Colorado is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It encompasses most of the Southern Rocky Mountains as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of the Great Plains. Colorado is the eighth most extensive and 21st most populous U.S. state. The 2020 United States Census enumerated the population of the State of Colorado at 5,773,714, an increase of 14.80% since the 2010 United States Census. Colorado gained an 8th Congressional District.
The Denver & Rio Grande Western Railroad, often shortened to Rio Grande, D&RG or D&RGW, formerly the Denver & Rio Grande Railroad, was an American Class I railroad company. The railroad started as a 3 ft narrow-gauge line running south from Denver, Colorado, in 1870. It served mainly as a transcontinental bridge line between Denver, and Salt Lake City, Utah. The Rio Grande was also a major origin of coal and mineral traffic.
Empower Field at Mile High is an American football stadium in Denver, Colorado. The stadium is nicknamed Mile High due to the city's elevation of 5,280 feet (1,610 m).
The Eisenhower Tunnel, officially the Eisenhower–Edwin C. Johnson Memorial Tunnel, is a dual-bore, four-lane vehicular tunnel in the western United States, approximately 60 miles (97 km) west of Denver, Colorado. The tunnel carries Interstate 70 (I-70) under the Continental Divide in the Rocky Mountains. With a maximum elevation of 11,158 feet (3,401 m) above sea level, it is one of the highest vehicular tunnels in the world. The tunnel is the longest mountain tunnel and highest point on the Interstate Highway System. With the completion of the second bore in 1979, it was one of the last major segments of the Interstate system to be completed. Opened in 1973, the westbound bore is named after Dwight D. Eisenhower, the U.S. President for whom the Interstate system is also named. The eastbound bore was completed in 1979 and is named for Edwin C. Johnson, a governor and U.S. Senator who lobbied for an Interstate Highway to be built across Colorado.
The Denver and Salt Lake Railway (D&SL) was a U.S. railroad company located in Colorado. Originally incorporated in 1902 as the Denver, Northwestern and Pacific (DN&P) Railway, it had as a goal a direct connection of Denver, Colorado, with Salt Lake City, Utah. It underwent numerous reorganizations throughout its financially troubled history and by the time the company was acquired in 1931 by the Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad, it had advanced only as far as Craig, Colorado. After the acquisition the line was connected to the D&RGW main, and the eastern half of the line was used to give the D&RGW a more direct route to Denver. The portions of the railroad still in use today are known as the Moffat Tunnel Subdivision of Union Pacific Railroad's Central Corridor. Amtrak’s California Zephyr service from Denver to Glenwood Springs follows much of the old D&SL route.
The Winter Park Express is a passenger train operated in Colorado, providing weekend service between Denver Union Station and Winter Park Resort.
The Denver, South Park, and Pacific Railroad was a historic 3 ft narrow gauge railroad that operated in Colorado in the western United States in the late 19th century. The railroad opened up the first rail routes to a large section of the central Colorado mining district in the decades of the mineral boom. The railroad took its name from the fact that its main line from Denver ascended the Platte Canyon and traversed South Park. Founded in 1872 by Colorado Governor John Evans, the company was purchased by the Union Pacific Railway in 1880, though it continued to be operated independently. The line went bankrupt in 1889 and was reorganized under the new moniker the Denver, Leadville and Gunnison Railway. When the Union Pacific went bankrupt in 1893, the DL&G lines went into receivership and were eventually sold to the Colorado and Southern Railway. In the first half of the 20th century, nearly all the company's original lines were dismantled or converted into 4 ft 8+1⁄2 instandard gauge. The last train to run the old DSP&P tracks was from Como, Colorado on April 11, 1937. A section of the standard gauge line between Leadville and Climax is still operated as a passenger excursion railroad called the Leadville, Colorado and Southern Railroad. At its peak the Denver, South Park and Pacific Railroad had 335 miles (539 km) of narrow gauge line, making it the largest narrow gauge railroad in the state of Colorado.
Berthoud Pass is a high mountain pass in central Colorado, in the Rocky Mountains of the western United States.
Tennessee Pass elevation 10,424 ft (3,177 m) is a high mountain pass in the Rocky Mountains of central Colorado in the United States. The pass was named after Tennessee, the native state of a group of early prospectors.
