Abandoned Banking! Tires! Windows! - Littleton, CO
Fair to say that I probably drove past these buildings in this story, at least 10 times a week, between 2006 and 2018. I also never really noticed them during that time. Never banked with Wells Fargo and I certainly wasn’t going to buy the new windows my apartment sorely needed, on my own. Tires and car needs were taken care of elsewhere, to finish off this bock. But we’re not there yet…
Hadn’t even thought of writing about these properties until I wrote the Adams Rental/Conoco/7Eleven story, a couple months ago. The one where a Conoco and an old gas station were demolished in favor of a new 7Eleven branded Conoco, and a used car lot (respectively), two blocks south of here. One of my points in that story was the high concentration of gas stations within this three block area of South Broadway. From this 7Eleven, A block or so north, you have the Loaf n’ Jug at Littleton Blvd. Used to be a Conoco station, before it was adopted by King Soopers.
That’s on the southwest corner of Broadway and Littleton Blvd.
Chipotle sits on the Northwest corner. 30 years ago, there was a second Conoco station here. In case the one across the street wasn’t good enough for you. Behind Chipotle is an Arby’s that Laura and I grabbed quite a few quick dinners from. Then there’s a four story mega-Wells Fargo, with another 7Eleven (at Powers Ave) hidden behind it. That big Wells Fargo was the parent to the junior Wells Fargo that would be directly to the left of the white building with the triangle-shaped roof. That would be Gravina’s Windows.
Spoiler alert! That junior Wells Fargo and Gravina’s Windows buildings would be demolished a few years after I took the pictures you haven’t seen yet.
Because the area needed ANOTHER gas station! First opening in 2021 as Murphy Express, the name was later changed to Murphy USA. Don’t know if the shameless tugging at the patriotism heartstrings has resulted in an increase in business, but it sure hasn’t helped their online reviews.
Directly behind Wells Fargo Jr., on the corner of Littleton Blvd. and Bannock St., was Coloradoland (Goodyear) Tire. They’d been closed for a nearly a year when I took this picture on March 22, 2015. Making note the front windows of the showroom are wide open, while the garage bay doors are all papered up. Since it’s not overly interesting, I’ll keep it in mind, but it’s not something I’ll specifically stop for.
Yet…
******
Saturday, February 17, 2018
There’s my old car, parked in the northwest corner of the King Soopers lot, at the Littleton Square Shopping Center. This was the final stop on a productive day. Photos were taken this morning that contributed to stories such as the Fire House Car Wash, Second Spin, the Universal Church, Chase Bank (Littleton) and a completely different Arby’s. Now I’m wrapping up the morning with a quick walk across the street. Once that is finished, I’ll re-park the car and fill out my grocery list, then go home.
Parked here for ease of crossing the street, but also for the flashback…
Sunday, February 16, 2014… Four years and 1 day earlier, I did a walk around the old King Soopers and surrounding stores. Pre-demolition work was going on inside the western building of Littleton Square. I was able to get some excellent pictures, just before the fence went up around the property. Not only Soopers and the Liquor store, but also the long gone neighboring Walgreens and Apostolic Church. My car was parked where the entrance to the drive thru liquor store was (closed in the fall of 2013). Drove through here multiple late nights when I’d give Erin “Lunch Rules” Brown, rides home from work in 2010-11.
Sunday, March 16, 2014… Demolition started on Littleton Square a few weeks later, and was completed in mid-April 2014.
I wrote that story some seven years back.
Sunday, March 9, 2014… King Soopers former entrance. Still one of my all time favorite photos, and the front cover of Wasted Quarter #70.
Tuesday, March 3, 2015… A much more sooperer King Soopers opened where the old one stood, in February 2015.
One last flashback before get back to not as long ago…
Sunday, February 16, 2014… Coloradoland (Goodyear) Tire is still open. Photo taken during the Littleton Square pre-demolition walk around. Note the similar melting snow piles in the parking lot. From the same storm that left those piles in front of the liquor store.
Okay, now we’re going back forward, four years and one day, so it’s Saturday, February 17, 2018, again.
If/when that changes, I’ll let you know.
