Introduction
Denver Moves Everyone (DME) is a long-term transportation plan that aims to increase the overall quality of public transportation in Denver, Colorado by 2050. The plan is led by the city’s Department of Transportation & Infrastructure (DOTI), which was created in 2020 to improve safety, bolster efficiency, and fight climate change. DME was one of the first robust transportation plans that the agency launched, with Phase One starting in 2021. The public engagement process, consisting of online surveys and in-person events to draw input from residents, concluded 18 months later and the agency has since started the implementation component of the transportation improvements.
Denver Transportation History
One of the first passenger transit railways introduced to Denver was a railway to Union Station in the heart of downtown in 1881. The railways were an additional form of transit available to residents beyond the more popular cable car during this time period. As Denver’s population steadily grew into the early 20th century, forms of transportation such as bicycles and streetcars allowed residents to move further away from the city core.
The rise of automobiles throughout the 1900s and highway construction encouraged by the Federal Highway Act in 1956 created a car-dependent culture in Denver. Denver’s former public transit company, Denver Tramway Company, was absorbed by the Regional Transportation District (RTD) in 1974. Since then, RTD has been the main public transit operator with over 100 bus routes and ten rail lines throughout the Denver-Aurora area. In 1994, RTD opened up its first light rail service but operations and major projects have not significantly expanded in the 21st century. Although RTD offers public transit options, about 75 percent of residents commute to work using passenger vehicles. This indicates that public transit is not an attractive commute option for many Denver residents compared to personal vehicles.
However, according to the 2018 Climate Action Plan, Denver hopes to reduce 80 percent of the city’s greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. 64 percent of emissions in the Denver metro-region come from the transportation sector, making it responsible for the majority of city emissions. As such, Denver created the DOTI and the DME plan to improve all forms of transportation in the metropolitan area. Improvements along public transit corridors, bicycle, and pedestrian walkways are prioritized in the plan to reduce congestion and passenger vehicle use.
DME Main Goals
There are five main focus areas for the DME plan: mobility, safety, sustainability, community and quality. The plan seeks to reduce traffic fatalities, reduce traffic congestion, promote public transit use, and better connect the city through transit solutions. Throughout the planning and public engagement process, participants recommended strategies such as transit-oriented development, increasing the cost of driving, and improving public transit access and service to accomplish these five goals. As displayed in Fig. One, specific improvements are focused around infrastructure for pedestrians, bicycles, public transit corridors, and safety signals. This demonstrates increased emphasis on passenger vehicle transportation alternatives as aligned with the sustainability target of the plan.
Fig One: DME 2023 Strategic Report
Equity is also a key consideration of each improvement area as illustrated in Fig. Two through the DOTI equity index. An intersectional analysis of race, education, age, vehicle ownership, disability status, and gender are marked as priority areas for infrastructure improvements.
Fig. Two: DME 2023 Strategic Report
Progress
According to the 2025 report, the city is making moderate progress toward each of these five outcomes by 2050.
Mobility
For mobility, there were three measured targets centered on distance to transit networks, bikeway networks, and trips made by these forms of transportation.
Target One: 75 percent of population within walking distance of high-frequency transit network
- Status (2024): 20 percent
Target Two: 100 percent of households within a ¼ mile of high-comfort bikeway network
- Status (2024): 78.9 percent
Target Three: 15 percent of all trips made by transit and 20 percent of all trips are made by walking, rolling, or bicycling by 2050
- Status (2024): 2.5 percent transit and 7.6 percent walking, rolling, or bicycling
Safety
Safety had one measured target of “zero traffic-related fatalities and serious injuries”
- Status (2024): 80 fatalities and 397 serious injuries
Sustainability
Sustainability goals were to reduce surfaces that prevent water from draining and greenhouse gas emissions
Target One: Reduce Impervious Surface to 30 percent by 2040
- Status (2024): 51 percent covered in impervious surface
Target Two: Reduce Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Transportation to 0 by 2050
- Status (2024): 2,557,557 metric tons of CO2 emissions
Community
Target One: 19 percent reduction in Vehicle Miles Traveled from baseline- 1.92 million VMT (2019)
- Status (2024): 1.69 billion VMT
Quality
Target One: Less than five percent of bridges classified as structurally deficient; 100 percent of traffic signals meeting city standards; and less than ten percent of pavement in poor condition.
- Status (2024): 10 percent of Denver’s bridges are rated as being in poor condition; 40 percent of signals in good condition or above, and 26 percent of pavement rated as being in poor condition.
Challenges & Criticism
While this plan underwent a public engagement process and drew from community input, one of the main challenges of DME is securing funding for proposed projects. Less than 25 percent of the necessary funding for 2050 goals is covered by existing funding (Fig. Three). Without the necessary funding secured, there is uncertainty about the feasibility of accomplishing critical projects in the plan.
Fig. Three: DME 6-year Capital Plan
Another area of concern is the efficiency of the DOTI and its ability to make substantial changes in public transit. The DOTI committee has acknowledged a need for increased, high-quality staffing to support their workload and without such changes, executing DME projects may be slow.
Although a large component of the public transit improvements was to implement Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) along major roadways, local transit experts have noted that the BRT corridors that the DME plan included are not connected (Fig. Four). While BRT will undeniably improve travel times on buses, there was a critical opportunity to connect these bus lines to create a more cohesive transit corridor. Upon examining these routes, many have called this oversight a large missed transit improvement opportunity.
Fig. Four: Denver Streets Partnership
Conclusion
DME is a robust, holistic plan that has undergone significant periods of public engagement, research, and planning. It includes key outcome areas with a set timeline of 2050; however, implementation challenges exist due to lack of funding required to realize such projects. There are also some public transit improvement oversights such as the BRT routes that, if addressed, could greatly improve the plan. With more funding and a reevaluation of BRT transit corridors, this plan could be a transformative endeavor for Denver’s transit future.