Greeley on tap: developers still warm to North Colorado town.

• Author: Titus, Stephen
• Position: Who Owns Colorado?

IT'S NOT ON INTERSTATE 25 AND IT'S not along the 1-70 corridor.

It's not even near the rapidly expanding E470 that will soon belt Denver, Boulder and Golden into a giant, tri-town megalopolis.

Despite Greeley's isolation from these three major transportation arteries, the Northern Colorado town's real estate market--residential and commercial -- continues to grow while many Denver-area developers complain of slow sales and see-through buildings.

Looking at Greeley's map of development possibilities might make a developer salivate. Thousands of acres of untapped land, all zoned commercial, line U.S. 34, the main drag leading into town from 1-25. But as Assistant City Manager Roy Otto points out, "untapped" is the operative word here.

So far, there is only one parcel with water, sewer or any other basic infrastructure. The rest of the land has a hit-and-miss patchwork of services, most of it not designed to support a burst of housing or commercial building.

"It looks attractive from the lay person's eye, but all the services are still needed out there before even the hottest economy in the world can change anything," Otto explained. "You don't want people in a big corporate center using porta-potties."

But Promontory, the one parcel that does have city services, is, so far, a big success for the city and the developer.

The 670-acre master-planned community is the new home to State Farm's and Swift's (formerly ConAgra) regional and corporate headquarters, respectively. In 1999, both companies threatened to move their operations out of the Greeley area. State Farm's move alone would have taken away more than 1,000 jobs.

Big developers like McWhinney Enterprises, with its high-class Centerra project along 1-25 in Loveland, courted Swift with promises of easy highway access, a big base of employees, abundant housing in one of Centerra's many residential projects, and close proximity to shopping and restaurants. State Farm, too, was a jewel in Greeley's commercial crown, and it also was looking for room to grow.

But a blitzkrieg of support from the city and a Greeley developer helped keep both Fortune 50 companies in town. "We formed an alliance and put together a map that allowed everyone to get what they wanted," said Don Slack, executive vice president of Westfield Development Inc., the company behind Promontory.

Land for the project was readily available. When a referendum to limit growth went on the statewide ballot in 2000, farmers in the...