Denver Denver ( ) is a List of municipalities in Colorado#Consolidated city and county, consolidated city and county, the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Colorado, most populous city of the U.S. state of ...

is the central city of a

conurbation A conurbation is a region consisting of a number of metropolises, cities, large towns, and other urban areas which, through population growth and physical expansion, have merged to form one continuous urban or industrially developed area. In most ...

region in the U.S. state of

Colorado Colorado is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States. It is one of the Mountain states, sharing the Four Corners region with Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah. It is also bordered by Wyoming to the north, Nebraska to the northeast, Kansas ...

. The conurbation includes one continuous region consisting of the six central counties of Adams, Arapahoe, Broomfield, Denver, Douglas, and Jefferson. The Denver region is part of the Front Range Urban Corridor and its metropolitan planning organization is the

Denver Regional Council of Governments Denver ( ) is a consolidated city and county, the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Colorado. It is located in the Western United States, in the South Platte River Valley on the western edge of the High Plains east o ...

. The

United States Office of Management and Budget The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) is the largest office within the Executive Office of the President of the United States (EOP). The office's most prominent function is to produce the president's budget, while it also examines agency pro ...

has delineated the Denver–Aurora–Centennial, CO Metropolitan Statistical Area consisting of ten Colorado

counties A county () is a geographic region of a country used for administrative or other purposesL. Brookes (ed.) '' Chambers Dictionary''. Edinburgh: Chambers Harrap Publishers Ltd, 2005. in some nations. The term is derived from the Old French denoti ...

: the

City and County of Denver Denver ( ) is a consolidated city and county, the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Colorado. It is located in the Western United States, in the South Platte River Valley on the western edge of the High Plains east of ...

, Arapahoe County, Jefferson County, Adams County, Douglas County, the City and County of Broomfield, Elbert County, Park County, Clear Creek County, and Gilpin County. The population, as of the 2020 Census, is 2,963,821, an increase of 16.5% since 2010. The Office of Management and Budget also delineated the more extensive 12-county Denver–Aurora–Greeley, CO Combined Statistical Area comprising the Denver –Aurora –Centennial Metropolitan Statistical Area, the Boulder, CO Metropolitan Statistical Area, and the Greeley, CO Metropolitan Statistical Area. The central part of the metropolitan statistical area (MSA) includes Denver and three immediately adjacent counties: Jefferson County to the west, Adams County to the north and east, and Arapahoe County to the south and east. The continuously urbanized area extends northwest into the City and County of Broomfield, bordering Jefferson and Adams counties, and south into Douglas County, adjoining Arapahoe County. Also included in the federally defined MSA are four rural counties: Elbert County on the southeastern prairie and Clear Creek, Gilpin, and

Park A park is an area of natural, semi-natural or planted space set aside for human enjoyment and recreation or for the protection of wildlife or natural habitats. Urban parks are urban green space, green spaces set aside for recreation inside t ...

counties in the

Rocky Mountains The Rocky Mountains, also known as the Rockies, are a major mountain range and the largest mountain system in North America. The Rocky Mountains stretch in great-circle distance, straight-line distance from the northernmost part of Western Can ...

Counties

The Denver –Aurora –Centennial Metropolitan Statistical Area comprises ten counties. The sortable table below includes the following information: #The official name of the county, #The county population as of April 1, 2020, as enumerated by the 2020 United States census #The county population as of April 1, 2010, as enumerated by the 2010 United States Census, #The percent population change from April 1, 2010, to April 1, 2020.

Metropolitan area cities and towns

Places with over 100,000 inhabitants

* Arvada *

Aurora An aurora ( aurorae or auroras), also commonly known as the northern lights (aurora borealis) or southern lights (aurora australis), is a natural light display in Earth's sky, predominantly observed in high-latitude regions (around the Arc ...

(Principal City) * Centennial *

(Principal city) * Highlands Ranch () * Lakewood * Thornton *

Westminster Westminster is the main settlement of the City of Westminster in Central London, Central London, England. It extends from the River Thames to Oxford Street and has many famous landmarks, including the Palace of Westminster, Buckingham Palace, ...

Places with 10,000 to 100,000 inhabitants

* Berkley (CDP) *

Brighton Brighton ( ) is a seaside resort in the city status in the United Kingdom, city of Brighton and Hove, East Sussex, England, south of London. Archaeological evidence of settlement in the area dates back to the Bronze Age Britain, Bronze Age, R ...

