Central Park, previously Stapleton, is a neighborhood within the city limits of Denver and Aurora, Colorado.

[1] Located east of downtown Denver, the neighborhood is at the former site of the decommissioned Stapleton International Airport, which closed in 1995.

The Central Park Neighborhood contains twelve specifically named sub-neighborhoods, 11 public/private schools, 50 parks (including city regional and community pocket-parks), 7 pools, several shopping and business districts, a city of Denver recreation center, and a Denver library.

The types of housing also varies (including single-family, condos, live-work townhomes, row homes, duplexes, and high-density apartments).

[6] Central Park's neighborhood 1,100 acres (4.5 km2) of open space also borders the restored Sand Creek Regional Greenway and Bluff Lake Nature Center, one of the nation's largest urban wildlife refuges.

In 2019, the Central Park RTD Station and its surrounding area was expanded by transit-oriented development, it now spans five blocks; which includes upscale apartments, offices, a new hotel and retail shops.

In 2020, in the wake of the Black Lives Matter movement and to condemn the legacy of the former Denver mayor Benjamin F. Stapleton, once a member of the Ku Klux Klan, the community formally changed the name of the neighborhood from 'Stapleton' to 'Central Park'.

As of 2022, the entire Central Park neighborhood has an estimated population of 30,000, and is still growing as the last new homes are still being finished by 2025 (although some infill will still occur after this).

Being the largest neighborhood in Denver, there are continual issues with crime statistics and other demographics that aren't accurate because the lack of context (per capita, per square mile, etc.).

The original airport was named for Benjamin Franklin Stapleton (November 12, 1869 – May 23, 1950), a low level member of the Ku Klux Klan who was the Mayor of Denver for five nonconsecutive terms: from 1923 to 1931 and from 1935 to 1947.

Beginning in 1925, Stapleton began actively working against the Klan, undermining their power in the police force and welcoming the NAACP convention that June.