Longmont is a

home rule municipality Statutory city may refer to: * Statutory city (Austria), an Austrian municipality acting as a district administrative authority * Statutory city (Czech Republic), a Czech city with special privileges * Statutory city (United States), a city in the ...

located in

Boulder In geology, a boulder (or rarely bowlder) is a rock fragment with size greater than in diameter. Smaller pieces are called cobbles and pebbles. While a boulder may be small enough to move or roll manually, others are extremely massive. In ...

and Weld counties,

Colorado Colorado is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States. It is one of the Mountain states, sharing the Four Corners region with Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah. It is also bordered by Wyoming to the north, Nebraska to the northeast, Kansas ...

, United States. Its population was 98,885 . Longmont is located northeast of the county seat of

. It is named after

Longs Peak Longs Peak is a mountain in the northern Front Range of the Rocky Mountains of North America. The fourteener is located in the Rocky Mountain National Park Wilderness, southwest by south ( bearing 209°) of the Town of Estes Park, Colorado, ...

, a prominent mountain that is clearly visible from the city (''mont'' means "mountain" in French).

History

Longmont was founded in 1871 by a group of people from

Chicago, Illinois Chicago is the List of municipalities in Illinois, most populous city in the U.S. state of Illinois and in the Midwestern United States. With a population of 2,746,388, as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the List of Unite ...

. Originally called the Chicago-Colorado Colony, led by president Robert Collyer, the men sold memberships in the town, purchasing the land necessary for the

town hall In local government, a city hall, town hall, civic centre (in the UK or Australia), guildhall, or municipal hall (in the Philippines) is the chief administrative building of a city, town, or other municipality. It usually houses the city o ...

with the proceeds. As the first planned community in Boulder County, the city streets were laid out in a

grid plan In urban planning, the grid plan, grid street plan, or gridiron plan is a type of city plan in which streets run at right angles to each other, forming a grid. Two inherent characteristics of the grid plan, frequent intersections and orthogon ...

within a

square mile The square mile (abbreviated as sq mi and sometimes as mi2)Rowlett, Russ (September 1, 2004) University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Retrieved February 22, 2012. is an imperial and US unit of measure for area. One square mile is equa ...

. The city began to flourish as an

agricultural Agriculture encompasses crop and livestock production, aquaculture, and forestry for food and non-food products. Agriculture was a key factor in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created f ...

community after the

Colorado Central Railroad The Colorado Central Railroad was a United States, U.S. railroad company that operated in Colorado and southeastern Wyoming in the late 19th century. It was founded in the Colorado Territory in the wake of the Colorado Gold Rush to ship gold fr ...

line arrived northward from Boulder in 1877. In 1925, the

Ku Klux Klan The Ku Klux Klan (), commonly shortened to KKK or Klan, is an American Protestant-led Christian terrorism, Christian extremist, white supremacist, Right-wing terrorism, far-right hate group. It was founded in 1865 during Reconstruction era, ...

gained control of Longmont's City Council in an election. They began construction of a large pork-barrel project, Chimney Rock Dam, above Lyons and marched up and down Main Street in their costumes. In the 1927 election they were voted out of office, and their influence soon declined. Work on Chimney Rock Dam was abandoned as unfeasible, and its foundations are still visible in the St. Vrain River. In 1955, United Airlines Flight 629 exploded over Weld County,

8 miles east of Longmont, killing 44 passengers and crew. During the 1960s, the federal government built the Denver Air Route Traffic Control Center in Longmont, and

IBM International Business Machines Corporation (using the trademark IBM), nicknamed Big Blue, is an American Multinational corporation, multinational technology company headquartered in Armonk, New York, and present in over 175 countries. It is ...

built a manufacturing and development campus near Longmont. Longmont Foods was a turkey processor that once supplied turkey products throughout the United States. For example, turkey hot dogs with the Longmont Foods label were sold throughout the US. In 1950 they constructed a large plant on southern Main St. that received trucks full of live turkeys. The company was eventually purchased by Butterball and then closed 2011. As agriculture waned, more high technology has come to the city, including companies like Seagate and

Amgen Amgen Inc. (formerly Applied Molecular Genetics Inc.) is an American multinational biopharmaceutical Corporation, company headquartered in Thousand Oaks, California. As one of the world's largest independent biotechnology companies, Amgen has a ...