* Broomfield * Castle Pines * Castle Rock * Columbine (CDP) * Commerce City * Englewood * Federal Heights * Golden * Greenwood Village * Ken Caryl (CDP) * Littleton * Lone Tree * Northglenn * Parker * Sherrelwood (CDP) * The Pinery (CDP) * Welby (CDP) * Wheat Ridge

Places with fewer than 10,000 inhabitants

* Acres Green (CDP) * Applewood (CDP) * Alma * Aspen Park (CDP) * Bailey * Bennett * Black Hawk * Bow Mar * Byers (CDP) * Carriage Club (CDP) *

Pines A pine is any conifer tree or shrub in the genus ''Pinus'' () of the family Pinaceae. ''Pinus'' is the sole genus in the subfamily Pinoideae. ''World Flora Online'' accepts 134 species-rank taxa (119 species and 15 nothospecies) of pines as ...

(CDP) * Central City * Cherry Hills Village * Coal Creek * Columbine Valley *

Conifer Conifers () are a group of conifer cone, cone-bearing Spermatophyte, seed plants, a subset of gymnosperms. Scientifically, they make up the phylum, division Pinophyta (), also known as Coniferophyta () or Coniferae. The division contains a sin ...

* Cottonwood (CDP) * Deer Trail *

Derby Derby ( ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, city and Unitary authorities of England, unitary authority area on the River Derwent, Derbyshire, River Derwent in Derbyshire, England. Derbyshire is named after Derby, which was its original co ...

(CDP) * Downieville-Lawson-Dumont * East Pleasant View (CDP) * Edgewater * Elizabeth *

Empire An empire is a political unit made up of several territories, military outpost (military), outposts, and peoples, "usually created by conquest, and divided between a hegemony, dominant center and subordinate peripheries". The center of the ...

Evergreen In botany, an evergreen is a plant which has Leaf, foliage that remains green and functional throughout the year. This contrasts with deciduous plants, which lose their foliage completely during the winter or dry season. Consisting of many diffe ...

(CDP) * Fairplay * Foxfield * Franktown (CDP) * Genesee (CDP) * Georgetown * Glendale * Grand View Estates (CDP) * Hartsel (CDP) * Heritage Hills (CDP) * Idaho Springs * Indian Hills (CDP) *

Kiowa Kiowa ( ) or Cáuigú () people are a Native Americans in the United States, Native American tribe and an Indigenous people of the Great Plains of the United States. They migrated southward from western Montana into the Rocky Mountains in Colora ...

* Kittredge (CDP) * Lakeside * Larkspur * Lochbuie *

Louviers Louviers () is a Communes of France, commune in the Eure Departments of France, department in Normandy (administrative region), Normandy in north-western France. Louviers is from Paris and from Rouen. Population History Prehistory In th ...

(CDP) * Meridian (CDP) * Montbello (CDP) * Morrison * Mountain View * North Washington (CDP) * Perry Park (CDP) * Ponderosa Park (CDP) * Roxborough Park (CDP) * Sedalia (CDP) * Sheridan * Silver Plume *

Simla Shimla, also known as Simla (List of renamed Indian cities and states#Himachal Pradesh, the official name until 1972), is the capital and the largest city of the northern Indian state of Himachal Pradesh. In 1864, Shimla was declared the summe ...

* St. Mary's * Stonegate (CDP) * Strasburg (CDP) * Todd Creek (CDP) * Twin Lakes (CDP) * Watkins * Westcreek (CDP) * West Pleasant View (CDP)

Communities previously part of the Denver metro area

Now part of the Boulder metropolitan area

Boulder In geology, a boulder (or rarely bowlder) is a rock fragment with size greater than in diameter. Smaller pieces are called cobbles and pebbles. While a boulder may be small enough to move or roll manually, others are extremely massive. In ...

* Longmont * Lafayette *

Louisville Louisville is the most populous city in the Commonwealth of Kentucky, sixth-most populous city in the Southeast, and the 27th-most-populous city in the United States. By land area, it is the country's 24th-largest city; however, by populatio ...

* Superior

Now part of the Greeley metropolitan area

* Dacono * Firestone * Fort Lupton * Frederick

Regional cooperation

The

(DRCOG, pronounced Doctor Cog) is a regional planning and inter-governmental coordination organization in a nine-county region. The Scientific and Cultural Facilities District (SCFD) provides funding for scientific and cultural facilities in a seven-county region including: *The Denver Museum of Nature and Science *The Denver Zoo *The

Denver Art Museum The Denver Art Museum (DAM) is an art museum located in the Civic Center of Denver, Colorado. With an encyclopedic collection of more than 70,000 diverse works from across the centuries and world, the DAM is one of the largest art museums betwe ...

