearest libraries are a 10 minute drive and none are located by anything remarkable, but there is a vending machine operated by the PPLD in the above mentioned town center that vends books or movies, sort of like a Red Box with a drop off.

The East & Briargate libraries are nice though and have teen centers. There's also more around the city.

Security/Widefield had its own separate recreation system.

[smdensbcs]

Originally Posted by jennykay

I would love to find a neighborhood where our kids could have some freedom to roam. Perhaps being able to bike to the local recreation center, park, a library, and/or a frozen yogurt or burger place.

It's not impossible but it's a very challenging ask here in Colorado Springs. After living near Garden of the Gods Park for several years we landed in a lovely neighborhood in the Southwest part of town (Skyway) just a few blocks from Bear Creek Park. Sending our pre-teen kids on a walk or bike ride those few blocks to the park would require them to walk/ride on the streets (there are no sidewalks) through a veritable gauntlet of gigantic SUV's with distracted drivers (smart phones anyone?) often going 45+ mph in a 30 mph "residential" zone, swerving around a variety of parked cars on streets where cars are not "supposed" to park but few seem to care enough to park in the driveways rather than the streets.


I apologize for sounding grumpy and I know I should just send the kids out there to survive on their own (heck they drove us kids around on highways in the open beds of pick-up trucks back in the '70's, right?), but it's really nerve-racking to send your only kids out onto streets without sidewalks where people drive like race-car drivers checking their folding race-course map.


I've not been to EVERY neighborhood in the Springs but I've really not found the ideal balance of walkable to "stuff" with reasonably safe and reasonably priced. It's almost like a triangle where you can always find one, sometimes find two, but never find all three things. Kind of like everything else in life - there is no perfect, everything has tradeoffs.


On the positive side, we HAVE found several wonderful smaller towns to visit within 2-3 hours of Colorado Springs that have fantastic in-town walkability and accessibility to outdoor adventures (Salida, Taos, among others), but that doesn't really solve the conundrum of wanting "it all" here in the Springs and sadly having to make concessions. C'est la vie.

[Mike from back east]

In the Briargate area, corner of Union Blvd and Briargate Pkwy (not BLVD), right by Memorial Hospital North there is a YMCA with a skate board park and across the street is the newly opened Venezia Park. This area is walkable to these things plus a supermarket (King Soopers), and reasonable distance to other items that can be seen on a google map.

Briargate is on the far north end of the city, just about everything up there is new or newish, has excellent D20 schools and access to all sorts of shopping, eats, movies, highways, hospitals, medical, gyms, etc.

[DrDog]

Originally Posted by Mike from back east

In the Briargate area, corner of Union Blvd and Briargate Pkwy (not BLVD), right by Memorial Hospital North there is a YMCA with a skate board park and across the street is the newly opened Venezia Park. This area is walkable to these things plus a supermarket (King Soopers), and reasonable distance to other items that can be seen on a google map.

Briargate is on the far north end of the city, just about everything up there is new or newish, has excellent D20 schools and access to all sorts of shopping, eats, movies, highways, hospitals, medical, gyms, etc.

As Mike says, check out north and northeast parts of town. All kinds of parks, sidewalks, rec centers full of young families.

[TCHP]

Originally Posted by smdensbcs

I've not been to EVERY neighborhood in the Springs but I've really not found the ideal balance of walkable to "stuff" with reasonably safe and reasonably priced. It's almost like a triangle where you can always find one, sometimes find two, but never find all three things. Kind of like everything else in life - there is no perfect, everything has tradeoffs.

This is pretty close to the truth and the list I posted are areas where you maybe able to hit on a couple of those pieces. Housing budget, school districts, and other aspects of what you want would also have to factor into that decision as well.