Front Range

The Front Range Urban Corridor is an oblong region located along the eastern face of the Southern Rocky Mountains and extends from the city of Pueblo in Southern Colorado to Cheyenne in southern Wyoming. A few cities in the Front Range include Denver, Golden, and Colorado Springs.

Detrital zircon grains of an igneous rock as seen through an incident light microscope. Photo credit: Martin Lindner. From: Költringer, Chiara. “Detrital Zircons: How the Age of a Resistant Mineral Can Help to Reconstruct the Climate of the Past.” Science. EGU Blogs: Climate: Past, Present & Future (blog), May 20, 2021.

Geology

November 21, 2023

Case Study: detrital zircon

[ED: On the occasion of releasing a new dataset: ON-004-04D Data tables of detrital zircon U-Pb…

Skyline Drive, a one-way road along Skyline Ridge (a hogback of Dakota sandstone) northwest of Cañon City, Colorado, features spectacular views of geological and paleontological features. Seen here, geologist Dr. Adam Jackson introduces the track impressions of a group of 30-foot-long, six-ton, armored Ankylosaurs. Photo credit: Cindy Smith.

Geology

May 19, 2022

Fremont County geologic attractions

Fremont County, two hours south of Denver, is located on the south-central Front Range of Colorado in a geological region…

Munroe Quarry near Livermore, Colorado in Larimer County, which produces gypsum from the Permo-Triassic Lykins Formation. Photo credit: Colorado Geological Survey.

Geology

April 11, 2022

Case Study: Lykins Formation

Small but significant areas of Colorado are underlain by bedrock that is composed of evaporative…

Pierre Shale (gray) exposed along St. Vrain Creek in Weld County, Colorado. Photo credit: Stephen Keller for the CGS.

Geology

March 15, 2022

Recent reports published

OF-20-11 Alkaline Complexes of the Wet Mountains Area, Colorado: A Geological Summary, Bibliography, and Data Compilation…

Looking northwest to Hells Kitchen from Ekkert, Colorado, towards Grand Mesa across the wide range of environments from

Geology

April 26, 2021

Recent STATEMAP quadrangles

The CGS actively participates in the STATEMAP portion of…

The classic afternoon thunderstorm forming over South Park can make field work ... complicated! Antero Reservoir Northeast quadrangle, South Park, Colorado, July 2017. Photo credit: Peter Barkmann for the CGS.

Geology

September 9, 2020

Recent STATEMAP quadrangles

The CGS actively participates in the STATEMAP portion of…

OF-19-03 Geologic Map of the La Salle Quadrangle, Weld County, Colorado (detail)

Geology

April 24, 2020

OF-19-03 Geologic Map of the La Salle Quadrangle, Weld County, Colorado

As we continue to expand geological mapping coverage of Colorado, we recently uploaded another of our…

Uranium roll front hosted in Dakota Sandstone, Turkey Creek Road road-cut, Dakota Hogback, near Denver, Colorado. Photo credit: James St. John.

Energy

August 14, 2018

Geology of Uranium Deposits in Colorado

Uranium is a widespread and ubiquitous element. It has a crustal abundance of 2.8 parts per million, slightly more than…

OF-16-03 Colorado Rocky Mountain Front Profiles (detail)

General

May 15, 2017

OF-16-03 Colorado Rocky Mountain Front Profiles

(NOTE: We’ are currently rolling over our physical publications sales to Amazon, and we haven’t yet gotten this great poster…

OF-16-05 Geologic Map of the Longmont Quadrangle, Boulder and Weld Counties, Colorado (detail, Plate 1).

Geology

April 12, 2017

OF-16-05 Geologic Map of the Longmont Quadrangle, Boulder and Weld Counties, Colorado

We just uploaded the most recent of our STATEMAP mapping products to…

Retaining wall settlement at the center of the image with the sorority houses in the background and the IM field in the foreground. Photo credit: T. C. Wait for the CGS.

Hazards

April 26, 2005

Case Study: mine subsidence, CSM

For decades, the west side of the Colorado School of Mines (CSM) main campus had subsidence issues related to…

Isoseismal map for the earthquake north-east of Denver - 9 August 1967 - MMI VII. (detail) Kirkham, Robert M., and William P. Rogers. “Bulletin 52 - Colorado Earthquake Information, 1867-1996.” Earthquake. Bulletin. Denver, CO: Colorado Geological Survey, Division of Minerals and Geology, Department of Natural Resources, 2000. https://coloradogeologicalsurvey.org/publications/colorado-earthquake-information-1867-1996.

Geology

August 9, 1967

Case Study: Denver – August 9, 1967

Major magnitude 5.3 earthquake shock in Denver One of the strongest and most economically damaging earthquakes to affect the…

HAZUS simulation: 1882 Earthquake, Rocky Mountain National Park Epicenter M 6.6, CEUS Attenuation

Geology

November 7, 1882

Case Study: The Big One

It has been 140 years since “The Big One”: Colorado’s largest historic earthquake: November 7, 1882 – Magnitude 6.6. On…