The free drive-up COVID-19 testing center at the Pepsi Center will close permanently Wednesday in favor of smaller community testing centers set to open in October.

The Pepsi Center testing site opened in late May, providing free testing for those with symptoms, and later those without symptoms, while city officials organized. Now, as Denver faces a new spike in COVID-19 cases, Robert McDonald says it’s time for a new strategy.

“The Pepsi Center stood in a gap,” said McDonald, executive director of the Denver Department of Public Health and Environment (DDPHE).

“We had to do get in front of this virus, we had to find out what was happening in our communities. That was done and now it’s time to stand that down and be more targeted with our testing efforts.”

DDPHE now will be subverting testing resources to smaller community testing sites. Four new community testing sites are set to open near the beginning of October, with the first being Paco Sanchez Park opening on Oct. 1.

Pop-up testing events also will be held through October, with some happening at the Denver Indian Center, Abraham Lincoln High School and the Montbello school campus.

McDonald pointed to the difficulty of under-represented communities getting to the Pepsi Center when many residents do not have access to vehicles or the internet to register online.

“It’s not getting to our most vulnerable populations,” McDonald said. “It’s all about being strategic with the testing resources we have.”

As of Monday afternoon, the Pepsi Center testing site has provided 116,061 COVID-19 tests, DDPHE said. There have been a total of 882,842 COVID-19 tests administered in the state, according to John Hopkins University. 

That means the Pepsi Center has been responsible for more than one in eight COVID-19 tests in Colorado since the pandemic began.

Of the 109 city-affiliated community testing locations opened since mid-May, 6,459 COVID-19 tests have been provided, according to DDPHE. This does not include testing from Denver Public Health, hospitals and urgent cares.

Though Denver will lose some testing capacity, McDonald said he is confident that closing the Pepsi Center testing site will not cause the city to fall below the Center for Disease Control’s recommended testing levels.

“We’re gonna monitor our testing numbers very closely,” McDonald said. “We’ll adjust accordingly if we need to.”

Denver’s initial announcement of the Pepsi Center testing site closure asked those who are able to seek testing from their own doctors instead of testing sites.

The Pepsi Center testing site has been operating at a reduced capacity since Sept. 13, going from the original eight lanes of service to four. All lanes will be closed after 4 p.m. Wednesday.

Current Denver testing sites and schedules for new sites are available at denvergov.org.