Here in Denver, where there has been quite a housing shortage over the past few years, developers are now building apartment buildings in virtually every part of the city, especially the neighborhoods in and adjacent to downtown. Last fall, when it was still warm and I was walking to the Union Station light rail train from the bookstore where I work, the building in the photograph on the left was just a hole in the ground. Now it is quickly rising skyward, soon to be leased to it's initial army of hipsters (a pride of lions, a colony of bats, an army of hipsters, etc.).
The problem with all these new apartments (such as the ones on California Street, north of downtown in the photograph on the right) is that they are pricey as hell. What do the people who rent these places do for a living? Do they all work in the tech industry? Are they all doctors? Or do they all just have dozens of roommates in order to pay the rent? Is Denver only attracting the affluent these days, while people with more moderate incomes are moving to more affordable places like Lincoln, Nebraska? Speaking of affordable places, my friend Valarie reports that Pueblo, Colorado - about 45 minutes south of Colorado Springs, Colorado - is still very affordable, with lots of nice Victorians in old established neighborhoods. The bottom line, of course, is that you are living in Pueblo. Or even worse, Lincoln, Nebraska. As Mark Twain once famously said, if he owned both Texas and Hell, he would rent out Texas an live in hell. Now I finally understand.
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