Salt Lake City | Transit and Airport Developments

[Jasonhouse]

Originally Posted by TonyAnderson

That is a cool pic. What's cooler is there's three new towers in that same view as of now.

Well, then shame on you SLC guys for not getting out there and snapping an updated pic for the forum!

[TonyAnderson]

Well Salt Lake is next in my get to know Utah series I have a pic from there but it's not as cool as that one with the light-rail timing.

[TonyAnderson]

Ok fine, here's one I have just a notch closer from where that pic was taken. You can see one is completed (blue/green glass building on the left), one is obviously rising, and since this pic is a couple months old, you can't really see the third one (Unless you know where to look. It's the pink/orange color just sticking out in front of the building under construction) but it's risen about 10 more floors since now and could currently be seen from here.




Compare:

[Jasonhouse]

It seems like those three will combine with existing nearby towers to make a distinct central core. Or a focal point in other words.

[marcusb]

Originally Posted by fflint

Pics or it's not true!

fflint-

You can see plenty of pics of the new towers under construction on this thread:

http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/showthread.php?t=174928

[eternallyme]

Originally Posted by agassiz904

Because the vast majority of people will never take transit. And with how the area is growing they need the capacity.

Even most European cities of that size only have a transit mode share of about 15-25% of the commuting traffic. No metropolitan area in North America in that population range (1 million to 2.5 million people) has more than 15%.

[BrandonJXN]

Can someone explain SLC's street numbering system? I'm confused as hell when I read a map of SLC and see a lot of 200 South, 300 East, 400 South and so on and so fourth.

[marcusb]

Originally Posted by ThreeHundred

Can someone explain SLC's street numbering system? I'm confused as hell when I read a map of SLC and see a lot of 200 South, 300 East, 400 South and so on and so fourth.

It is like a x-y coorindate plane, just instead of a horizontal scale that goes from -x to 0 to +x you have roads that go from some west like 2000 West to Main Street to some east like 2000 East. Instead of a y scale that goes from -y to 0 to +y you have roads that go from some south like 2000 South to Center Street to 2000 North.

As far as addresses work it is again like a x,y coordinates. So say I lived on 200 North half way between the 600 East and 500 East then my address would be 550 East 200 North.

Of course some roads have other names like in salt lake city instead of Center Street there is South Temple. Most all cities in utah have their own numbering system, but in Salt Lake County in seems they just keep all the same numbering through the county so the numbers just gets really big.

It is all a little confusing at first, but it makes it a whole lot easier to find somewhere when all you have is an address

[jtown,man]

Salt Lake City pisses every liberal big city kids from the east coast and west. They are mad that such a religious and conservative city could have such a nice new LR and commuter rail. BUT what their mainly pissed about....is that you guys are building fast as hell AND within budget(something the Democrats who control EVERY large American city knows nothing about).

Not trying to start anything, I'm just impressed as hell at SLC.

[Okstate]

^ I have heard that SLC is very liberal & the suburbs are conservative. Is that wrong?

[John Martin]

Originally Posted by Okstate

^ I have heard that SLC is very liberal & the suburbs are conservative. Is that wrong?

That's true, Salt Lake City proper is quite liberal, and most of the surrounding area is conservative. Many of the projects involve much more than just Salt Lake City though, the light-rail does go through plenty of conservative areas (with major expansions in those areas underway) and much of the downtown construction is funded by a "conservative" organization, so it's not necessarily a liberal/conservative situation

[Okstate]

And considering as you say much of the downtown construction is funded by a "conservative" organization...doesn't that explain partially why these projects are within budget?

[Jasonhouse]

^lol

let's get back to the topic.

[Okstate]

^ I think back on track would have been better!

[WilliamTheArtist]

I liked that SLC was a conservative area AND were doing commuter and Light rail successfully. You mention rail here (Tulsa Oklahoma very conservative area) and its seen as part of some "Liberal Agenda" bunch of liberals trying to tell us what to do and make us live like they want and destroy our conservative way of life, use taxes for social engineering, etc. But with SLC doing rail, I can point to them and say "Look, this conservative place is doing rail and its working for them,,, here are some good economic and "conservative" reasons why it can work here as well...". Rail isnt just some liberal, socialist plot lol.

