I'm all for the redevelopment of that site. There are any number of options that would be far more attractive than what's there now. With the LDS Church involved, whatever will be built should be high quality and reasonably attractive. Any good guesses as to what might be going up?
I like the look of Salt Lake's skyline, especially from particular vantage points. The rub is that as someone correctly pointed out recently, "they would all be so much better looking if they were a lot taller." That's true, but imagine if in this pic The WTC, Westgate, 99 West, The Regent, Chase, 222, as well as adding in Hyatt, Astra, and Wells Fargo and they were all twice as tall. Maybe we should play a longer game here, that really is now much shorter than past history would suggest. Salt Lake is now on the cusp of some dramatic moves that I predict will involve breaking the glass ceiling heights on the skyline. Salt Lake's development timelines have shortened significantly over the past 20-plus years, even during some pretty rough economic times nationally. The upcoming Olympics and its runup of the next ten years will focus a great deal of attention on downtown. Salt Lake City and its greater Metro are already receiving an ever-growing, endless parade of praise from national and international publications and talking heads. The first Olympics helped to expose a huge audience nationally and internationally to the Wasatch Front's and greater Utah's stunning scenery and accessibility. The day will come soon when we'll look at the 300' and 400-footers as an attractive street-level presence complementing the 500'-700' new tallest's.
Who wants to take on an update of this once very popular photo? No doubt TRAX must be included, climbing the bench along with the current skyline in the background. Actually, this was the second generation of the original, which had some very cool special photo-shopping effects added to it. Comrade or anyone who might have a copy of that original please post it.
Meanwhile, it would be so cool if on one of Salt Lake's glorious bluebird springtime days someone anyone would update this pic. Paniolo Man, I know you're tempted, but perhaps we should give you a break for once. J/K, have at it!
Photo provided by Wikipedia Commons
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