Salt Lake City: Official Development News Thread - Part 5

[Rileybo]

Neat ideas about water all around I guess, but as was stated by someone else a page or two back, it requires political action for anything to manifest and sadly the motivation isn’t there.

The problems are solvable. Will they be solved?

[wrendog]

Comparison of skyline from 2013 to 2024. Astra looks great from this angle. Pretty big difference actually. From Reddit:

[Orlando]

/\/\/\ Thanks for sharing! I love that picture comparison

[Always Sunny in SLC]

Originally Posted by Nebula3lem123

I think the point is that a potential pipeline would allow even more economic activity, be it through tourism of the lake, better snow allowing better skiing, supporting a much higher population, and sustaining agriculture that actually contributes heavily to the gdp. I think a pipeline would be great as well, but it's definitely a far-future thing.

Correct. The idea would be to pump sea water to the GSL which creates a lot of valuable land and therefore tax revenue. It would become, if done well, an national destination during the summer time. It would have the aesthetic of something like Channel/Catalina Island(s). Dry, but with managed beaches/sand, could be very nice to be on Antelope or Stansbury. The cities could then desalinate water or just capture more of what comes out of the Wasatch.

This would be energy intensive (until new materials like graphene replaces the current polymers) and only sustainable with solar/wind for example. I am a believer that we are entering an age of super cheap energy and with solar there will be excess that can be sold at very low cost for those that can accept intermittent power. A pipeline can run at variable flows depending on power availability.

This isn't just a Utah project. I would envision a pipeline that runs up I-15 and/or across I-80/70 and then state(s) such as TX, NM, UT, CO, NV, AZ or Southern CA who can pay for spurs to support their populations. This would make it more politically feasible as it cuts across red and blue states. It could free the West from the unpredictability of drought cycles.

There are obviously major potential issues such as possibly enabling explosive sprawl as water accessibility is THE deciding factor whether developers build homes. Also, what to do with the brine waste is not a trivial question.

[Paniolo Man]

Took some pictures around downtown today.

The Citizen Apartments:





Liberty Duet:



The DeWitt:



Worthington:



Restoration of Silverado:

[Paniolo Man]

Brix:

[Comrade]

Spotted on the latest episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm:

[Nebula3lem123]

Originally Posted by wrendog

Comparison of skyline from 2013 to 2024. Astra looks great from this angle. Pretty big difference actually.

Night and day! Even in 2013, downtown looked like a hollowed out city in the 70s. Excited to see what it'll look like in another 10 years.

[Rileybo]

While I’m not a huge fan of glass boxes, the addition of shiny blue towers into the skyline over the last 10 years has helped improve its overall aesthetic.

Seven significant additions since 2013:

-Borg Cube
-111 Main
-95 State
-CCH
-Liberty Sky
-Astra
-Worthington

I like Worthington more than I thought I would.

[Nebula3lem123]

Originally Posted by Rileybo

Seven significant additions since 2013:

-Borg Cube

[delts145]

Thanks, Paniolo Man for the always great updates!!

Originally Posted by Enemy4thePeople

Well, I don't know what I'm talking about but I think the north side is less than 10' from the property line, which means they can't have more than 25% of that face with windows, and if those windows on each side of the tower portion are 8' wide all the way up the building, that would account for almost exactly 25% of that wall. Then subtract the penthouse, and factor in the garage wall square footage and you're more than safely buffered from that maximum. And you get a good amount of shear wall. Also, when building so close to the property line, even next to a one story pawn shop or whatever, you have to consider that another building can be built just as close to your building at some point in the future, so you're not putting windows with a just view of another blank wall within spitting distance.

Could they have designed it differently and stepped it back to get more windows, then use a structural system that wouldn't need so much shear wall, and sacrifice income generating square footages? Yeah, sure. If things were different, things would be different. But that's not what happened, and it's good that we've got a sufficient residential tower built right downtown on a prominent corner.

I don't know. I don't think we're getting a tower by Zaha Hadid or BIG or MVRDV or OMA anytime soon, so I'm fine with it.