; Amgen closed its Longmont campus in 2015. In April 2009, the GE Energy Company relocated its control solutions business to the area. The

downtown ''Downtown'' is a term primarily used in American and Canadian English to refer to a city's sometimes commercial, cultural and often the historical, political, and geographic heart. It is often synonymous with its central business district ( ...

along Main Street, once nearly dead during the 1980s, has seen a vibrant revival in the 1990s and into the 21st century. During the mid-1990s, the southern edge of Longmont became the location of the first New Urbanist project in Colorado, called Prospect New Town, designed by the

architect An architect is a person who plans, designs, and oversees the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to provide services in connection with the design of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the buildings that h ...

Andrés Duany Andrés Duany (born September 7, 1949) is an American architect, urban planner, and a founder of the Congress for the New Urbanism. Early life and education Duany was born in New York City but grew up in Cuba until 1960. He attended The Choat ...

and

Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk (born December 20, 1950) is a professor at the University of Miami's School of Architecture and an architect and urban planner in Miami, Florida. Plater-Zyberk is considered to be a representative of the New Urbanism scho ...

. Longmont was the site of Colorado's first library, founded in 1871 by Elizabeth Rowell Thompson, though it lasted up to a year before its collection of 300 books was lost. Following this, Longmont also was the site of one of Carnegie's libraries with the single-story structure being opened in 1913. It remained open until August 7, 1972, when, due to overcrowding with approximately 22,000 books within the space, it was closed just a week before the new library that had been constructed next door was opened. In May 2013, the Longmont City Council voted to finance and build out its own municipal gigabit data

fiber-optic An optical fiber, or optical fibre, is a flexible glass or plastic fiber that can transmit light from one end to the other. Such fibers find wide usage in fiber-optic communications, where they permit transmission over longer distances and at ...

network, known as NextLight, to every house and business over a three-year period starting in late 2013.

Geography

Longmont is located in northeastern Boulder County and extends eastward into western Weld County. U.S. Highway 287 (Main Street) runs through the center of the city, leading north to Loveland and south to downtown Denver. State Highway 119 passes through the city south of downtown and leads southwest to Boulder and east to

Interstate 25 Interstate 25 (I-25), also known as the Pan-American Freeway, is a major Interstate Highway in the western United States. It is primarily a north–south highway, serving as the main route through New Mexico, Colorado, and Wyoming. I-25 st ...

. The elevation at City Hall is above

sea level Mean sea level (MSL, often shortened to sea level) is an mean, average surface level of one or more among Earth's coastal Body of water, bodies of water from which heights such as elevation may be measured. The global MSL is a type of vertical ...

. St. Vrain Creek, a tributary of the

South Platte River The South Platte River is one of the two principal tributaries of the Platte River. Flowing through the U.S. states of Colorado and Nebraska, it is itself a major river of the American Midwestern United States, Midwest and the American Sou ...

, flows through the city just south of the city center. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, Longmont has a total area of , of which is land and , or 5.30%, is water.

Climate

According to the

Köppen Climate Classification The Köppen climate classification divides Earth climates into five main climate groups, with each group being divided based on patterns of seasonal precipitation and temperature. The five main groups are ''A'' (tropical), ''B'' (arid), ''C'' (te ...

system, Longmont has a cold

semi-arid A semi-arid climate, semi-desert climate, or steppe climate is a aridity, dry climate sub-type. It is located on regions that receive precipitation below Evapotranspiration#Potential evapotranspiration, potential evapotranspiration, but not as l ...

climate, abbreviated ''Bsk'' on climate maps. The hottest temperature recorded in Longmont was on July 7, 1973, and June 27, 1994, while the coldest temperature recorded was on January 16, 1930.

Demographics

2020 census

As of the

census A census (from Latin ''censere'', 'to assess') is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording, and calculating population information about the members of a given Statistical population, population, usually displayed in the form of stati ...

of 2020, there were 98,885 people living in the city (2023 estimate: 98,630). The

population density Population density (in agriculture: Standing stock (disambiguation), standing stock or plant density) is a measurement of population per unit land area. It is mostly applied to humans, but sometimes to other living organisms too. It is a key geog ...

was . There were 41,680 housing units. The racial makeup of the city was: * 65.65%

White White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no chroma). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully (or almost fully) reflect and scatter all the visible wa ...

* 0.91% African American * 0.45% Native American * 3.52% Asian * 0.06%

Pacific Islander Pacific Islanders, Pasifika, Pasefika, Pacificans, or rarely Pacificers are the peoples of the list of islands in the Pacific Ocean, Pacific Islands. As an ethnic group, ethnic/race (human categorization), racial term, it is used to describe th ...