Coloradoland (Goodyear) Tire is not open. Photo taken from King Soopers lot, before I crossed the street, at Bannock.
The building to the right is Wells Fargo Jr. We’ll get there shortly…
There’s been some changes at this building over the last month. The signs above the garage doors are being removed. More importantly, the paper has been pulled off the garage doors. Now I’m more interested in what’s going on here…
Though I should have stopped by earlier. I missed getting close-ups of the signs that were taken off the walls.
Not to mention the other signs that are now gone.
Seems like a very 1960’s entryway.
Looking through the side window, at the Goodyear display on the wall. With a big buncha sun interference.
Greatly prefer cloudy days for photos…
Now looking in the front window, towards the cashier area. Door to the service area is left open, hallway towards the back area of the store, and some interesting circles on floor. I’m thinking aliens.
Better look at the dirty front windows and Coloradoland Tire & Service letters, from the center median.
Traffic was light this morning, so I ran out, took this picture and ran back.
My shadow taking a picture of the Coloradoland Tire on the east facing wall, standing in the closed drive thru and mini parking lot of Wells Fargo Jr. This bank operated as a dive thru only satellite location to the bigger Wells Fargo across the parking lot. For some reason, I didn’t turn around to take any picture of the front of this bank, which faced Littleton Blvd. Missed a few angles that I should have taken, and would have been no extra effort to do… That’s a big regret, I botched this one.
Was mesmerized by the two drive thru banking lanes apparently… I walked through the lane and turned to take this picture. Clearly more interesting than the front of the building. I don’t know, maybe it was the sun?
This sign has been hanging here for at least 23 years.
In other words, Junior was misbehaving, so Senior took away his night depository.
Looking at the drive up from this angle shows the bank itself wan’t very wide.
Drive thru vacuum tube launcher.
Don’t know what I’d do with it, but I always wanted one of those vacuum tube canisters.
Thanks for leaving this in the window, I was wondering when Wells Fargo Jr. closed permanently. It was Friday, June 3, 2016 at 2pm. Gotta love how they’re cutting out early on a Friday… Typically the biggest day of the week for drive up banking service. Seems almost like a dick move on Wells Fargo’s part.
Oh well, not like you can’t see a nearby, massive, Wells Fargo bank, if you simply look to your left.
Looking into the drive thru window. Not a fan of the dark orangish-red walls. That would really get on my nerves after a few hours. Looking down the bank hallway, there would be tellers on the left, dealing with the additional drive-up lanes on that side of the bank.
Try as I may, I couldn’t get a better look inside those two doors on the left.
To cover up for my short-sightedness, here’s an exterior shot of Wells Fargo Jr. from a Googlesmobile drive by in September 2014. Obviously it was still open then. The Wells Fargo monument sign was removed immediately after the bank closed. The drive-up window I was just looking through, would be on the left side of this picture. A row of windows in front, then the entrance on the angled front right corner. The drive-up lanes can be seen behind the bank.
In February 2018, the blinds in the front windows were all closed. Except for the one furthest left. Looks like this was the bank break room. Assuming that’s why there’s a sink. The landscaping had become unruly in the year and half since its closure. I didn’t feel like stomping through brush for another sliver of through the blinds bank life.
Looking inside the heavily tinted glass on the door. Luckily the airlock was left open, so I got a good look behind the teller windows. Because the bank was drive up only, with no inside banking, it opened right up to where the banking happens.
Opposite side of those teller windows. Also didn’t feel like going through the snow and those bushes for a look inside the windows.
I was really slacking on this mission. Guessing I was fatigued as it had been a long morning, after working all night.
I just wanted to get this done, get my groceries and get home.
But first…
Across the alley/driveway (which aligns with Acoma Street, if that existed in this part of town) is a series of retail storefronts, with the last occupant being Gravina’s Windows.
Gravina’s has a really cool box sign above the front doors. They didn’t take it down when they moved, so I’m assuming it was destroyed when the building was demolished.
Inside the doors was a bunch of empty boxes.
And some jackets.
Chimney, on the south side of the building. Complete with a Gravina’s is moving sign on the wall.
The sign is in the present tense, but the move happened a while ago.
Their new location is a larger, squarer space, shared with the inaccurately named Comfort Dental.
