Wood: What’s to come in 2026

The new year should bring resolution to some major business issues and expansions that made headlines in 2025, and even earlier.

Northern Colorado and the Boulder Valley have seen their fair share of lawsuits, proposed business expansions and controversies. Here are some of the issues and projects that should come to resolution this year.

• Catalyst/Cascadia — Greeley voters will decide on Feb. 24 whether to repeal zoning for the massive Cascadia and Catalyst projects in west Greeley. Catalyst would cost $1.1 billion and would include a city-owned arena, hotel and water park, largely surrounded by the Cascadia mixed-use development. Opposition to the project spurred a petition campaign to place the zoning on the ballot.

• Costco — Where will Costco locate a new store in Northern Colorado? Several years ago, west Greeley was touted as a potential home for the membership-model retailer, but word came that the company preferred Loveland or Johnstown, with the rumored site being at U.S. Highway 34 and Centerra Parkway in Loveland. 

• Amazon.com — The company’s 3.5-million-square-foot distribution center north of Northern Colorado Regional Airport in Loveland has seemingly sat dormant since completion, with the opening delayed. Rumors have been rife about whether the company would open it at all, given changes in the economy. But Amazon told BizWest that it would open the center in the second half of 2026, employing 1,000 workers but with the potential to employ 3,000. (It will also include 5,000 robots.)

• Bandimere Speedway — The New Horizons Foundation, a Christian-oriented nonprofit purchased 114 acres along Interstate 76 on behalf of Bandimere, which sold its Morrison location in 2024. More land is needed, but the project remains on the drawing board.

• Pearl Arts District — A proposed $632 million arts and entertainment district is planned for Boulder, just west of Foothills Parkway. The project at 3550 Frontier Ave. would include a 1,750-seat performing-arts center with standing capacity of 2,500; a 150-room hotel, housing, dining and cultural spaces.

• Greeley downtown civic campus — Properties are being swapped for a complex real estate development in downtown Greeley, with new spaces being built for the City of Greeley, Weld County and Greeley-Evans School District 6. 

• JBS USA headquarters — What will JBS decide regarding its headquarters? The meat-processing company had pitched the City of Greeley on purchasing its current headquarters building in the Promontory business park for $15.7 million, paving the way for the company to acquire the adjacent, three-building State Farm campus. The city opted not to buy the JBS building, and the company has so far not proceeded with the State Farm acquisition. 

• GlobalAI Cloud Inc. — Through an affiliated entity, New York data-center company GlobalAi purchased the former Carestream property in unincorporated Weld County. While the company has been silent about its plans, the 438-acre campus could house a massive data-center operation, with Greeley and Windsor potentially competing to annex the site.

• Future Legends — Mired for years in lawsuits, a bankruptcy and judicial foreclosure proceedings, the sports complex in Windsor likely will learn its fate in 2026, with a lawsuit in Weld District Court potentially coming to a close. Lenders and contractors are vying for primacy in any foreclosure action. Will the new year bring closure, or will we still be talking about this development in 2027?

• Williams Village II/Dark Horse — Will the iconic Dark Horse Tavern find a new home as its current building is demolished to make way for a new mixed-use development? Developers have expressed their intent to build a new home for the Dark Horse, but nothing is final. The Dark Horse obtained a brief extension before its current building is demolished — at least until mid-March — but will it locate temporarily elsewhere, and will a new home arise?

We’ll keep an eye on these and many other stories in the year ahead.

Christopher Wood can be reached at 303-630-1942 or [email protected].

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