* .52% from other races * 4.14% from two or more races. *

Hispanic The term Hispanic () are people, Spanish culture, cultures, or countries related to Spain, the Spanish language, or broadly. In some contexts, Hispanic and Latino Americans, especially within the United States, "Hispanic" is used as an Ethnici ...

or Latino of any race were 24.73% of the population. There were 42,201 households, of which 24.8% had children under the age of 18 living with them. 44.1% were married couples living together, 27.7% had a female householder with no spouse present, and 18.6% had a male householder with no spouse present. 27.9% of all households were made up of individuals, and 12.7% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.32 and the average family size was 2.87. In the city, the population was spread out, with 23% under the age of 20, 6.2% from 20 to 24, 27.4% from 25 to 44, 25.6% from 45 to 64, and 17.8% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 40 years. The median income for a household in the city was $82,984, and the median income for a family was $102,651. Male householders had a median income of $67,311 versus $46,467 for females. The

per capita income Per capita income (PCI) or average income measures the average income earned per person in a given area (city, region, country, etc.) in a specified year. In many countries, per capita income is determined using regular population surveys, such ...

for the city was $46,830. About 11.1% of families and 8.5% of the population were below the

poverty line The poverty threshold, poverty limit, poverty line, or breadline is the minimum level of income deemed adequate in a particular country. The poverty line is usually calculated by estimating the total cost of one year's worth of necessities for ...

, including 8.8% of those under age 18 and 8.8% of those age 65 or over. In 2011 Longmont was rated the second safest city in Colorado.

Education

Longmont is home to the Boulder County Campus of Front Range Community College, the St. Vrain Valley School District, and to a number of private schools. Longmont is also home to the Master Instructor Continuing Education Program (MICEP) a voluntary accreditation program for aviation educators. There is also a municipal public library. there was deliberation over whether to establish a library district and to have the library publish news. That year the library's director stated, in the words of Corey Hutchins of the ''

Columbia Journalism Review The ''Columbia Journalism Review'' (''CJR'') is a biannual magazine for professional journalists that has been published by the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism since 1961. Its original purpose was "to assess the performance ...

'', "lacks resources and hasn’t kept up with the city’s growth".

Transportation

Longmont has bus service to Denver and Boulder as part of the RTD transit district. Longmont is connected to Fort Collins, Loveland, and Berthoud via
FLEX
regional bus service. , the FasTracks project plans to extend RTD's commuter rail B Line to Longmont, which could be completed in the early 2040s. In 2012, Longmont was recognized by the League of American Bicyclists as a silver-level bicycle-friendly community. Longmont is one of 38 communities in the United States to be recognized with this distinction. It is the only city in Colorado placed at the silver level that is not a major tourist center or a

university A university () is an educational institution, institution of tertiary education and research which awards academic degrees in several Discipline (academia), academic disciplines. ''University'' is derived from the Latin phrase , which roughly ...

city. Vance Brand Airport is a public-use airport owned by the city. It currently has no scheduled passenger flights, but it is popular for general aviation.

Media

The ''Longmont Leader'' (formerly the ''Longmont Observer'') is the local daily newspaper. The '' Longmont Times-Call'', while bearing the city's name, is published from Boulder and is operated by Alden Global Capital of New York City. Longmont's

radio station Radio broadcasting is the broadcasting of audio (sound), sometimes with related metadata, by radio waves to radio receivers belonging to a public audience. In terrestrial radio broadcasting the radio waves are broadcast by a land-based rad ...

s include KRCN, KGUD, and

KKFN KKFN (104.3 FM broadcasting, FM, "Denver Sports 104.3 The Fan") is a commercial radio station serving the Denver-Boulder, Colorado, Boulder media market, market. Owned and operated by Salt Lake City–based Bonneville International, KKFN airs ...

