Denver and Salt Lake City Compared

Mr. Beat compares and contrasts the two biggest American Rocky Mountains-based cities, Denver, Colorado and Salt Lake City, Utah.

Produced by Matt Beat. All images and video by Matt Beat, used under fair use guidelines, or found in the public domain. Music by @DivKid and Cheel.

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#geography #bestcities #wheretolive

Denver, Colorado and Salt Lake City, Utah

Two major cities in the American West basically located on both sides of the Rocky Mountains, about 371 miles (597 km) from each other. However, because of all those mountains, it still takes eight hours to drive from one to the other. And yep, just look at those mountains. They’re a big reason why Denver and Salt Lake City are two of the fastest growing major cities in the country.

[iammrbeat]

Which is better? Salt Lake City or Denver?

[carolineann]

I spent the first 21 years of my life in Colorado, and I just moved to Salt Lake for college this year. It is insane to me both how much I knew and recognized about both cities and also how much I learned from this video.
also, the oquirrh mountains are pronounced “ochre”

[recelehberger]

As a Denver native, this was fun. Thanks for the content Mr beat, big fan of your content. Go Broncos

[CJ-]

I grew up in a suburb of Denver but have lived in SLC area for 25 years. Hard to say one is 'better'. They are different. I never thought I would like a place as much as Denver/Colorado but as an outdoor guy I will give the edge to SLC/Utah and we mostly have southern Utah to thank for that (although the wasatch high country being 20 minutes from the valley floor doesnt hurt either). Southern Utah is next level when it comes to outdoor stuff. The entire southern part of the state is a big uncrowded red rock playground. It's unreal. That said I sill love to visit my Colorado roots and still consider the Denver pro sports teams to be 'home team' (not much choice between Utah and CO for that, CO is an awesome sports town).

[shadkarlson]

Lived in Denver for 18 years and have lived in Salt Lake now for 6. I will always be preferential to Denver since it's home to me, but both are great places and you really can't go wrong.

One thing I will say that is noticeable is the climate. I definitely miss Denver's year-round sunshine and slightly nicer weather in both the summer and winter. Not drastically different but enough to be noticeable.

[rileyweston]

Thanks for the video, Beat. There are some small factual errors about Utah here, but since you used recent drone footage of SLC rather than the 30-year-old helicopter shots our news stations still use.. I’ll let that slide!

[devingiles]

Hey, Mr. Beat. Can you please compare both Edinburgh and Glasgow in Scotland?

[esquiredan]

Two years ago my wife had two job offers to consider- one in Denver, and the other in SLC. We took time to scope both cities out back to back. Our experience astonished us. Being left-leaning outdoorsy tree-huggers, we never expected to love SLC far more than Denver. The whole time we were in Denver we couldn’t even see the mountains (due to haze). Plus the homelessness has reached tragic levels. Conversely, SLC has many neighborhoods within the city proper that are way up into the mountains on the north and east sides. That’s how close they are. The city is clean and generally feels safe.

As major urban hubs go, it’s a quiet place to raise a family. People in my office frequently take half-days off work to go ski just 20 mins away from downtown. Plus there are more breweries and distilleries than you would imagine.

[brianemery]

Both have very interesting history. SLC does better with transit. In another mountain region, how about a video comparing Alberta and British Columbia. Lots to uncover, one province is conservative with an energy based economy and two medium sized metros (Calgary & Edmonton) and the other on the Canadian West Coast with a Pacific Rim port city (Vancouver) and also very resource rich.

[mazda]

I always love seeing Denver being talked about by outsider. So many things that I just find normal and take for granted are actually quite unique. Also I loved seeing my old campus so many times in this video!

[avacurtis]

Quick note from a salt lake city based Climate activist. Salt lake is not naturally drying it is a result of careless water management policies.

[joshuaberger]

I live in Denver and traveled to SLC multiple times. Despite Denver being bigger, I think SLC feels more urban due to the fact that it's completely surrounded by mountains so doesn't have room to sprawl as much as Denver sprawls. Plus, SLC is much more scenic because it's surrounded by mountains on almost all sides, whereas Denver is on the high plains a good 10 miles east of the Rockies. If it weren't for my wife's office job (I work remote), I'd totally up sticks to SLC. Denver is nice too, but SLC is just more prettier and I think still retains a certain charm that Denver has lost in it's growth.

[logansimmons]

Lived in both, could see the sphinx in the Gilgal from my apartment in SLC 😂 I personally prefer Salt Lake due to it's proximity to the mountains and lower density. Also, as good as Colorado mountian biking is, Utah can't be beat! Both are great though.

[ZacharyRiggs]

I love these videos! I would like to see a comparison of San Diego/LA, Las Vegas/Phoenix, San Francisco/Sacramento, or Seattle/Vancouver. It would also be epic to compare California /Texas/Florida.

[CoronaryArteryDisease.]

Both are great places. Park City, which is close to SLC, is definitely one of my favorite places in Utah. Lots of stuff from the olympics is still there. I rode a bobsled down a competition course! Colorado Springs has a huge olympic training facility. Vail in Colorado was also super fun. However, if you don't like the outdoors and doing things like rock climbing, mountain biking, kayaking, etc., Utah might not be for you entertainment wise.

[skidogleb]

Salt Lake City is sweet! Nothing like 2 feet of snow to help me stay home and play video games.

[TrogdorElite]

As a third generation Denver native this video was super fun. Also appreciate the one photo of my alma-mater the Colorado School of Mines. I also grew up in Morrison, the location of Red Rocks, and attended Red Rocks Elementary at the base of Red Rocks Park. We could hear the sound checks and rehearsals from our playground.

[rochellegriffin]

I am super impressed with the information accuracy and quality footage of this video. So often I feel Utah gets misrepresented, but this was really excellent! Great, thorough work! Thank you!

[TrendyStone]

My sister lives in Denver but misses SLC. It's just not that easy to get to the ski resorts in Denver. I live in Ogden and can be on the slopes in 30 minutes. It can take hours to get from Denver to the ski resorts.

Note that since January the Great Salt Lake is up 3 feet.

[morgank.]

I would also like to add that a big part of the Temple Square tourism occurs during the month of December when they have all the nativity scenes, Christmas lights and other festive things out. As someone who worked as a custodian there for a year, that was definitely the busiest time. With renovations ongoing, that hasn't been a thing for the last couple of years, and I'm not entirely sure when it will be back, but at least historically, that was a big thing for (especially Mormon) locals.