Salt Lake City: Official Development News Thread - Part 5

[Orlando]

Originally Posted by tchild2

You figured? I have a family and grew up in Utah County, where the hell else ought I to live?

Sorry. That might have been a little too finger pointing, but I guessed based on your attitude in your original response, which came across as very conciliatory of the current sprawl mindset. It was like, "it's just how it is.. excuse, excuse, excuse". I mean it's quite typical and quite apathetical of many residents along the Wasatch Front. My sister lives in Tooele and commutes to work in Murray. I would tell her that is really stupid and irresponsible, but then that wouldn't go too well with her, I'm sure. My brother lives about 45 minutes or more from downtown Saint Louis on the furthest outskirts of the metro area. I love both of them, but them and their spouses are the same mindset that you you somewhat seem to be in along with many others along the Wasatch Front. It's irresponsible land-use development that's allowed in the U.S. because people complain that it infringes on their personal freedoms if the government has more say or control over land-use and urban planning. Thus the U.S. is super irresponsible in their development patterns, consumerism, energy consumption, and pollution habits.

Originally Posted by tchild2

Actually, I lived in Orem and now Lindon while most of Lehi was just farmland. My payroll company chose Lehi because it offered a central location between Utah and SL counties for our clients. Downtown, no matter how ideal a notion to pack all business into a central downtown core, would not have been a good fit for our workers or clients.

This is part of the problem in itself. Many employers have followed the Thanksgiving Point development lead and developed there instead of in existing metro centers or nodes, like downtown Provo, downtown SLC, or even downtown West Valley City, or downtown Sandy. This has exacerbated sprawl bigtime. I think Lehi still offers a valuable node, but it has become more important than the existing downtowns, and the planning is horrendous. The south end of the Salt Lake Valley and northern Utah Valley has been all stand-alone office or apartment developments, with a sea of parking around them. It has pulled away vital energy and vitality from the existing urban cores and it is completely car-centric, environmentally irresponsible, and so ignorant of good urban planning. Northern Utah people come across not as being smart and future thinkers, but backwards conservatives, when it comes to urban planning and responsible and smart development. Also, why do you think the Utah tech scene is having a problem attracting much needed new talent? Many of those relocating from out-of-state would prefer to be in Salt Lake City where there is more of an urban vibe, connectivity, eateries, & bars.

Originally Posted by tchild2

Well, 95% of US cities resemble the growth and sprawl of SLC than they do Seattle and Portland. Then again, we don't have anarchists taking over our cities either. Btw, my father lived in Seattle for twenty years. City is fantastic if you can afford to live in the "walkable" older areas. Otherwise, the traffic in Seattle, cars, and congestion is much worse than SLC.

That's like saying "Well, if the rest of the US is developing poorly and sprawlish like, then it's okay, right?" We can do much better. SLC and northern Utah is doing much better than other metros their size with transportation, but unfortunately most of the mid-sized to smaller metros are doing poorly in this regard, except for a few like Portland. Btw, the congestion is bad if you live way out there and drive to work in Seattle. That's why they have discouraged freeway expansions, but have expanded their commuter rail and light rail. I take the bus, and it is very efficient. I live about 25 minutes out from downtown, but I take the bus and I don't have to deal with parking, gas, traffic, etc. I get it about the affordability issue, but that's also because of the high-salary tech companies in the Seattle area and also by foreign real-estate investors.

Originally Posted by tchild2

Can't go back Orlando, we can only go forward. The best we can do now is try make the sprawltopia of Utah denser and more urban...which is what I think planners are trying to do. Light rail has gone in, higher density housing is going in around the light rail nodes. It will take time. I have never, not even remotely liked or agreed with the car-centric and sprawl planning, but here it is and what can we do?

I appreciate what you are saying, but there needs to be big attitude change along the Wasatch Front, in general. There needs to be more reinforcement of prioritizing our existing urban cores over sprawl development, which is what the vast majority of office development is being developed like. Their needs to be better education to the citizens and the government officials, and especially the real-estate & development people along the Wasatch Front. We saw that article about 6 months ago or so, where a new developer or company would come in to town, because they hear Salt Lake's market is hot. They want to go downtown, but they see the blight, and parking lots, and the local real-estate developers are apathetic, and they tell them to go down south and get a lease in a stand-alone office building. Awful. There needs to be a greater vision and understanding sold to those real-estate agents and developers. There's a lack of confidence or vision of what a vibrant urban core could be in SLC. The demand is there for the tech companies to locate in downtown or other existing urban nodes and be more connected pedestrian wise and otherwise. Many tech workers live in SLC but commute to Lehi. New apartments popping up in SLC are leased out before construction has even started.

