Signs for the last chance to live in the remaining subdivisions of Castle Pines North will soon be taken down. With only 164 homes left to complete, CPN is becoming a vibrant but stable community. Home builder inventories are nearly sold out and only custom homes remain to be finished. When complete, more than 10,000 people will call CPN their home.

CPN has been under construction for more than 20 years. Now, with the bulldozers and contractor trucks leaving and schools and neighborhood events growing, a sense of community has taken root. Where has CPN been and where is the community going?

Community Began More Than 20 Years Ago

The community began in 1984. Over the next few years, nearly 500 homes were built in portions of the Royal Hill and King’s Crossing neighborhoods, as well as Glen Oaks, The Hamlet, The Retreat, Claremont Estates and Huntington Ridge. In the late 1980s, Denver was hit hard with the national recession and home sales essentially stalled in the metropolitan area, including CPN.

Getting Started Again

In the early nineties, a task force of community citizens worked with new homebuilders to create a vision for how to finish CPN and stabilize the community’s financial status. This group took their ideas and found ways to make CPN happen. The results of these efforts are the neighborhoods that line the streets today. With goals to put an infrastructure of community services in place, this group laid the ground work to welcome schools, parks, golf courses and libraries to the CPN community.

First School and Golf Course Open

Spurred by this community effort the Douglas County School District built Buffalo Ridge Elementary School in anticipation of a student population that would fill its halls. This was a seminal factor of jumpstarting the community and CPN quickly went from 500 homes to nearly 1,000 homes by the time BRE opened its doors in 1997.

A nationally recognized golf course was another key factor in creating the CPN community. The Ridge, a premier designed golf course opened in July, 1997. Although privately owned, the course is open to the public and provides discounts for CPN residents.

Commercial Services Move In

Families moving in and schools opening started to attract the retail eye. In the early stages of the community, the only store near CPN was a gas station located just off the Castle Pines Parkway interchange. Between 1999 and 2002, commercial businesses started moving into CPN. Initially, developers looked at the CC-20 site and sites located near I-25. Community citizen action pushed developers to keep commerical development separate from the neighborhoods.

Parks and Recreation Underway

Another strong selling point in a community is the parks that provide gathering spots in the neighborhood. In the late nineties, the Parks Authority was formed to meet the needs for parks and other active recreation in the area. By 2001, home build out had reached the 2,000 mark. This year also brought the opening of Coyote Ridge Park and a proposal for a recreation center that was narrowly defeated in a 2002 vote.

Road and School Expansions

On December 7, 2001, the extension of Monarch Boulevard to Quebec opened, and later Buffalo Trail and Daniels Gate Road were added as neighborhoods came into being. In 2003, Timber Trail Elementary was built to keep-up with the growing student population of CPN.

Build-Out Nearly Finished

In 2005, the CPN community grew to 3,000 homes and started to feel complete. Soon only custom homes in the Estates at Hidden Pointe, Whisper Canyon, Estates at Buffalo Ride and Amber Ridge will remain to be built. When complete, CPN will have 3,259 homes. Schools are up and running. The community hosts many events, like the Carriage Rides, Easter Egg Hunt, Community Garage Sale as well as many summer activities that all bring the neighborhoods of CPN together.

Although the dream for a library has yet to materialize, in late 2004 the bookmobile started providing service to the area. Community leaders continue working with the Library District to provide a more permanent presence in CPN.

Now, in the community’s long tradition of citizen action, the Community Completion Task Force is looking to put the finishing touches on CPN.