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Recently my vanity provoked me into boarding an airplane for the first time since 1986. I had been invited to speak in Phoenix. Even though I'm a homebody by nature, Arizona looks appealing in mid-November when you're staring at leafless trees and plunging thermometers in central Colorado.
Given the vagaries of winter weather and the age of my automobiles, let alone my ignorance of freight-train schedules and routing, there was no choice but to fly.
So off I drove to use the airport at a remote metropolis.
Much to my surprise, I was able to reach it on the first try -- no missed exits followed by confusing cloverleaf reversals followed by wrong lanes that led to the tank farm or some rental car impoundment.
The pleasant surprises continued. I could park within easy strolling distance of the terminal, which was so new it still sparkled. Everything ran on time. My baggage did not get routed to Cleveland.
Upon my return two days later, I was on my way home less than 15 minutes after the wheels touched the runway -- short walk to the baggage area, no crowds to elbow through, minimal traffic.
These miracles of modern transportation did not occur at Denver International Airport, since it isn't open yet. Nor did they occur at Stapleton, where I seldom fail to venture up the wrong concourse after two miserable hours of getting confused by traffic and parking.
It is with some reluctance that I mention this site where travail and travel are no longer necessarily synonymous, since if more people discover this gem, it may lose some of its relaxed charm and become as hectic and harried as other airports.
However, my sense of public duty has overwhelmed mere selfish personal concerns, and so I mention this location: the new Colorado Springs Airport.
If I ran that airport, I'd promote it from Littleton to Raton, from Salida to Las Animas. I'd tell Coloradans that there's an airport built for us when we need to go somewhere, as opposed to DIA, built to serve millions of folks from everywhere who just happen to be changing planes at a hub that just happens to be in Denver -- 60 percent of the passengers handled at DIA will never leave the building.
If I stretch it, maybe I can connect these two Colorado
airports to the reason I went to Phoenix. There was a
convention of legislators from western states, and I was on
a panel to discuss the soul of the West.
My fellow
panelists were Ed Marston, publisher of High Country News,
and Don Snow, co-editor of Northern Lights in Montana -- I
felt flattered to be in that company.
The Mountain West is a highly urbanized area (more urban than America in general, in fact), but it is defined by its open spaces, not by its cities. That is, what makes the West a distinctive region is not Denver or Phoenix, cities so typically American that they're often used as test markets by national corporations, but the stretches of sparsely populated mountains, prairies and desert in between.
Denver's traditional job, as historian Tom Noel has
noted, was to serve as an inland port
for this
region. When goods arrived in bulk, they were broken down
in Denver to be shipped to hardware stores and haberdashers
throughout the West. Ores and like products from the
hinterland were processed in Denver for shipment elsewhere,
perhaps back to the hinterland after processing.
Apply this to transportation, and the idea is to get from Salida or Casper or Moab to Denver, where you make connections to the rest of the world.
DIA appears to be designed quite well for connections to the rest of the world. But there's not much in the way of service for the Salidas of this world.
In short, DIA will probably serve the national transportation system well, but it won't be a regional transportation center. This void might be filled by airports in places like Grand Junction and Colorado Springs.
It used to be that if someone from Casper had to see someone from Durango, they met in Denver, which was thus the logical place for specialized goods and services. But what happens to Denver if the logical place becomes Colorado Springs or Grand Junction?
The historian and geographer Carl Abbott has observed this process in the Pacific Northwest. Seattle, he argues, is becoming a national and international city while Portland takes over the regional role.
Denver could be emulating Seattle while Colorado Springs is Portland. Then look at our state legislature, with both houses led by Colorado Springs delegates -- who will understandably promote their city's interests. Denver may become a big player in Washington, Tokyo and Munich, but in 20 years, it might not be much of a player in Colorado, or the West in general.
This means that the soul of the West
won't be
refined or articulated in Denver, which will be just
another stepping stone for regional managers who were in
Omaha last year and hope to be in Houston next year.
Meanwhile, if you want to catch a plane with minimal aggravation, and you're anywhere south of Colfax, try the Springs. I'd forgotten that travel could be pleasant.
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