Utah and their officials need to create an urban growth boundary or constraints to thwart irreponsible land development. The worst example of what is happening is Eagle Mountain. That is the biggest example of "leap-frog development". Perhaps a gas tax would work to pay for all the infrastructure needed but then the ignorant people would complain. Someone one here said that people are educated about sprawl, etc., but really? Then why are they doing it and why are the government leaders and developers, etc. going full throttle on it? If they truly were educated about it, they would change their habits.

[Hatman]

Orlando, no offense, but your comment reminds me of this:


Urban planning must be tough. It isn't like engineering or science or mathematics where there is an obvious right answer you can reach through calculation. Instead, you've got people acting in their own self interests, and trying to force them into the logical ideal is like herding cats...... But really, is it right to force a lifestyle on a person? I live in Liberty Wells, and I have a lawn. I used to despise lawns for being wasted space and wastes of water. But I like playing with my little kiddos on the grass, so I spend the time and money (and water) to care for it.
Is it wrong to have a lawn... or two... in a desert? Economics certainly doesn't think so. I pay a pittance for the water it takes to water it. So the real question is - should water be so cheap? Is it cheap because of a subsidy, or are we paying for the true cost? If the cost of water is subsidized, let's reexamine the subsidy and why it exists. If no subsidy exists, then it isn't a problem; people ought to be free to spend money how they see fit.

I've changed my tune in recent years. I don't think Sprawlysprawl is inherently a bad thing. People need homes, and the market is only responding to what people are willing to pay. If commuting and traffic jams are an issue, we can add bus lines and transit services, which are awesome. Nothing is quite so urban as people of all kinds sharing the same space together on a bus or train. As time goes on and as space becomes scares, housing developments become more dense. It is rare to have farm fields become apartment buildings (despite what we see happening in Utah County), but it is relatively common for old homes or commercial buildings knocked down and replaced by bigger buildings. Sustainable cities grow up, they don't pop up.

So tchild2, I think your views are valuable, and I hope you stay on the Forum. And Orlando, I love your renders of towers downtown. I hope you keep posting them - they make the forum awesome.

[Utah_Dave]

You feeling ok Hatman?

[bob rulz]

I'm with you Orlando. And I understand your point Hatman, about how we can't force people how to live and that it's not bad for people to have their own house and their own lawn. But we swing far too much in the direction of bad urban development. If you build an inefficient, environmentally destructive, sprawling suburb and put bus lines through it...it's still an inefficient, environmentally destructive, sprawling suburb.

Somehow Europe manages to do just fine with far more compact development. They still have suburbs and yes, they even have sprawl, but even their sprawl is far more compact and accessible than ours is.

[Hatman]

Originally Posted by Utah_Dave

You feeling ok Hatman?

I guess my point was incomplete.

I've spent a lot of time on my bike rides this year watching old houses get demolished to make way for apartments - and it seems pretty obvious to me that in another ~80 years all the new wood-and-stucco houses that look so new and shiny now will also be in pretty shabby shape, and will be getting cleared away for something new. The huge garages in front will look very silly in an age where cars are autonomous and no longer social status symbols. We really don't build much in this country that is intended to last. From the perspective of one life time it may look pretty permanent, but as time goes on, the trend toward density will be unstoppable.
Build like the Romans - a first draft in wood, a second draft in brick a century later, and finally the real thing in marble, concrete, or stone.

As to the point about Europe, they have developed differently for many socio-cultural reasons, but also because they are doing exactly what I said about economic incentives: driving in Europe costs a lot of money - so much that trains and buses are *more* economically viable.
Example:


meanwhile, here in Utah, nearly a third of our road subsidies are pulled from income tax revenue - meaning that drivers and non-drivers alike pay 1/3 the cost of a driver's commute (compared to a transit rider, who's commute is subsidized about 90%+ by non-transit riders, but I digress).

We could do something similar here. My dream is that instead of the government providing different levels of funding to different modes of transportation, that they would create a 'funding by receipt' style subsidy. If a road carried X amount or people between points A and B (A and B have value based on a land-value tax, which is a different but highly relevant topic to this thread), in Y amount of time, then that road is funded to the degree of Z. If a train carries the same number of passengers between the same points in the same amount of time, it gets exactly the same amount of subsidy.
Basically, it makes the funding mode-agnostic, which is something that's never existed before. Something little like that would drastically change our land-use patterns, and it would do so without heavy-handed politics.

