Centennial recently hired an expert to help it learn how to take advantage of the traffic on Arapahoe Road.
The study, which will take a look at the five and a half miles between Parker Road and Quebec Street, should be finished in December.
Arapahoe Road, which many Centennial residents feel is the city's main street, is traveled by thousands of vehicles daily, making it seem like an area bustling with retail opportunity. However, appearances are deceiving, and major retailers are actually outside the Centennial limits. Any sales taxes raised in these stores do not go to Centennial.
Centennial's economic development manager, Neil Marciniak, pointed out that while they are doing well, businesses along Arapahoe Road could do better. The thoroughfare is dominated by office complexes and car dealerships instead of smaller shops, which he believes most people would prefer.
The plan will try to discover ways to increase a variety of retail businesses along Arapahoe that would be more intimate. Centennial put the Arapahoe Urban Center subplan into place in 2009. The new study will use the earlier plan as a basis for taking a look at “ground level” type development in the near future.
Once the study is complete, city officials could work with brochure printers to create a booklet describing upcoming retail opportunities in the area, and make it available to commercial realtors.