Because Anxiety-Inducing Painful Dental is too many letters for a sign.
There’s a sun faded colorized version of the Gravina’s box sign on the back of the building.
Seen here from behind, in the Arby’s drive thru. On January 27, 2015.
Further up in the Arby’s drive thru is the Gravina’s and Wells Fargo combo sign, along with the soon to be removed Dr. Dale Retzer Chiropractor sign. When I recently dug this photo out of the Colorado picture stash, I thought the workers on the boom truck were actually removing the Chiropractor sign. In actuality, they are across the street. Working on installing the new King Soopers/Littleton Square sign.
Nice optical illusion… Now where are my Seasoned Curly Fries!
That familiar Gravina’s/Wells Fargo sign, with Dr. Dale Retzer forced off the light box. Across the street and to the right is the King Soopers co-branded Loaf n’ Jog gas station. With fuel discounts earned from purchases made using your SooperCard!
And there’s Big Daddy Wells Fargo, from the north end of the Gravina’s building.
The curve of Arby’s drive thru lane in the right corner.
Opposite corner of Big Daddy Wells Fargo from Broadway and Powers. 7Eleven would be to your immediate right.
This is really scratching the itch of perpetual homesickness.
There’s a reason I keep writing about Colorado, despite leaving 8 years ago…
Canopy covered Wells Fargo drive up banking vacuum tube launchers.
These go underground, unlike the two on the side of the bank.
This drive-up has closed. Past tense. No warning. You’ll only know when if you chose the lanes on the side of the building.
Sucker…
That drive thru is accessed by this little enchanted trail.
Not just a hut in a parking lot.
This was my last photo of Wells Fargo Jr. I definitely did a poor job covering the doomed buildings on this block.
Two and a half years later, from a November 2020, Googlesmobile drive-by.
The property is fenced off, and pavement is getting scraped off the drive thru.
The fence extended to include the Gravina’s building. Excavator parked out front, prepared to reduce these buildings to piles of nothing. Likely within days of Googles driving by. But I wasn’t around for any of that. So let’s get back to the enchanted entrance to the Well Fargo drive thru, when it was still there. A few paces to your right would place you behind the Coloradoland Tire building.
Where the sun was powerless against the last dustings of snow…
Coloradoland Tire didn’t have a traditional Dumpster House on the property, instead using a Garbage cage.
Their dumpster and other trash was just stored against the wall by the back door.
Buckets and stuff next to the dumpster. From the looks of things, someone must be starting to clean the property out. After being closed and covered up for more than three years, there’s been the removal of signs and something’s been going on in the garage…
Zoom out for perspective on what we’re looking at.
No taking of waste tires without permission… So says this sign hanging by the back door.
Window peeking, left to right:
Rather gross looking wash area, with the hint of an employee restroom immediately to the right.
Don’t know where the door to the left lead, but it couldn’t have been an exit.
Inside the first garage door, King Soopers can be seen across Littleton Blvd, through the other side.
Little further down the row. The open door leads into the former tire showroom.
Last side of the garage.
I missed the Goodyear sign by a month. It was still inside the frame in January. Across Bannock St. is the new Gravita's Windows store.
And way off in the distance… The Rocky Mountains.
Sigh….
One last look of the garage as I cross the street, on my way back to the car.
And a shot from Bannock St. As I waited for the light that’s about to change, a few weeks later.
Laura and I moved to Minnesota at the end of May 2018. So this is my lasting memory of Coloradoland Tire.
However, by November 2018, the poorly named IntelliDent opened up here.
Providing dent repair, specifically caused by hail, to not enough people to sustain their business at this location.
By 2020, the former tire shop as now Hinsdale Auto.
They still appear to be going strong today, and have very strong online reviews.
So that’s… A good thing…
Ending this story on the tire shop reopening as something else, seemed kind of flat.
So here’s a close up of the painting on the Wells Fargo drive thru wall. Obscured by a single horizontal blind. When the bank was demolished, I doubt the painting was saved. So it is my honor to ensure that painting has the bare minimum of exposure for however long this site stays online.
Yeah… That’s a better ending.
A better story will happen soon…
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