"This redevelopment is much more than building a new park," Arvada Mayor Lauren Simpson said at the Sept. 24 ceremony that started construction at Gold Strike Park, as Arvada Press reported. "We do that a lot, and they're all special. But this one is really special."
Gold Strike Park sits where Ralston Creek meets Clear Creek. The Colorado Register of Historic Places lists it as the first place in Colorado where gold was discovered, by Lewis Ralston in 1850. For most of the time Arvada has owned it, the site has been better known as a trail junction than as a park. The version now under construction is meant to change that. To do it, the city widened the story the park tells. The gold discovery is now one chapter of a longer history, and the Cheyenne and Arapaho chapter comes first.
A park that waited nearly three decades
If you've biked the Clear Creek Trail, you've probably crossed Gold Strike Park without stopping. Wenk, the landscape architecture firm behind the design, describes the 7.6-acre site plainly. It calls it "an underused urban island overrun with invasive species and hemmed in by industrial corridors," and also notes that it "remains as the nearest open space for many surrounding neighbors."
The plans go back a long way. Here's how Wenk's project history and later reporting lay out the timeline:
- 2000: The city develops the original master plan for the park. It includes the pedestrian bridge that still links the Ralston Creek and Clear Creek regional trails.
- 2016: The Arvada Clear Creek Corridor Master Plan picks up what Wenk calls the "still-unfulfilled vision" for the park.
- Spring 2023: Wenk and the city continue schematic design with a focused round of public engagement.
- 2024: Arvada wins a $7.3 million federal Outdoor Recreation Legacy Partnership grant.
- Sept. 24, 2026: Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes leaders lead a Ground Blessing Ceremony, and construction begins.
- Fall 2028: Expected completion.
From the first master plan to the expected opening is 28 years. The project also ran later than the city's own schedule within the last few years. The city's 2024 grant announcement aimed to start Phase 1 by 2025, and the shovels went in during fall 2026.
Why the story got bigger
For decades the park's identity rested on one event. Wenk writes that during the 2023 design work, "while the park's focus had long been Colorado's first gold discovery, research during the schematic design phase revealed the land's deeper history and the community's desire to share a broader narrative." That 2023 round drew input from the general public, the Arvada Parks Advisory Committee, the Arvada Historical Society, the Mile High Flood District, Jefferson and Adams counties, the City of Wheat Ridge, and Hyland Hills Park & Recreation District.
As Arvada Press noted in its ceremony coverage, the Cheyenne and Arapaho lived in what is now Arvada long before Ralston arrived, until the United States government forcibly relocated them. The paper reported that the city's relationship with the tribes began with the naming of Little Raven Park in 2023, and that the unified tribes took part in designing the Gold Strike redevelopment.
At the ceremony, Darin DeLay, Arvada's Parks and Urban Design Manager, described that participation this way:
"Not as a symbolic gesture, but as a guiding kinship and storytelling that inspire and inform spatial understanding, our ecological stewardship, and the long-term resilience with this land."
The quote comes from the Arvada Press account of the event, which also reported that tribal legislator Gordon Yellowman led the traditional Ground Blessing before tribal and city representatives turned the earth with gold-plated shovels.
Yellowman also shaped the design itself. Wenk credits him as a consultant and Tribal Historian whose traditional stories pushed the design team to ask, "What is it to be?" To be redbird, water, cottonwood. That question became the organizing idea for the park.
What that question looks like on the ground
Wenk says the final design uses "tribal stories, historical information, and local ecology" to shape its nature play and learning features. It combines wildlife, Indigenous history and gold panning through native plantings and animal-themed play areas tied to the Colorado ecoregions those animals lived in. The planned features include:
| What's planned | What it adds at the confluence |
|---|---|
| Nature play and an interactive water feature | Animal-themed play areas tied to Colorado ecoregions |
| Bouldering feature | A climbing option right off the regional trails |
| Bicycle playground | A spot built for bikes beside two of Arvada's busiest trails |
| Event lawn with an educational pavilion | A place for gatherings and school programs |
| Interpretive gardens | Native plants that tell the site's history |
| Gold History Path and Indigenous History Path | Two walking routes, one for each part of the site's past |
| Plumbed restrooms, two mid-sized parking lots, school-bus drop-off | The facilities that make longer visits and field trips possible |
| New central pedestrian bridge over a restored Ralston Creek | A new crossing over a cleaned-up creek corridor |
One feature changed between drafts. When the city released its earlier design plans, Colorado Community Media reported that the southeast corner was still undecided among a bicycle playground, a dog park and a community garden. Wenk's description of the final design lists a bicycle playground.
The less visible upgrades matter just as much. Restrooms, parking and a bus drop-off are what let a site at a trail junction work as a destination. A family can drive there for the day, and a school can bring a class. Wenk describes the new bridge across the restored Ralston Creek as "physically and symbolically binding the land." The city's grant announcement also commits to protecting and improving environmentally sensitive areas along the creek.
How the work is sequenced, and who is paying
The build happens in two phases split by the creek. Phase 1 covers the part of the park east of Ralston Creek and includes most of the community amenities. Phase 2 covers the west side, including the creek crossings. So the playgrounds and gathering spaces on the east side are slated to come before the new crossings to the west.
The $7.3 million Outdoor Recreation Legacy Partnership grant is the largest single funding piece. The National Park Service runs the program, and the city credited Colorado Parks and Wildlife and the National Park Service for their support. The city announced the award alongside a local match. Reported totals give a sense of how much of the project the grant covers. Denverite put the total budget at about $14.7 million in October 2024, and Denver7 reported about $14 million in July 2025. By either figure, the federal grant pays for roughly half. Both numbers are older estimates, not a confirmed final cost.
What's happening on the corridor this fall
Construction has only just begun, and the sources reviewed for this post don't say whether the park itself or the trail sections through it are closed or detoured. Before planning a ride through the confluence, check the city's Gold Strike Park project page for current access.
Gold Strike isn't the only trail work underway in Arvada. Upstream, the city posted on Sept. 16, 2026, that part of the Ralston Creek Trail north of Arvada-Blunn Reservoir, near Highway 93, would be detoured starting the week of Sept. 14. Trail users were sent to a gravel path just south of the main trail, and the city estimated the detour would last three to four weeks. The work is for a new 1.7-mile segment of the Colorado Front Range Trail that will connect to the Ralston Creek Trail. That estimate runs out around now, and the notice hasn't been updated, so check the city's notice before you head out.
Taken together, Arvada's two creek corridors are getting work at both ends. A new regional trail connection is going in near the reservoir, and a two-year rebuild has started at the confluence, where Ralston Creek meets Clear Creek on the city's eastern edge. Phase 1 is the east side of Ralston Creek, and completion is expected in fall 2028.
At Denver Does It, we follow projects like this because what's happening at the parks and trailheads near you is part of knowing a place well. If you have questions about how the Gold Strike construction fits into your part of Arvada, or you'd like an introduction to someone local who follows the trail work closely, Start With Us.
