How safe are rural areas around Durango? (Denver, Cortez: real estate, high crime)

[nckid]

I'm considering relocating to Durango and am interested in a property listed on south side (about 13 mi from Home Depot) of Durango--La Posta Canyon Rd. Acreage looks lovely and private, but is this area too secluded? Is there problem with vandalism? Also, does anyone know if navigating this road in winter is a problem? I would need to commute for work and property closer to downtown Durango is just toooooo expensive!

[jazzlover]

I can't comment specifically on the area you refer to near Durango. I will offer this up: if you are locating in an isolated, rural area anywhere in Colorado, it is absolutely possible that you will be a victim of property crime or vandalism. My family had a farm in rural Colorado for a number of years. For several of those years,we did not live on the farm property. We had continual problems with thefts of tools, equipment, and other items--all taken from secured buildings. This in a county that, at the time, was considered relatively "safe."

There are several reasons for this. First, in rural Colorado, law enforcement personnel must cover huge geographical areas. In one Colorado county I lived in, there were generally four sheriff's deputies on duty at any given time covering an area about three times the size of Rhode Island. In a lot of Colorado counties, there may be no law enforcement on duty outside of incorporated areas between 2 and 8 AM. Second, like it or not, the drug trade and drug use, especially meth, is alive and well in rural Colorado. People desperate to feed a habit are quite willing to steal to do it. Third, though I don't consider this an excuse, there are a lot of people in rural Colorado who can't make a decent living there. Some of them turn to crime to suppplement meager incomes. This is exacerbated by rural Colorado's increasignly "have/have not" social structure.

Once again, this is not something that the real estate people of chamber of commerce types are likely to tell you. I would be very careful about having a property in most rural areas of Colorado that I would leave unattended for any length of time. A lot of rural Colorado rural residents go many years without problems, but all it takes is to get "cleaned out" once to leave a real bitter taste. I know--it's happened to me.

[nckid]

Thanks Jazzlover for the valuable info. I suspected this might be the case. It's a real bummer because property closer to Durango seems so expensive it is pretty much out of reach for me. And this property looked so appealing...Guess it's back to the drawing board... By the way, I noticed the crime index (listed on this website) for Durango nearly doubled between 2004 and 2005 and is currently almost double that of the US average--Yikes! what's your take on that? I'm assuming those stats refer to city limits of Durango as well as rural. Again, thanks for your insight.

[jazzlover]

Tourist towns generally can have high crime indexes for two reasons: First, a lot of times the statistics are calculated by comparing the number of crimes against the permanent population of the community. Because resort areas have a lot of part-time residents, transients, and tourists, the stats can be skewed. Second, and more disturbing, communities that do have a high "transient"--meaning not permanent--base can tend to harbor some criminals in that transient population. A fellow I knew who was a cop in a ski town told me that property crime would go way up at the end of the ski season when the transients were ready to leave and some would "help themselves" to some things on their way out.

I will say again--and the chamber of commerce types and "growth-apoligists" won't like it--that resort towns tend to be sociologically unbalanced and often unhealthy. They also can have some pretty serious drug problems. There are people there who have a fair amount of idle time and have the money to buy drugs; and there are people there willing to sell them. Meth is a big problem in the some of the poorer areas of Colorado, while cocaine, marijuana, and the like are still pretty popular in some of the affluent resort areas.

[AMB8301]

I have lived in rural areas surrounding Durango since '93 and have never once had an issue. It is not unheard of to hear of break-in's, stuff walking off, definitely more in the recent years. There are meth users, well many areas have this problem, but I've noticed more issues in Montezuma county (Mancos, Cortez) then La Plata. Most of the time our house is unlocked, bicycles in the yard, the kid's toys everywhere, the garage door wide open... Crime is increasing yes, but it's not the type of place where I'm watching my every move.


I haven't been out La Posta in years so I'm unsure of what it looks like now. I do have friends that live out there, and have for 5 years now, and have never had an issue with anything. They say the drive isn't bad in the winter, and they both drive in to Durango everyday.

[nckid]

Originally Posted by AMB8301

I have lived in rural areas surrounding Durango since '93 and have never once had an issue. It is not unheard of to hear of break-in's, stuff walking off, definitely more in the recent years. There are meth users, well many areas have this problem, but I've noticed more issues in Montezuma county (Mancos, Cortez) then La Plata. Most of the time our house is unlocked, bicycles in the yard, the kid's toys everywhere, the garage door wide open... Crime is increasing yes, but it's not the type of place where I'm watching my every move.


I haven't been out La Posta in years so I'm unsure of what it looks like now. I do have friends that live out there, and have for 5 years now, and have never had an issue with anything. They say the drive isn't bad in the winter, and they both drive in to Durango everyday.

