A couple weeks ago, I headed out to Colorado, the Centennial State, with buddy and fellow streets.mn writer Chris Iverson. It’s nice! Second time since the fall. Weather was good. We went out to wander around and also ride a new train line that just opened up, connecting Downtown Denver with Denver International Airport, which is rumored to house a secret Illuminati base, per former Minnesota governor Jesse Ventura.
This is a real painting that’s going on there, at their airport
Sort of a weird vibe.
Anyway, we utilized all sorts of types of public transit while out in Colorado, which was pretty neat.
- We took a local bus (RTD) from the airport to Denver when we arrived
- We took an interurban bus, excellently named “Bustang” and operated by the Colorado Department of Transportation, from Denver to Fort Collins
- We took a regional bus for the inexplicably low price of $1.75 from Fort Collins to Boulder, which is like 50 miles away. Fort Collins’ transit agency is named “Transfort“–great
- We took a sort of commuter bus (RTD) from Boulder back to Denver, which was called the “Flatiron Flyer,” which is almost as good as “Bustang”
And so that all was well and good, and all these great names–but when we got back to Denver and were excited to take this new train out to the airport to come back to Minnesota, we were struck by something kinda nuts.
And I’m sorry, this is a little embarrassing (!) but I just have to point out that it looks like they accidentally named the train the wrong thing??
Train
You’ll note that it’s named the “University of Colorado A Line,” for what the first paragraph of the line’s Wikipedia page describes as “sponsorship reasons.”
The University of Colorado is…in Boulder, really. There is a University of Colorado-Denver, but I didn’t know about it until I doublechecked that for this post, and also the train doesn’t really go there either–Union Station, which is very nice, is about six blocks away from the edge of their campus, which is also across a river. I’m sorry! (I didn’t want to have to be the one to point this out–but was there a vetting process here?)
Here in Minnesota, a more damp but less symmetrical state, we have our own A Line opening up next month, running from Rosedale Mall down Snelling Avenue before swinging west to Minneapolis to link up with the 46th Street Blue Line station. One thing that it isn’t named is the “University of Minnesota A Line,” for it does not end at or even pass through the University of Minnesota, a different place entirely.
Definitely something to look out for if you’re visiting–which you should do, because it’s very nice there–the train named after the University of Colorado…does not go to the University of Colorado.