Best Performance by a TV Anchor in a Tough Spot 2001 | Jim Benemann, Channel 9 | Best of Denver® | Best Restaurants, Bars, Clubs, Music and Stores in Denver | Westword
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Best Performance by a TV Anchor in a Tough Spot

Jim Benemann, Channel 9

The ratings at Channel 9 have dipped since the departures of longtimers Ed Sardella and Ron Zappolo, but the station's ten o'clock newscast remains the area's most most popular -- and Jim Benemann is a big reason why. Sardella left big shoes to fill, but Benemann slipped into them quite comfortably. He's not flashy, just companionable and extremely watchable.

Best Alternative Nickname for 'Convergence Corridor'

Pink-Slip Prairie

It seemed like such a good idea six months and 2,000 stock-market points ago: Give the cities along the Front Range one marketable identity that would give Silicon Valley a run for its money. But since the fall of 2000, that money has disappeared faster than your average Denver worker at 4 p.m. on a Friday, and today the entire Convergence Corridor looks like one big booster boondoggle. Better to pay a local advertising company a boatload -- and the boosters did -- to promote our high-altitude fun than to market our high-tech potential. As another area that's been Silicon-jobbed might warn of catering to the wrong companies: Boeing, Boeing, gone!

Best Alternative Nickname for 'Convergence Corridor'

Pink-Slip Prairie

It seemed like such a good idea six months and 2,000 stock-market points ago: Give the cities along the Front Range one marketable identity that would give Silicon Valley a run for its money. But since the fall of 2000, that money has disappeared faster than your average Denver worker at 4 p.m. on a Friday, and today the entire Convergence Corridor looks like one big booster boondoggle. Better to pay a local advertising company a boatload -- and the boosters did -- to promote our high-altitude fun than to market our high-tech potential. As another area that's been Silicon-jobbed might warn of catering to the wrong companies: Boeing, Boeing, gone!

Best News for a Downtown Institution

YMCA

For decades, the downtown YMCA has offered low-cost housing both for people just passing through and for those trying to turn their lives around right here in Denver. And so last year, when the Y announced it would be selling the building in order to help finance needed renovations of its fitness facilities, many feared that housing would be converted into high-end lofts or offices. But then the Y agreed to sell the structure to the Colorado Coalition for the Homeless, which will renovate the 189 rooms, continue to offer them to the public, and also allow the 95-year-old YMCA to rehab its recreation facilities. This is one real estate deal that includes something rare in the development world: a social conscience.

Best News for a Downtown Institution

YMCA

For decades, the downtown YMCA has offered low-cost housing both for people just passing through and for those trying to turn their lives around right here in Denver. And so last year, when the Y announced it would be selling the building in order to help finance needed renovations of its fitness facilities, many feared that housing would be converted into high-end lofts or offices. But then the Y agreed to sell the structure to the Colorado Coalition for the Homeless, which will renovate the 189 rooms, continue to offer them to the public, and also allow the 95-year-old YMCA to rehab its recreation facilities. This is one real estate deal that includes something rare in the development world: a social conscience.

Best TV Sportscaster

Drew Soicher, Channel 9

Drew Soicher, the wiseacre brother of Channel 4's Marc Soicher, has a nicely jaded sense of humor, which he exhibits both during newscasts (love his witty "Drew or False" feature) and while reporting. In one memorable package, he tried to patch up the differences between two warring hockey players by telling each that his counterpart wanted to get to know him better. The players involved didn't get the joke, but the audience sure did.

Best TV Sportscaster

Drew Soicher, Channel 9

Drew Soicher, the wiseacre brother of Channel 4's Marc Soicher, has a nicely jaded sense of humor, which he exhibits both during newscasts (love his witty "Drew or False" feature) and while reporting. In one memorable package, he tried to patch up the differences between two warring hockey players by telling each that his counterpart wanted to get to know him better. The players involved didn't get the joke, but the audience sure did.

Best New Building Plan

The Denver Art Museum's new wing

Construction of a wildly fanciful wing for the Denver Art Museum, designed by architectural superstar Daniel Libeskind, is about to get under way just south of the museum. Although its unconventional structure has been likened to a plane crash, this wing will surely be one of the best buildings in town. Almost as remarkable as the Libeskind design is that DAM director Lewis Sharp was savvy enough to have guided the commissioning process, allowing overlapping committees to have their say but also making sure that the existing Gio Ponti museum building was protected.

Best New Building Plan

The Denver Art Museum's new wing

Construction of a wildly fanciful wing for the Denver Art Museum, designed by architectural superstar Daniel Libeskind, is about to get under way just south of the museum. Although its unconventional structure has been likened to a plane crash, this wing will surely be one of the best buildings in town. Almost as remarkable as the Libeskind design is that DAM director Lewis Sharp was savvy enough to have guided the commissioning process, allowing overlapping committees to have their say but also making sure that the existing Gio Ponti museum building was protected.

Best Eye in the Sky

Lynn Carey, Metro Traffic

Lynn Carey's work ethic, which she displays weekdays on Channel 7 and a slew of radio stations, including the Peak, KDKO, KNUS and Boulder's KWAB, was honed in area restaurants. She spent twenty years working as a waitress at such places as McCormick's Fish House & Bar and Dixons Downtown Grille (she still subs at the Edgewater Inn on occasion), and she brings a waitperson's mentality to the traffic beat. In other words, she does her best to fill every order and gets the information to customers while it's hot.

Best Of Denver®

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