Parker

Parker is its own town in northeastern Douglas County, about 23 miles southeast of downtown Denver. Its northern edge runs along the Arapahoe County line, and downtown is built around Mainstreet and Parker Road.

A stage stop called Twenty Mile House

Alfred Butters set up the Pine Grove Way Station around 1864 for travelers on the stage routes. It later became the Twenty Mile House, named for its distance from Denver. James S. Parker, a Civil War veteran from Illinois, bought it in 1870 and became postmaster. He sold the Denver and New Orleans Railroad its right-of-way for a dollar so the tracks would run through the center of town, and in 1882 the settlement was renamed for him.

Ruth Memorial Chapel, dedicated in 1913 and named for a local doctor's child who died young, is on the National Register, and the town rents it out for weddings.

Mostly newer houses, almost always with an HOA

Parker stayed small for a long time. The Parker City Land Company began a "modern western town" in the 1960s, and the town incorporated on May 1, 1981, with about 285 residents. By 2000 the population was 23,558, and by 2020 it was 58,512. If you shop here, you'll mostly be touring subdivision houses from the last few decades, not old farmhouses. Apartments are going up downtown too, like the Juniper complex at Mainstreet and Pine.

Town code requires an HOA for every residential community, and the town clerk counts 62 metro districts, special districts that typically provide roads, water and similar infrastructure. Expect HOA dues on top of the mortgage, and before you write an offer, ask whether the house sits in a metro district and what it costs you.

Mainstreet and O'Brien Park

O'Brien Park covers 10.7 acres on the northeast corner of Parker Road and Mainstreet. It has the town gazebo, which hosts outdoor concerts and the Mayor's Holiday Lighting, plus the H2O'Brien pool, a lighted softball field and two playgrounds, one rebuilt in 2023.

Poulette Bakeshop is at 19865 Mainstreet, on the corner of Pine, in a new space that is nearly double the size of its old strip-mall shop on Hess Road. It made the New York Times list of the 22 best independent bakeries in the country, and the lines out the door explain why.

Down the street at 19420 Mainstreet, Parker Garage serves dinner and weekend brunch in a restored building that was once a garage, a feed store and an auction house. Black+Haus Tavern, at 19501 E. Mainstreet, is a locally owned scratch kitchen with craft cocktails and more than 150 whiskies.

The town is also studying a redesign of the Parker Road and Mainstreet intersection, looking at traffic, road access, walking and biking links and the way into O'Brien Park. A preferred option has been picked in preliminary form but nothing is final, so keep an eye on it if you're buying near that corner.

The Cherry Creek Trail and the bigger parks

The Cherry Creek Regional Trail runs about 8 miles through town from the Arapahoe County line to Stroh Road. It's a 10-foot concrete path with a dirt equestrian trail beside it, and trailheads at McCabe Meadows Park, Bar CCC Park and Cottonwood Trailhead Park have parking and restrooms. The town plans to extend it north to Cherry Creek State Park and south to Castlewood Canyon State Park.

Salisbury Regional Park is getting four lighted ball fields and two lighted turf soccer fields, with construction scheduled through 2026.

Getting to Denver

Parker has no rail station. RTD's weekday 483 bus runs along Parker Road and Lincoln Avenue to Lincoln station in Lone Tree, where the E, R and T light rail lines stop and there are about 1,734 parking spaces. Plan on driving for most trips.