The city and county of Denver opened a new animal shelter in June, with construction funded by the Better Denver Bond Program. The 36,040-sq-ft, state-of-the art facility is more than twice the size of the original shelter, with space to care for more than 300 animals at a time. The site, located along the South Platte River at 1271 W. Bayaud, also houses a barn, which allows the shelter to accommodate less common domestic animals like horses, cows, pigs and chickens.
The new shelter was designed by Animal Arts and built by Denver’s Golden Triangle Construction. It replaces one of the oldest shelters in Colorado. The original facility started out as a dog pound built in 1972, but over the years, the shelter’s services expanded to the point that a new facility was critical to meet the needs of the area’s growing animal population.