Homeless camps ‘suffocate’ one of Denver’s first LGBTQ bars, forcing closure

One of Denver’s first LGBTQ+ bars shuttered its doors Thursday after being “suffocated” by homeless encampments crowding the city.

The Triangle Bar lost roughly 50% of its business in the last several months — with owner Scott Coors attributing the tavern’s floundering to downtown Denver’s unrelenting homelessness problem.

“With heavy hearts we announce that, effective today, Triangle Bar Denver is closing our doors indefinitely. As confirmed by our survey, the encampments surrounding us pose a health and safety concern that has slowly suffocated our business,” Coors told Denver7.

“We have worked hard to provide a safe and welcoming place for all members of our community to celebrate, play, and give back to others for the last 6 years. Thank you from the bottom of our hearts to those of you who have supported us through thick and thin, it’s been a pleasure and an honor to be part of your extended family.”

The historic bar came to its tragic end after conducting a 500-person survey in which 75% of its patrons confirmed they were visiting the business less frequently — and more than 60% citing safety concerns due to the encampments.

The tent cities, filled with trash, mattresses and drugs, have also created an eyesore on the downtown scene.

The Triangle Bar, which has been a staple since the 1970s, is located less than a tenth of a mile away from a massive tent city at Broadway and 20th Street.

Another camp — which made headlines last month for running its own decked-out, open-air tavern for the homeless — can be found just steps in the other direction.

The Broadway camp has been a persistent nuisance for months, forcing Coors since August to consider closing the local landmark if the “inescapable problem” of homelessness didn’t improve soon.

The tent city has been repeatedly demolished, and was even cleared up just four days before The Triangle Bar’s final day, but was re-erected almost immediately.

“We had a clean neighborhood for less than 24 hours before they moved right back into the space where “gutter house” was,” said Coors.

Other neighborhood bars and restaurants have also reported drastic drops in revenue due, with all of them blaming the homeless encampments.

The Triangle Bar will reopen for just one day Oct. 8 for what Coors is calling the “Farewell Beer Bust” to celebrate the “life of the Triangle.”

The bar’s closure comes just one before the city announced that its Denver Basic Income Project, which gave regular lump sums of cash to its homeless population, was showing promising results.

The project kicked off six months ago and has thus far shown that recipients are spending the money on vital needs and sleeping on the street less. They appear to be securing full-time work at higher rates when given more money.