. Sports radio is broadcast on KKSE-FM from a tower about southeast of Longmont. Also located nearby is KDFD, a

Fox News Radio Fox News Radio is an American radio network owned by Fox News. It is syndicated to over 500 AM and FM radio stations across the United States. It also supplies programming for three channels on Sirius XM Satellite Radio. History In 2003, ...

affiliate with a conservative talk format. The KDFD (760 AM) transmitter site is about east of Boulder. NPR programming can be heard on

Colorado Public Radio Colorado Public Radio (CPR) is a public radio state network based in Denver, Colorado that broadcasts three services: news, classical music and Indie 102.3, which plays adult album alternative music. CPR airs its programming on 15 full-power ...

stations KCFR from Denver, and KCFC (AM) in Boulder. The NPR affiliate KUNC from the Fort Collins- Greeley market can also be heard in Longmont. Longmont is also served by

Pacifica Radio Pacifica may refer to: Art * ''Pacifica'' (statue), a 1938 statue by Ralph Stackpole for the Golden Gate International Exposition Places * Pacifica, California, a city in the United States ** Pacifica Pier, a fishing pier * Pacifica, a conce ...

affiliate KGNU, a non-commercial

community radio Community radio is a radio service offering a third model of radio broadcasting in addition to commercial broadcasting, commercial and public broadcasting. Community broadcasting, Community stations serve geographic communities and communities o ...

station from Boulder.

Economy

According to the city's 2020 Annual Comprehensive Financial Report, the top employers in the city are: In addition, Longmont supports a thriving craft brewing industry as well as many recreational and travel-related businesses. Local breweries include two of the nation's largest craft brewers, Left Hand and Oskar Blues, as well as many others. To service the transportation needs of brewery patrons, the local Brew Hop Trolley offers a hop-on-hop-off brewery tour for a fixed price. Longmont is known for its 'maker' community. Longmont also features a Saturday Farmers Market. Due to its proximity to

Rocky Mountain National Park Rocky Mountain National Park is a List of national parks of the United States, national park of the United States located approximately northwest of Denver in north-central Colorado, within the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains. The park is s ...

, Longmont is home to many hotels, restaurants, and other businesses that cater in part to the tourists visiting the park each year. One recreational business that calls Longmont home is Mile Hi Skydiving, which is one of the largest skydiving facilities in the state of Colorado. Longmont is also home to Saul, the World's Largest Sticker Ball at StickerGiant, a custom sticker and label printing company on the city's east side. Other businesses support skiing and other snowsports, bicycling, and rock climbing. Longmont's median household income was $89,720 per year in 2022. The largest industries in Longmont as of 2022 are manufacturing (7,188 people); professional, scientific, and technical services (6,533 people); and retail trade (6,066 people).

Government

Longmont is a

. Its current

city charter A city charter or town charter (generically, municipal charter) is a legal document (''charter'') establishing a municipality such as a city or town. The concept developed in Europe during the Middle Ages. Traditionally, the granting of a charter ...

was adopted in 1961, and has been amended numerous times since. Longmont is governed by a seven-member City Council, which consists of the directly-elected mayor of Longmont and six additional councilmembers. Of the six councilmembers, three are elected from one of three wards, and three are elected from the city

at-large At large (''before a noun'': at-large) is a description for members of a governing body who are elected or appointed to represent a whole membership or population (notably a city, county, state, province, nation, club or association), rather tha ...

. The mayor is elected for a term of two years, and each councilmember is elected for a term of four years. Regular city elections in Longmont are held on the first Tuesday in November of odd-numbered years. The officials elected at each regular city election alternate between (1) the mayor, the councilmembers from Wards One and Three, and one councilmember elected at-large, and (2) the mayor, the councilmember from Ward Two, and two councilmembers elected at large. Longmont operates under a council-manager system of government, with a city manager acting as the city's chief administrative officer. The city manager is appointed by and serves at the pleasure of the City Council. This is a list of individuals who have served as mayor of Longmont.

Federal and state representation

In the Colorado House of Representatives, Longmont is split between the 11th and 19th House districts, which are currently represented by Representatives Karen McCormick (D) and Dan Woog (R), respectively. In the Colorado State Senate, Longmont is a part of the 17th Senate district, which is currently represented by Senator Katie Wallace (D), who was selected by a vacancy committee to represent the district following the resignation of former Senator Sonya Jaquez Lewis. At the federal level, Longmont is a part of

Colorado's 2nd congressional district Colorado's 2nd congressional district is a congressional district in the U.S. state of Colorado. The district is located in the north-central part of the state, and encompasses the Front Range northwest of Denver metropolitan area, Denver, mai ...

, which is currently represented in the United States House of Represenatives by Congressman Joe Neguse (D).