Thank you for that explanation Enemy4thePeople. I am a fan of Astra as far as its contribution to the density and skyline of SLC at this point in the city's evolution. But like most, I agree that the north wall needs something. One fairly uncomplicated solution could be to add a large attractive artwork on the blank space, much like we've seen on some of the new mid-rises in Central Ninth or over on the west side of Downtown. Or perhaps something similar to what they do regularly to several large blank exposed walls here in Central and Downtown L.A. Not a billboard exactly but a classy fabric announcement of an upcoming seasonal schedule. On Sunset Blvd. it's often the announcement of a major movie premiere, or downtown they will often celebrate the upcoming symphony, opera, ballet, or theater season. Think something like the large past announcements downtown of the upcoming CCC or during the 2002 Olympics. People seem to enjoy them and they add to the street vibe here in L.A. without being a crass billboard. Also, as much as I like the Hyatt CC it could use something on those blank walls. Tastefully celebrating particular conventions like the O.R. would be welcomed and appreciated.

Downtown Wallscape. Switches out regularly. Some are classier than others but IMO it beats a large empty wall. They add vibrancy, capture pedestrian's whimsy and attention often inducing a smile, and I think are much better than a clunky billboard. On this one much of the time you'll have a major announcement of upcoming events at The Disney or Dorthy Chandler performance halls. They're always very classy and much anticipated.

Here's a permanent artwork on the Korea Town Target at the intersection of Virgil and 6th mixed-use retail/residential. This is a rendering. The actual completed artwork is different and quite beautiful.

.

[Atlas]

New baseball stadium and district renderings just dropped. More on the official website.













This is very cool. Sorry to see your work not come to fruition, Orlando

Edit: found this on Instagram. Not sure where it came from.

[Paniolo Man]

Every time they update the renderings we lose a bit of Gadsby.

[TheGeographer]

Exciting to see the ballpark renderings! Would be awesome to see all this built and maybe one or two taller buildings around the stadium. Overall though if this was all built I’d be happy about it. Now the state just needs to clean up the river and up their annual bar liscence quota to make this dream a reality

[RC14]

Two things I noticed in those renderings: 1.) There are high rises at the intersection of Redwood Road and North Temple in the first image, which I like. Although, I doubt they are actually part of the plan.
2.) I am disappointed that the smoke stacks are no longer visible from the stadium but this also allows for unobstructed mountain views, which is good I guess.

[Orlando]

Originally Posted by Paniolo Man

Every time they update the renderings we lose a bit of Gadsby.

They also have crammed up buildings in front of the Gadsby on the west side of it. We had a lot more public space throughout.

[Orlando]

One component that has been consistent from our competition winning scheme to the masterplan that we did after the competition and to the scheme that is now being shown, is a woonerf through the northern most blocks. If any of you want to pull up the renderings from previous online leaked images, you can see a woonerf threading through them.

[Orlando]

I do like the renderings. We were going to do more higher level renderings like these, but we were cut short by the announcement of the MLB and LHM group. So, we just had to wrap up what we had done as quickly as possible. I wish I could show you what we had done. Maybe sometime later.

[meman]

Thanks Atlas for the great renderings.

I was really excited to hear about this huge new 3 billion dollar development at Redwood road and North temple. Just heard about it today, Will be huge for Salt Lake city!!!!!

[Enemy4thePeople]

Originally Posted by delts145

I am a fan of Astra as far as its contribution to the density and skyline of SLC at this point in the city's evolution. But like most, I agree that the north wall needs something. One fairly uncomplicated solution could be to add a large attractive artwork on the blank space, much like we've seen on some of the new mid-rises in Central Ninth or over on the west side of Downtown. Or perhaps something similar to what they do regularly to several large blank exposed walls here in Central and Downtown L.A. Not a billboard exactly but a classy fabric announcement of an upcoming seasonal schedule.

I think a mural would be great. I'm all for murals. Something swapped out seasonally or for events might be tough given the height, but if they've figured it out in LA, they can probably figure it out here. Maybe they can figure out how to project art onto it without giving them free reign to sell it as ad space.