Pueblo is not a city that appears on most travel itineraries, which is part of what makes it interesting. Set in the Arkansas River valley at the edge of the southern Colorado plains, where the Front Range of the Rockies begins its climb to the west, it is a steel town that has spent forty years adjusting to the closure of its steel mill — and adjusting, slowly and on its own terms, into something more interesting than its industrial reputation suggests. The Historic Arkansas Riverwalk, the restored Union Avenue Historic District, and a surprisingly good art museum make it worth an afternoon or overnight stop on any journey through southern Colorado.
This city is about halfway on the TransAmerica bike route – between Oregon and Virginia. Going East, Pueblo marks the beginning of flat country. We were very glad to have made it to Pueblo. We saw the. historic district and river walk although our primary concerns were not tourism but bike servicing, laundry and other chores.
A Little Background
Pueblo sits at the confluence of Fountain Creek and the Arkansas River, a site that was significant to the Ute people and, before them, to the ancestral Pueblo peoples whose descendants still live throughout the Southwest. The first permanent American settlement — a fur trading post — was established here around 1842. The area’s development accelerated when the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad arrived in 1872 and the Colorado Coal and Iron Company (later Colorado Fuel and Iron, or CF&I) chose the site for what became one of the largest steel mills in the western United States.
The CF&I steel mill employed tens of thousands of workers over its century of operation, drawing immigrants from southern and eastern Europe — Italians, Slovenians, Croatians, Mexicans — who gave Pueblo a working-class, culturally mixed character distinct from the Anglo-Protestant towns of the Front Range to the north. The mill’s closure in the 1980s was the defining economic event of recent local history; its legacy, the Bessemer neighbourhood, and the former mill site (now partially a museum) remain central to the city’s identity.
What to See and Do
The Historic Arkansas Riverwalk is a 2-kilometre landscaped waterway running through downtown — a man-made canal system built after a devastating 1921 flood, redeveloped in the 2000s into a pleasant walking circuit with public art, restaurants, and boat tours. Modest in scale but well done. Free to walk; boat tours approximately US$7.
The Steelworks Center of the West at the former CF&I site south of downtown tells the history of Pueblo’s steel industry — the immigrant workers, the labour history, the industrial process — with genuine seriousness. One of the better industrial heritage museums in the region. Adult approximately US$12.
The Pueblo Museum of Art in the Union Avenue Historic District has an unexpectedly strong collection of American Western art — Frederic Remington, Charles Russell — and significant rotating exhibitions. Free admission on Sundays; otherwise adult approximately US$8.
Union Avenue Historic District — the late-nineteenth-century commercial street between the train station and the Arkansas River — has a concentration of restored Victorian commercial buildings, independent shops, and restaurants that represents Pueblo’s most successful piece of urban heritage. The Vito’s Pizzeria and Bakery on Union Avenue is the kind of place that has been feeding the town since 1938.
The Pueblo Chile is a regional product worth mentioning: Pueblo, like its New Mexico neighbours to the south, has a distinct green chile pepper variety that is the subject of local pride and a September harvest festival. The Pueblo Slopper — an open-faced burger smothered in green chile, served at a handful of local diners — is the local dish.
Getting There
Pueblo Memorial Airport has limited scheduled service; Colorado Springs Airport, 70 kilometres north, has better connections. Pueblo is on I-25, the Front Range highway; Colorado Springs is 45 minutes north, Trinidad and the New Mexico border is 90 minutes south. Amtrak’s Southwest Chief passes through La Junta, 90 kilometres east, but not Pueblo itself.
Cost and Hours
Pueblo is affordable — one of the lower-cost cities in Colorado. Mid-range hotels run US$90–150 per night. This is not a major tourist centre and other places in Colorado will have a stronger pull on tourists. However, it has some interesting spots. Allow half a day to a full day; an overnight stop is comfortable.