Another point - when people freak out about the suburbs growing on to the ends of the earth, it is because they are projecting current trends at current rates into the future. I do not believe current trends are sustainable, and so I do not think they will continue for long. I also think things like autonomous robo-buses and robo-taxis will drastically change the equation. Imagine no more parking downtown, and all existing lots filled with towers. Imagine no more traffic jams to get downtown. Imagine buses that come on demand, with wait times of less than 5 minutes. Imagine train service so frequent that waiting for your train is like waiting for an elevator to arrive. When this level of service is achievable - either sometime late in this decade or early in the next, depending on the mode - it will completely change the desirability of the city and the suburbs. I can't imagine that many office parks on the side of the freeway will survive as-is. I hope they can be converted to housing.

TL;DR, my point is that I don't think there is any point in taking sides in this urban vs suburban debate, because 1) the current trends are about to change significantly, and 2) people will still chose urban and suburban based on their own quality-of-life metrics, and the only moral way to help influence that decision is to put a fair price on the thing being consumed. The future of planning and legislation is not banning things outright - it is placing an appropriate tax on the unsustainable thing, be it land, transportation, or fuel use vs clean air.

Anyway, I've rambled too long, and I don't really belong on this thread anyway. so, uh.... Look at this picture I took from City Creek a few weeks ago!

[Stenar]

Originally Posted by Hatman

...
meanwhile, here in Utah, nearly a third of our road subsidies are pulled from income tax revenue - meaning that drivers and non-drivers alike pay 1/3 the cost of a driver's commute (compared to a transit rider, who's commute is subsidized about 90%+ by non-transit riders, but I digress).

This doesn't account for oil/gasoline subsidies. If U.S. gasoline wasn't subsidized, it would also be $6/hour. Make people pay the full cost of their own gas and those long commutes won't look so attractive.

[bob rulz]

I agree with your idea of how to tax things hatman. But I disagree with
"I don't think the suburban sprawl patterns will be sustainable for much longer so it will eventually stop" statement, because it's already unsustainable and it's not stopping. Something not being sustainable, unfortunately, is not really a reason for that thing to stop in the way our society is structured. I also think that the autonomous vehicle future is a lot further away than people think, and your ideas of buses that come every 5 minutes and trains so frequent you barely ever have to wait sounds nice, but in reality, I have a hard time imagining that will actually happen.

Also, I call your picture and raise my own that I took today. Looks like the pedestrian tunnel under State Street is actually getting pretty close:


Can't really see it too well in the picture, but the escalators down into the tunnel look to be essentially complete.

[Hatman]

Originally Posted by Stenar

This doesn't account for oil/gasoline subsidies. If U.S. gasoline wasn't subsidized, it would also be $6/hour. Make people pay the full cost of their own gas and those long commutes won't look so attractive.

Exactly.

Or they'll just buy electric cars and still commute across the state. It solves half the problem, at least.

[Hatman]

Originally Posted by bob rulz

I call your picture and raise my own

Neat. I remember reading an old schedule saying they wanted to have that tunnel open for the holiday crowds of 2020. I guess they'll get some extra time to wrap that up.

I'll keep the chain going. Here's a sunset over the library a couple days back:

[locolife]

Originally Posted by Orlando

Utah and their officials need to create an urban growth boundary or constraints to thwart irreponsible land development.

I don't see it happening in our lifetimes. You're comparing one of the most conservative regions in the country against one of the most liberal places and suggesting that an ultra liberal policy from Seattle or Portland would be supported in the Salt Lake area.

Further, establishing such a policy is basically asking the dominant LDS base to vote against a foundational piece of their lifestyle. The typical suburban sprawl neighborhood is quintessential LDS life.

[mattreedah]

Originally Posted by locolife

I don't see it happening in our lifetimes. You're comparing one of the most conservative regions in the country against one of the most liberal places and suggesting that an ultra liberal policy from Seattle or Portland would be supported in the Salt Lake area.

Further, establishing such a policy is basically asking the dominant LDS base to vote against a foundational piece of their lifestyle. The typical suburban sprawl neighborhood is quintessential LDS life.

I'm beginning to wonder if some of you have ever actually been to Portland, Seattle or any of the other places you hold up as beacons of progressive living. I'm going to level with you all. If you get away from the 1 mile downtown radius there are suburbs and cars and highways and churches and even some Republicans.

From SLC Punk, "[SLC] It's like any other place...people, houses, roads, cars. What else do you think is out there?

- Freedom.

- Yeah.

Freedom. It's not out there."

