Big Sky Country

Not Big Sky as in Montana but big sky in Aurora, just east of Denver.  I've been traveling to Colorado for work for a while now with a destination of either Colorado Springs or Boulder.  I always fly into Denver but had never really stayed in Denver -- until this week.  A 3-day meeting landed me at a Hyatt House just off Tower and Pena and this is the view pretty much if I look in the eastern direction.  Denver is very built up in the north, west and south.  So where else do you build?  Signs for (relatively) affordable housing all over the place ($200K affordable, that is) but I'm not too sure about this geography.  I had seen the most spectacular (and scary at the same time) lightning storms in this area and with all this open land, I do wonder what it's like in the summertime.