Metro Denver Green Homes Tour

Hello All,

This upcoming weekend is the annual Metro Denver Green Homes Tour. Cost is $10 (purchase tickets at newenergycolorado.com/home-tour). Tours from 9-4, reception at the Jeffco Unitarian Church from 4-6.

Tours are self-guided (flexible) and include both new and retrofit installations in Arvada, Denver, Golden & foothills, Littleton and Westminster. Prominently featured will be the Geos Neighborhood (Arvada), also on the Green Homes tour last year. This year, however, first phase construction for this fully Passive House community is complete; thus the tour provides an excellent opportunity to visualize what the co-located Ralston Creek Cohousing Community will look like, feel like. (FYI-- Passive Homes are abodes that virtually heat and cool themselves given their tight building envelopes, geothermal, solar, and strategic orientation/placement, which significantly lowers the monthly cost of living).

The Ralson Creek Cohousing Community will be unique in that it will include a multi-family, apartment style building fully compliant with Passive House standards. The only place where a similar situation can be found is in Ithaca, New York, within the world-famous Ecovillage at Ithaca community.

The other thing that I find interesting about the Ralson Creek Cohousing Community is its' location in Arvada. For those of you who toured Highland Crossing Cohousing Community in Littleton last spring, the environs will look familiar. Surburban cohousing can address various aspects of affordability (i.e. land costs, municipal support/cooperation), and as these neighborhoods evolve to become increasingly walkable and efficiently served by public transport, it merits taking a look, even if you are a die-hard urbanite.

Wendy