[Rileybo]

I’ve said my pieces on places like Portland, but yeah y’all... this is a nation wide trend going on. Salt Lake is usually just as bad as other cities.

[||acres||]

Originally Posted by bob rulz

Can't really see it too well in the picture, but the escalators down into the tunnel look to be essentially complete.

Does anybody know if this building is going to be used for anything other than the entrance to the underground pedestrian tunnel? The old one had a shitty museum

[ThePusherMan]

The Social Hall "Museum" always made me laugh. They know that's just what bars are right?

[tchild2]

Originally Posted by Hatman

. Sustainable cities grow up, they don't pop up.

So tchild2, I think your views are valuable, and I hope you stay on the Forum. And Orlando, I love your renders of towers downtown. I hope you keep posting them - they make the forum awesome.

Thanks, I have been here for years, mostly just reading up on highrise developments in SLC and elswhere.

I think everything I meant to say was this; "Sustainable cities grow up, they don't pop up." Utah is growing up and changing.

Besides, with EV's on the horizon, what will it matter? We will be in self driving cars and everything carbon neutral. We can all spread out with our own 5 acre lots.

[bob rulz]

I'm sure that was partially tongue-in-cheek, but I still want an urban living lifestyle, even if that fully autonomous future really does come as soon as people are saying - still very very skeptical that will happen in the next 20 or even 30 years.

Also, we've got to get renewable energy to power those EVs before we can be carbon neutral.

[Hatman]

When the technology is available, and when it is widespread are two different things. I think the technology will be available much sooner than people realize. Granted, I've thought this for a very long time and have been wrong about it for just as long - but for thanksgiving travels (despite Covid, I know, I know...) my Model 3 did all the freeway driving on its own, without any interventions. There are plenty of videos out there showing the new Full Self Driving software package (rumored to be released to all FSD customers this December, but probably sometime Q1 2021) working in all kinds of real-world situations. If you haven't seen any yet, I highly recommend you get on YouTube and search "Tesla FSD demo". I've wasted many good hours watching other people watch their car drive around. I mean, what else is there to do with my time?

But availability doesn't mean the world changes in an instant. Heck, there are still people who don't have smart phones. It will take many decades to convert all cars to electric/autonomous ones, but that doesn't mean things won't move quickly in other regards.
For example, parking requirements for new developments downtown can be removed entirely. Once the writing is on the wall that parking is going to be just as useful as hitching posts for horses, why even bother constructing parking garages? That will save huge amounts of land and construction costs, and will make living downtown cheaper. Small little changes like this will add up over time, and will make the city naturally more attractive to people and businesses, and a smart city will be proactive in getting these changes started.

[locolife]

Originally Posted by mattreedah

I'm beginning to wonder if some of you have ever actually been to Portland, Seattle or any of the other places you hold up as beacons of progressive living. I'm going to level with you all. If you get away from the 1 mile downtown radius there are suburbs and cars and highways and churches and even some Republicans.

From SLC Punk, "[SLC] It's like any other place...people, houses, roads, cars. What else do you think is out there?

- Freedom.

- Yeah.

Freedom. It's not out there."

I dig the SLC Punk quote, great movie I watched repeatedly as a kid.

I've traveled to Seattle extensively, my last job had me there 3-4x a year for over 6 years. My point is on if Utah would support an urban growth boundary, the mindset of voters who control something like that going into place just isnt there. Utah is home of the now famous anti-clean air rallies.... these folks are not supporting progressive ideology.

[RC14]

A couple pictures I took this morning:

Seven 02:


650 S Main:


Will there be a tower crane erected on this site at some point?

[Atlas]

95 State's core seems to be topped out. I think the roof structure will add another ~38.5 ft on top of that.





Also, I was looking through loopnet and saw these interesting parcels for sale among others:

• Former Sizzler at Sugar House Park (under contract): https://www.loopnet.com/Listing/2111...y-UT/19693977/
• Weird Building on 200 S and 200E (D-1 zoning): https://www.loopnet.com/Listing/205-...y-UT/21469990/ (is the Block 200 project dead?)
• Motel 6 site across from RL Hotel (D-1 zoning): https://www.loopnet.com/Listing/176-...y-UT/21529830/
• More land in Sugar House: https://www.loopnet.com/Listing/1121...y-UT/20847368/

That Sizzler site in particular is a prime spot and could be turned into something really fantastic with the right vision and developer. Here's a fun idea: a mixed-use building with rooftop amphitheater facing the Wasatch (like this one in Denver). In any case, I hope we get something nice architecturally that takes advantage of the corner and not another suburban CVS.