Fort Collins, Colorado

Profile:

Travelers on the Overland Trail in 1862 would stop at Camp Collins on the Cache La Poudre River, named after Col. W. O. Collins of the 11th Ohio Cavalry. The military camp was built to protect the trading-post from attack during the Indian wars of the 1860s, and was incorporated as Fort Collins in 1869. The new community was given a boost by the arrival of the Colorado Central Railroad in the late 1870s. Soon irrigation canals turned the area into productive farmland.

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After World War Two Fort Collins’s population doubled as manufacturing grew in importance, and during the 1960s enrollment at the Colorado State University also doubled. Today Fort Collins is very much a college city, with the university and the Poudre School District as the two top employers. But Hewlett-Packard, WaterPik, and Anheuser-Busch, among others, are also present, producing pharmaceuticals, electronics, scientific instruments, and many other things.

In 2006 MONEY magazine named Fort Collins the Best Place to Live in America.

Population:

City population: 128,000 in 2005 (estimated), 206th-most populous in the U.S.
Metro area: 251,000 in 2000, 142nd-most populous in the U.S.
Change in Fort Collins’s population in the 1990s: +29,319 (+32.8%)

Interesting Facts:

Fort Collins experiences 296 days of sunshine per year and 22 days with 90º + weather
Elevation: 5003 feet
Median value of a Fort Collins house/condo in 2005: $229,700
Median real estate property taxes paid for housing units with mortgages in 2005: $1,510
Number of single-family new-home construction permits issued in 2005: 732 buildings. Average cost: $230,800
The average annual temperature in Fort Collins is 48º F
Fort Collins gained a reputation as a very conservative city in the twentieth century, with prohibition of alcoholic beverages being retained from the late 1890s until 1969.

Demographic:

The racial makeup of Fort Collins:
- White (85.4%)
- Hispanic (8.8%)
- Other race (3.6%)
- Two or more races (2.5%)
- American Indian (1.3%)
- Black (1.0%)
- Chinese (0.6%)
Median age: 28.2
Ancestries: German (28.7%), English (14.2%), Irish (14.1%), Italian (5.4%), French (4.1%), Swedish (4.0%)
Among people in Fort Collins age 25 and above, 48.4% have a college degree
Average household size: 2.45

Avg. Family Income:

Median household income in 2005: $44,261

Transportation:

Fort Collins’s downtown streets form a grid with I-25 running north–south on the east side of the city. U.S. Highway 287 runs east–west in the northwest sector
Transfort, Fort Collins’s local bus system, operates daily on 16 routes
Allegiant Air offers airplane service into Fort Collins/Loveland Airport. Denver International Airport, 25 miles south, is served by nearly 20 airlines
Fort Collins is served by the Union Pacific and Burlington Northern Santa Fe railroads
Parcel service for Fort Collins is provided by Federal Express, Airport Express, United Parcel Service, and others. Fort Collins has two-day rail-freight access to the west coast or the east coast and eight motor-freight carriers. Many local industrial sites have rail freight spur service.
Bicycle commuters benefit from city incentives and excellent bike paths through town