Quote:
Originally Posted by Nexis4Jersey
How many TOD projects are underway in the SLC metro?
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Nexis4Jersey, That's a good question, and I imagine there are those who are keeping track. Hopefully, someone will answer your question statistically. In general, there are so many, you probably could at least say dozens in various stages of planning, or actual physical stages of construction. Salt Lake City Metro has been booming, even in this depressed economy. Home prices are once again climbing, and while condominium construction is still depressed, apartment construction, especially around transit is booming. Heavy Commuter Rail, Light Rail, Street Car and BRT have gone from being a bit of a pipe dream fifteen years ago, to being a wave of necessity today. Even the most starry eyed urbanistas would never have imagined that Metro SLC and it's citizens and town councils would have embraced all of these modes so quickly and fully. There really is a mentality 'that if you build it they will come'. If a metro town has a transit line in their boundaries, they are jumping on station construction and TOD development. Some, such as Downtown's massive City Creek Center(pictured below) and Gateway Center are far along in the process of their development phases. Many have a retail and office component, but have not entered planned phases of residential yet. Some are simply a newly completed station, with a parking lot in the middle of a field. Of course, these have detailed plans for village centers, and we'll just have to see what they'll all look like in ten years. If the economy gets back on the right footing soon, and the next ten years look anything like the last ten, Salt Lake City Metro will be an urban planner's Mecca.
The article below gives us an idea of what the plans are. While the plans may seem very hopeful, it is interesting to note that all the lofty plans relating to population and transit growth have been exceeded substancially over these past fifteen years.
Lee Davidson - The Salt Lake Tribune
http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/news/53969793-78/temple-north-airport-station.html.csp
Regarding the new North Temple Line to the Airport
"The last big push will be this spring and summer," said Jim Webb, project manager for the Utah Transit Authority, noting the project is 80 percent complete. "We will probably be substantially complete in the fall of this year."
That will be followed by an estimated six months of system testing with trains on the track. The line is expected to open for passengers sometime in early 2013 —which is actually years ahead of the original projected completion date of 2015...
...Officials also see it as the start of a bright future, believing that the new line can help the surrounding North Temple corridor to become perhaps a national model for redevelopment...
...In March, the city and UTA held a conference to tell area businesses and residents how they hope the new line will turn the North Temple area into a forerunner of what they hope to see throughout the Wasatch Front during the next 30 years. They are eyeing transit projects to handle an expected 67 percent growth in population.
They hope a third of the regional population will cluster in new high-density town centers built around transit stations, including along North Temple. Many buildings would have businesses on the first floor, offices on the second and residences above that. They city has changed zoning ordinances to allow that...
Rick Egan, The Salt Lake Tribune
TOD - The City Creek Center
The City Creek Center is massive already, even though it just opened a couple of months ago, and this is really only it's 1st phase. It is surrounded on the north and dissected through the middle by Light Rail.
By Photo Dean @ http://www.flickr.com/photos/2120243...n/photostream/
http://instagrid.me/tag/citycreekcenter/
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