*The Denver Center for the Performing Arts *The Denver Botanic Gardens In addition, the Regional Transportation District (RTD) provides

mass transit Public transport (also known as public transit, mass transit, or simply transit) are forms of transport available to the general public. It typically uses a fixed schedule, route and charges a fixed fare. There is no rigid definition of whi ...

, including a

light rail Light rail (or light rail transit, abbreviated to LRT) is a form of passenger urban rail transit that uses rolling stock derived from tram technology National Conference of the Transportation Research Board while also having some features from ...

system. In 2005 the RTD developed a twelve-year comprehensive plan, called " FasTracks", to build and operate rail transit lines and expand and improve bus service throughout the region.

Economy

The most prosperous parts of the area are in the south and the northwest, while the most industrialized areas are in the northeast, specifically in the northern part of Denver proper and extending to areas such as Commerce City in Adams County. Changes in house prices for the area are publicly tracked on a regular basis using the Case–Shiller index; the statistic is published by

Standard & Poor's S&P Global Ratings (previously Standard & Poor's and informally known as S&P) is an American credit rating agency (CRA) and a division of S&P Global that publishes financial research and analysis on stocks, bonds, and commodities. S&P is co ...

and is also a component of S&P's 10-city composite index of the value of the residential real estate market. The Denver MSA is also home to one of the fastest growing tech scenes outside of Silicon Valley in the country. Electricity is provided by Xcel Energy. Cable television is provided by

Comcast Comcast Corporation, formerly known as Comcast Holdings,Before the AT&T Broadband, AT&T merger in 2001, the parent company was Comcast Holdings Corporation. Comcast Holdings Corporation now refers to a subsidiary of Comcast Corporation, not th ...

Sports

The following table shows sports teams in the Denver metropolitan area that average more than 12,000 fans per game:

Air quality

The center of the metropolitan area sits in a valley, the Denver Basin, and suffers from

air pollution Air pollution is the presence of substances in the Atmosphere of Earth, air that are harmful to humans, other living beings or the environment. Pollutants can be Gas, gases like Ground-level ozone, ozone or nitrogen oxides or small particles li ...

known colloquially as the ''brown cloud'', building up if the air is stagnant as it often is in the winter. Severity of pollution in this area has varied enormously over the years. In the late 1980s the area was frequently in violation of multiple National Ambient Air Quality Standards established by the

United States Environmental Protection Agency The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is an independent agency of the United States government tasked with environmental protection matters. President Richard Nixon proposed the establishment of EPA on July 9, 1970; it began operation on De ...

(EPA). The Regional Air Quality Council (RAQC) was formed in 1989 to create plans to address the problem. Through a variety of measures the area's air quality was improved and in 2002 the EPA designated the area in compliance with all federal health-based air quality standards. Denver was the first major city in the United States to reach compliance with all six of these standards after previously violating five of them. Since then the EPA introduced a new standard for small particulates and made the existing ozone standard stricter. In 2003 the new ozone standard was frequently exceeded in the area and was occasionally exceeded as far away as

Rocky Mountain National Park Rocky Mountain National Park is a List of national parks of the United States, national park of the United States located approximately northwest of Denver in north-central Colorado, within the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains. The park is s ...

. The RAQC hopes to implement plans enabling the area to comply with the new standards by 2007.

Sister cities

Though Aurora, Brighton, Broomfield, Denver, Lakewood, and Longmont have their own individual

sister city A sister city or a twin town relationship is a form of legal or social agreement between two geographically and politically distinct localities for the purpose of promoting cultural and commercial ties. While there are early examples of inte ...

relationships, the Denver Regional Council of Governments (DRCOG) as a whole has a sister city relationship with the Baghdad Governorate of

Iraq Iraq, officially the Republic of Iraq, is a country in West Asia. It is bordered by Saudi Arabia to Iraq–Saudi Arabia border, the south, Turkey to Iraq–Turkey border, the north, Iran to Iran–Iraq border, the east, the Persian Gulf and ...

References

External links

Denver Regional Council of GovernmentsInternational MigrationRegional Air Quality CouncilRegional Transportation DistrictScience & Cultural Facilities District

United States Census Bureau

U.S. population estimates
{{DEFAULTSORT:Denver-Aurora-Broomfield, Co Metropolitan Statistical Area Geography of Denver Metropolitan areas of Colorado Geography of Aurora, Colorado