Rollins Pass, elevation 11,676 ft (3,559 m), is a mountain pass and active archaeological site in the Southern Rocky Mountains of north-central Colorado in the United States. The pass is located on and traverses the Continental Divide of the Americas at the crest of the Front Range southwest of Boulder and is located approximately five miles east and opposite the resort in Winter Park—in the general area between Winter Park and Rollinsville. Rollins Pass is at the boundaries of Boulder, Gilpin, and Grand counties. Over the past 10,000 years, the pass provided a route over the Continental Divide between the Atlantic Ocean watershed of South Boulder Creek with the Pacific Ocean watershed of the Fraser River, a tributary of the Colorado River.
Dillon Reservoir, sometimes referred to as Lake Dillon, is a large fresh water reservoir located in Summit County, Colorado, United States, south of I-70 and bordered by the towns of Frisco, Silverthorne, and Dillon. It is a reservoir for the city of Denver, and its waters are under the control of Denver Water. Popular ski areas are close to the reservoir, including Copper Mountain, Keystone, Arapahoe Basin, and Breckenridge.
The Moffat Tunnel is a railroad and water tunnel that cuts through the Continental Divide in north-central Colorado. Named after Colorado railroad pioneer David Moffat, the tunnel's first official railroad traffic passed through in February 1928.
David Halliday Moffat was an American financier and industrialist.
Eldora Mountain Resort is a ski area in the southwest corner of Boulder County, Colorado, near the unincorporated community of Eldora and 3 miles (5 km) west of the town of Nederland.
Oliver Henry Nelson Shoup was the 22nd Governor of Colorado from 1919–1923.
Interstate 70 (I-70) is a transcontinental Interstate Highway in the United States, stretching from Cove Fort, Utah, to Baltimore, Maryland. In Colorado, the highway traverses an east–west route across the center of the state. In western Colorado, the highway connects the metropolitan areas of Grand Junction and Denver via a route through the Rocky Mountains. In eastern Colorado, the highway crosses the Great Plains, connecting Denver with metropolitan areas in Kansas and Missouri. Bicycles and other non-motorized vehicles, normally prohibited on Interstate Highways, are allowed on those stretches of I-70 in the Rockies where no other through route exists.
Jerry Sonnenberg is a member of the Colorado Senate, representing Senate District 1, which encompasses Cheyenne, Elbert, Kit Carson, Lincoln, Logan, Morgan, Phillips, Sedgwick, Washington, Yuma counties, and parts of Weld County.
Sal Pace is a marijuana legalization advocate and former American politician. Pace served as a member of the Colorado House of Representatives (2009-2013) and Pueblo County Commissioner (2013-2019). During his time in the state house, Pace served as the Colorado House minority leader. During his elected career, Pace was an early proponent of marijuana legalization. In 2012, he ran unsuccessfully against incumbent congressman Republican Scott Tipton in Colorado's 3rd US Congressional District. He currently serves as the national chairman of the board of the Marijuana Policy Project and on the US Cannabis Council board, HeadCount's Cannabis Voter Project advisory board, and Colorado’s Institute of Cannabis Research Governing Board.
The Central Corridor is a rail line operated by the Union Pacific Railroad from near Winnemucca, Nevada to Denver, Colorado in the western United States. The line was created after the merger with the Southern Pacific Transportation Company by combining portions of lines built by former competitors. No portion of the line was originally built by the Union Pacific; in fact, some portions were built specifically to compete with the Union Pacific's Overland Route. The line is known for significant feats of engineering while crossing the Wasatch Mountains of Utah and the Rocky Mountains of Colorado. The line features numerous tunnels, the longest and highest of these is the Moffat Tunnel.
State Highway 119 is a 63.7-mile-long (102.5 km) state highway in north central Colorado. It extends in a southwest to northeast direction, from a junction with U.S. Route 6 in Clear Creek Canyon between Golden and Idaho Springs to a junction with Interstate 25 (I-25) east of Longmont. The southwest portion of the road is a scenic mountain drive providing dramatic vistas of the Front Range, while the northeast portion is a busy interurban thoroughfare. The city of Boulder separates these two vastly different sections of SH 119.
