Athmar Park

First, the good. Athmar Park isn’t bad to look at, and if you are in the market for a home, it’s possible to get one of the solid little mid-century homes for an affordable price. Many of the houses are owner-occupied, which means that their residents take pride in keeping them up. On weekend mornings, people from all over the Denver metro area drive in and throng the nondescript shopping plaza that is home to Star Kitchen. This is Denver’s best dim sum, delicious Chinese dumpling chaos, and although you may not know what you’re eating, it’s hard to go wrong. This shopping plaza is part of the multi-cultural stretch of South Federal (see my review of Westwood for a fuller description of South Federal) that offers a fascinating hodgepodge of Asian and Mexican restaurants and shops.

Now, the bad. Many areas of Denver formerly known for violence, crime, and gang activity have largely shed their bad reputations, but Athmar Park is not one of them. The problem has gotten better over the last decade, but overall, Athmar Park remains an example of the problems endemic of the west side/south Federal neighborhoods as a whole. Although there are plenty of safe streets and good neighbors, there are also pockets where residents and visitors alike feel unsafe. West Denver is a hub of gang activity, and in the Athmar Park area, gangs of different ethnicities vie over territory. Along with Westwood and some of the other West Denver neighborhoods, cleanup efforts are being undertaken by some nonprofits and grassroots groups, but it has yet to be seen if they will have an impact.