Fire department

The Longmont Fire Department was established in its current form in 1908. The history of the department can be traced back to the creation of the ''W. A. Buckingham Hook & Ladder Company'' in 1879. the department operates from six stations throughout the city. Longmont Fire Department Station 1 was built in 1907, used by the department until 1971, and listed in the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...

in 1985.

Notable people

* Valarie Allman (b. 1995), discus gold medalist in the 2020 Olympics and

2024 Olympics The 2024 Summer Olympics (), officially the Games of the XXXIII Olympiad () and branded as Paris 2024, were an international multi-sport event held in France from 26 July to 11 August 2024, with several events started from 24 July. P ...

; graduate of Silver Creek High School * Greg Biekert (b. 1969),

American football American football, referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada and also known as gridiron football, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular American football field, field with goalposts at e ...

player and coach; played football for Longmont High School * David Bote (b. 1993),

MLB Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball league composed of 30 teams, divided equally between the National League (baseball), National League (NL) and the American League (AL), with 29 in the United States and 1 in Canada. MLB i ...

player; Longmont native * Vance D. Brand (b. 1931),

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the federal government of the United States, US federal government responsible for the United States ...

astronaut; graduate of Longmont High School * Elizabeth A. Fenn (b. 1959),

Pulitzer Prize The Pulitzer Prizes () are 23 annual awards given by Columbia University in New York City for achievements in the United States in "journalism, arts and letters". They were established in 1917 by the will of Joseph Pulitzer, who had made his fo ...

–winning historian; Longmont resident * Terry Johnson (b. 1935), engineer and entrepreneur * John R. Kelso (b. 1831), congressman and author; Longmont resident * Kody Lostroh (b. 1985),

Professional Bull Riders The Professional Bull Riders, Inc. (PBR) is an international professional bull riding organization headquartered in Fort Worth, Texas, United States. It is the largest bull riding league in the world, sanctioning hundreds of events every yea ...

World Champion 2009; Longmont native * David Pauley (b. 1983), MLB pitcher; graduate of Longmont High School * Jack Reynor (b. 1992), Irish actor; born in Longmont * Kristen Schaal (b. 1978), comedian and actress; raised in Longmont *

Dan Simmons Dan Simmons (born April 4, 1948) is an American science fiction and horror writer. He is the author of the Hyperion Cantos and the Ilium/Olympos cycles, among other works that span the science fiction, horror, and fantasy genres, sometimes ...

(b. 1948),

Hugo Award The Hugo Award is an annual literary award for the best science fiction or fantasy works and achievements of the previous year, given at the World Science Fiction Convention (Worldcon) and chosen by its members. The award is administered by th ...

–winning author; Longmont resident * Kimiko Soldati (b. 1974), diver at the

2004 Olympics The 2004 Summer Olympics (), officially the Games of the XXVIII Olympiad (), and officially branded as Athens 2004 (), were an international multi-sport event held from 13 to 29 August 2004 in Athens, Greece. The Games saw 10,625 athletes ...

; raised in Longmont * Fred Stone (b. 1873), stage and film actor; lived in Longmont *

William Oxley Thompson William Oxley Thompson, D.D. (November 5, 1855 – December 9, 1933) was the fifth president of Ohio State University. During his term as president, he was known for his practice of segregationist policies against black students on campus ...

(b. 1855), fifth President of The

Ohio State University The Ohio State University (Ohio State or OSU) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Columbus, Ohio, United States. A member of the University System of Ohio, it was founded in 1870. It is one ...

; founder of the short-lived Longmont Presbyterian College * Ed Werder (b. 1960), Dick McCann Award–winning sports reporter; attended Longmont High School

Sister cities

Longmont has established a

sister city A sister city or a twin town relationship is a form of legal or social agreement between two geographically and politically distinct localities for the purpose of promoting cultural and commercial ties. While there are early examples of inte ...

relationship with: * Chino, Nagano, Japan * Ciudad Guzmán,

Jalisco Jalisco, officially the Free and Sovereign State of Jalisco, is one of the 31 states which, along with Mexico City, comprise the 32 Political divisions of Mexico, Federal Entities of Mexico. It is located in western Mexico and is bordered by s ...

, Mexico * Northern Arapaho Tribe, Wind River Reservation, Wyoming

References

External links

City of Longmont official website

History of Longmont

Longmont Museum & Cultural Center
{{Authority control 1871 establishments in Colorado Territory Cities in Boulder County, Colorado Cities in Colorado Cities in Weld County, Colorado Populated places established in 1871