[eternallyme]

Originally Posted by WilliamTheArtist

I liked that SLC was a conservative area AND were doing commuter and Light rail successfully. You mention rail here (Tulsa Oklahoma very conservative area) and its seen as part of some "Liberal Agenda" bunch of liberals trying to tell us what to do and make us live like they want and destroy our conservative way of life, use taxes for social engineering, etc. But with SLC doing rail, I can point to them and say "Look, this conservative place is doing rail and its working for them,,, here are some good economic and "conservative" reasons why it can work here as well...". Rail isnt just some liberal, socialist plot lol.

What are the densities like in Tulsa? I know your transit system is one of the worst in America, wasn't sure if it was political or based on low densities...

Salt Lake City is constrained by geography so it pretty much has to develop at higher densities...

[delts145]

Originally Posted by WilliamTheArtist

I liked that SLC was a conservative area AND were doing commuter and Light rail successfully. You mention rail here (Tulsa Oklahoma very conservative area) and its seen as part of some "Liberal Agenda" bunch of liberals trying to tell us what to do and make us live like they want and destroy our conservative way of life, use taxes for social engineering, etc. But with SLC doing rail, I can point to them and say "Look, this conservative place is doing rail and its working for them,,, here are some good economic and "conservative" reasons why it can work here as well...". Rail isnt just some liberal, socialist plot lol.

I tend to agree with your line of thinking William, it makes allot of 'common sense'. I think that as Salt Lake City proper and it's more conservative suburbs come online with these many projects over the next few years, people such as yourself will have some solid proof to point to and visit for ideas. Our political leaders have been open minded enough, no matter what their leanings, to realize that attractive mass transit is good for growth and prosperity. There have been many visits by the local political decision makers to Portland and dozens of European cities. One size does not fit all, but there are always ways to duplicate specific succeses at our respective cities. Hopefully, cities such as Tulsa, Oklahoma City etc. will realize that they can have both the option of a pleasant suburbia, combined with an array of denser urban villages, and attractive urban-transit choices for it's citizens.

Now, if we can just get our local developers to start building some Devon Energy style towers. Allot of incredible things happening downtown here, but we're also wishing for a few new tallests to break that glass ceiling, LOL.

[delts145]

Originally Posted by esirhgih

A few things from UTA's youtube channel:

First, testing of the new 500 mph service on FrontRunner north
• Video Link

• Video Link

Also, starting at about 1:50 in this video update for the mid-jordan line, they say that the sections of track around Daybreak should now be complete and that testing on those sections with the new Siemens cars should begin in "early 2010", so we should be able to see them soon:
• Video Link

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[TonyAnderson]

Originally Posted by ThreeHundred

Can someone explain SLC's street numbering system? I'm confused as hell when I read a map of SLC and see a lot of 200 South, 300 East, 400 South and so on and so fourth.

Yeah it's actually really, really simple. Every block is 100 'units'. So if you're on 100 West and go 1 block west you'd be on 200 West. Rinse and repeat.

[delts145]

Originally Posted by arkhitektor

New LRT Vehicles:



The new trains are expected to arrive by the end of the month and they will be tested along the Daybreak portion of the track, which is completed.

Originally Posted by stayinginformed

Those new light rail trains look really nice. It is unfortunate that they will only be running on new portions of the track. Does anyone know if there are plans in the future to change the layout of the TRAX stations (ie wheelchair ramps) so that they will eventually run on the older portions in the future?

Originally Posted by John Martin

I'm pretty sure they are going to be used on existing track. I don't see how UTA could possible order that many of them just for the new lines. They're low-floor cars, so the wheelchair ramps will no longer be necessary.

Where did you get those, arkhitektor?

Originally Posted by TonyAnderson

I assume they're going to decorate the exterior?

Originally Posted by arkhitektor

Yeah, they were still on the assembly line in California in the picture I posted above and have yet to be painted in the UTA livery:


The picture was from Daybreak's facebook page. (facebook.com/Daybreakutah)
We should be able to see them testing in Daybreak by the end of the month.

The new cars will have to run through the existing stations as at least the Mid-Jordan line will continue up the existing track to downtown. No modification is needed to make the existing platforms compatible, the current wheelchair ramps will just not be needed anymore.

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