AMB8301,Are your friends referring to La Posta Canyon Rd or La Posta Rd? My understanding is that La Posta is a county road and La Posta Canyon Rd is a private, winding, gravel road. If it's actually in pretty good driving condition, I'm encouraged. I am still intrigued by the property out there and would like to consider it further. But it is almost 5 miles down La Posta Canyon Rd, off of La Posta Rd. So road conditions that far off the county road are an important factor. Any clarification would be greatly appreciated!

[cookiedough]

We've lived in many different states and towns, and are now living in a small town in rural Nebraska. People said it was a friendly, small town and it seems to be fine. But crime does happen everywhere. We went on vacation and someone tried to break in through a window. They chose a tough window to get in through, though, and our 40-pound barking, protective dog was home, so they didn't have any success. A dog won't protect you against every criminal, but in my opinion, it's one of the best deterrents around, city or country. And we love Colorado

[babyziggy2000]

how are the jobs in durango colorado (construction)

[rocko G]

I have been looking at posts by Jazzlover for a while now, and I have to wonder if

1.)Jazzlover has something personal against Durango, or
2.)Jazzlover is from Durango and doing his part to slow the invasion of wealthy “Glacier club” people from his town.

So much of what Jazzlover says about Durango seems to contradict what people, that I know who have lived in the town for many decades say about this town.

Jazzlover would have us believe that Durango is a massively overpriced town, with no water, no jobs, with Detroit crime, that is 100% dependent on being resort town, and about to go up in smoke the next time there is a Forrest fire. Gezz, I think you forgot to mention that the boogieman lives there also. I guess if you are so convinced that “peak oil” is going to destroy the planet next week, all that really matters is where the deepest bunker is huh?

I must say that from my research and from what I hear from Durango residents that much of what Jazzlover says about this town is blown way out of proportion. High crime? Where are you from Amish country? There is no place devoid of crime and desperate people, but I think it is inaccurate to scare people off of this town by using high crime… please, welcome to the USA already.

From everything I have heard Durango is a perfectly safe, healthy and thriving place to live. I also don’t agree that Durango is totally dependent on being a “resort” town. Durango has, for a long time and will continue to have a strong population of real people living there and making it a wonderful community regardless of weather or not DMR becomes the next Telluride. Sure it is getting more “Aspen” like developments etc but Durango is far from being a soulless resort town, I don’t think it will fully be turned to the dark side and become a Telluride either.
Don’t get me wrong, much of the success of the town is tied with tourism and DMR, but if they were to slow a bit, it would not kill the town.

No Durango does not have as many jobs a Silicon Valley, but guess what… It is a small mountain town, it is not the Denver tech center, it has what is has just like any other town of its size in Colorado or Iowa or Nebraska or what ever. If you don’t have a job set up, or if you’re not an entrepreneur or have money already it is a hard life in any town of this size any where in the USA.

I would love if Durango’s growth was a bit slower or if the town had a bit less high end new residents coming in raising the prices for the rest of the people, but that is life, every place in the country, or the world for that matter is growing like crazy with a few exceptions (Detroit and small Midwest farming towns), When a town has the raw beauty and personality that Durango has it is virtually inevitable that more high end people will move there, instead of misleading people about the place maybe you should work with the city to control growth and help prevent the town from exploding into the next “mountain destination” Yes Durango is not the same it was 20 years ago, but most town are not the same and if you want to live in the Durango of 20 years ago you can move to places in Montana that will provide that for another 10 years… maybe if your lucky.

Whatever the case lets not misrepresent the town of Durango.

[DgoNative]

Thank you Rocko G. I've read a few of Jazzlover's comments and they are the most depressing responses on any of these threads. I have no idea where he lives that can live up to his standards of Shangri-la: empty, beautiful, cheap, and void of daily normalcies.

I grew up in Durango, CO and now live in Seattle. I actually just returned from a trip back to Durango yesterday and I can't say how homesick I become after I visit the place. Granted it is a small town, (you can't get the excitment that you can from a place like Seattle) Durango still offers a vast amount more than almost all towns its size. I think if I had grown up in a different community, I would definitely relocate to Durango as it is a wonderful environment in every aspect.

As for nckid, la posta canyon road is not that bad. If the weather should turn so bleak as to make the road a danger to drive on, there are numerous connecting roads that connect la posta to HWY 550. That way you can be assured to drive on a road that gets more attention to snow removal. And the new bridge they installed next to the home depot takes the stress off of the tight curves and sudden dropoffs that the short ending stretch of la posta entails.

On the crime aspect, it's true that it has been increasing along with the size of Durango. This means that you can no longer leave your doors unlocked 24/7, but it shouldn't cause you worry that people are conspiring to maraude your property.

I would say go for it nckid. One question I have though is, have you ever looked at this property in person?