CSBJ Daily

Fire Station No. 1, erected during 1925 at the corner of Weber Street and Colorado Avenue, is one of the most significant historic structures in Colorado Springs. It was designed by noted architect Thomas McLaren, whose other work includes City Auditorium, City Hall, Grace Episcopal Church and Sacred Heart Church.

Fire Station No. 1 was built in 1925

The Gazette-Telegraph in 1925 described the new building in glowing terms.

“The new fire station is one of the most attractive of the new municipal buildings. … The total cost will be about $40,000. … The exterior face brick is buff of Canon City make, and with red brick inserts appropriately placed. The trim is terra cotta, buttresses and iron balconies relieve the external faces of walls. The roof is of Spanish tile, all in salmon tone.”

But after 83 years, the building is no longer well-suited to its original purpose. To accommodate contemporary needs, the city needs to build a new fire station.

But where?

The existing site is too small to accommodate a modern facility, unless McLaren’s masterpiece is either demolished or wrapped with a new building. No alternative sites are available at reasonable cost. No one at the city is willing to tear down a building of such importance. Wrapping it doesn’t make sense financially or aesthetically.

But, Deputy Fire Chief Dan Raider, who’s in charge of building new stations, said there’s another solution.

Move the building.

Such a move, according to Deputy City Manager Steve Cox, is not only possible, but feasible.

“We’ve talked to Mega Movers (the popular Discovery Channel series), and they’ve given us an estimate” Cox said. “They say they can do it for $625,000.”

The fire station’s new home? Less than 200 hundred yards away, on a yet-to-be-built center island at the intersection of Pikes Peak Avenue and Weber.

“We’re really implementing part of Gen. Palmer’s vision for downtown”, Cox said. “Twenty years after the city’s founding, he said that he had made the avenues too wide-and center islands on Pikes Peak Avenue would improve downtown.”

The fire station might become a restaurant in its new location.

“We’ve had some informal talks with developers,” Cox said. “We think that the total cost of moving and renovating would be less than $1.5 million, and we’d execute a long-term lease on the site, so the cost to the city would be minimal, with the developer paying most of the cost.”

Local architect Michael Collins, who also heads the Historic Preservation Alliance, is enthusiastic about the planned move.

“I think that it’s doable,” he said. “The big obstacle would be underground utilities – moving them could be a big expense. And then you’d have to solve traffic and pedestrian flow issues, but those can be overcome.”

Collins also said that relocating the fire station would transform a presently sleepy downtown corner and possibly jump-start other development on nearby property.

“David and Chris (Jenkins) might go ahead a little faster with their project (on the vacant half-block lot on Pikes Peak between Nevada and Weber),” he said. “ I don’t think that Chris will go forward until the new building is leased – and having the fire station there ought to improve things.”