Salt Lake:Official development news thread

[urbanboy]

[delts145]

Steve, If you ask me those were some very nice pics, especially from a phone camera? I like the just before dusk lighting on your pics, very nice. Anxious to see this Natural History Museum project underway. It seems like half the people love it and half hate it. I like it, though I'm more of a fan of the Huntsman Inst. design.


by Stevena07

Polshek Partnership Architects






.

[arkhitektor]

I noticed from TRAX on my way to work this morning that the Simantov Oriental Rug company on Main Street is closing after 30 years at that location.

So that leaves what, like 7 actual businesses operating on Main St. between S. Temple and 400 S.?

On a somewhat related note, my wife and I were in DT Ogden Saturday night. There was a lot going on on 25th St. there are tons of restaraunts and bars open and the whole area felt surprisingly alive. Its sad to see Salt Lake losing even more of its retail presence on Main Street. Thanks Gateway!

[delts145]

All the more reason for an additional emphasis of residential on Main. In order for retail to flourish along all of Main as it will undoubtedly at the north end, when CCC is finished, we need more highrise residential to be put in place between 2nd and 6th South, State and West Temple.

[SLC Projects]

Originally Posted by delts145

All the more reason for an additional emphasis of residential on Main. In order for retail to flourish along all of Main as it will undoubtedly at the north end, when CCC is finished, we need more highrise residential to be put in place between 2nd and 6th South, State and West Temple.

I agree. Once CCC opens, downtown gets the broadway theater, once the retail space opens for 222 South Main and the trib. Building becomes a Condo building. Live will return to main street.

[SLC Projects]

Originally Posted by SLC Projects

I agree. Once CCC opens, downtown gets the broadway theater, once the retail space opens for 222 South Main and the trib. Building becomes a Condo building. Life will return to main street.

I meant to put life not live. But for some reason the Edit button isn't working.

Oh well you guys know what I meant.

[LivingInExile]

I think Salt Lake City is going to be the next big destination to move, like Atlanta, Phoenix, Las Vegas, and Charlotte. Hopefully more high-rises though.

[delts145]

I agree with you LivingInExile, although it's been in the top five growing metro's/States for some time now. In 2007 it was in the top three. It will be interesting to see where everthing shakes out with the economy going through this huge transformation. I'm still saying that as with the airline industry, the current shakeup in the world economy will end up pushing Salt Lake City Metro even more toward the top. Salt Lake Metro is rapidly becoming one of the premier places to watch and to move, or expand a company to and do business. The latest yearly GDP growth figures just released, had Salt Lake Metro at the #1 position in the nation. The pace was not only in the positive unlike many areas, but double to five times that of many surrounding states.

[arkhitektor]

Here's something I noticed downtown the other day:

I was on my way to S.L. Central Station on TRAX and had needed to find a restroom. I was going to be early getting onto FrontRunner, so I decided to get off TRAX at Gallivan Plaza, find somewhere to go to the bathroom, then get on the next TRAX train 15 min. later and still make my FrontRunner connection.

Anyway, I tried the Wells Fargo bldg., One Utah, Walker Center, US Bank, Sam Weller's, Hotel Monaco, Scottish Imports, Rite Aid, Subway, Gateway West, Zions Bank, and none of them had public restrooms. I nearly wet my pants before I found a bathroom I could use in the South Visitor's center on Temple Square.

Am I crazy or does it seem like some of these places on Main St. could have a public bathroom? Do they have problems with security and homeless folk or something?

[cololi]

Yes and yes. Public bathrooms often have security issues. It kills me that a lot of the businesses don't see the negative perception of being unfriendly that they create by not letting the public use their restroom.

Of course, I would just go in to Sam Wellers, look around, then find the bathroom and use it.

The population of SLC is not big enough to support the amount of retail that we have downtown. More people is absolutely what we need. The problem is that the market for urban living in Utah is still small, but it is growing. As it grows, we will see more people wanting to live in an urban setting. I do not see huge impacts from CCC in terms of adding street life to main. The malls demonstrated that inward oriented enclosed malls do not work in an urban setting. While CCC is not as inward oriented, it is still primarily inward oriented, similar to how Gateway is inward oriented. The residential component will help, but I suspect that the majority of the condos are going to be second homes with part time residents so their impact will be minimized. Even though CCC will have less retail square footage than Crossroads and ZCMI did, given the population, it will be difficult for retail to establish itself on southern main.

[wrendog]

They should put a bunch of these downtown:

[SLC Projects]

No public Restrooms!!!

[urbanboy]

When the improvements at Gallivan Plaza are completed, you will only need to walk this far:

[arkhitektor]

I don't know how to articulate this well, but it seems like retailers prefer locations like the Gateway or suburban strip malls because there is a single managenemt company that owns or controls the whole area. As a retailer you benefit from the stability that this brings and the whole development can be managed and marketed in the aggregate. The businesses in the area attract customers for each other. As a retailer opening a store, you know that there is already going to be a customer base and there is less risk involved. I think that this is one of the reasons that Gateway is so sucessful, becuase Boyer runs the show there and it is a safer bet for new entrants to the market.

It seems like there would be a market for a large management company to take control over say, all of the random retail spaces on Main street between 100 South and 200 South and manage them all like a little strip mall along the street.

Maybe this doesn't make any sense at all but to me it seems that there is so much vacant retail space and each owner or property manager is trying to lease one storefront at a time, but they are all still empty. If they somehow combined efforts to market themselves, they would be more attractive for new businesses, especially franchises and national chains who probably just look over Main street because it is so much easier to open at the Gateway instead.

[urbanboy]

That's a great idea: a Main Street Businesses Coalition!

Isn't there already something like this in existence?

[arkhitektor]

Originally Posted by cololi

The population of SLC is not big enough to support the amount of retail that we have downtown. More people is absolutely what we need.

I wonder what percentage of shoppers at the Gateway are people who actually live downtown. From my observations, it seems like most of them are just suburbanites who think that it is cool to do their shopping "downtown". Its great that Gateway is bringing people to the city center, I just wish they were all coming to the real downtown, not a stucco version of it a mile west of Main Street.

I wasn't around before the Gateway opened, but were there many stores that were already downtown and actually relocated to Gateway? I can think of Old Navy which abandoned Main St., but are there others?
Most of the stores there seem like typical suburban retail outlets, not stores that would have been DT on their own.

[arkhitektor]

Originally Posted by urbanboy

Isn't there already something like this in existence?

If there is, they are doing a terrible job of promoting themselves.
This is why it seems like a single experienced management company could do a good job of leasing out storefronts on Main St. as a whole instead of everyone going their own.

[DMTower]

Originally Posted by arkhitektor

Here's something I noticed downtown the other day:

I was on my way to S.L. Central Station on TRAX and had needed to find a restroom. I was going to be early getting onto FrontRunner, so I decided to get off TRAX at Gallivan Plaza, find somewhere to go to the bathroom, then get on the next TRAX train 15 min. later and still make my FrontRunner connection.

Anyway, I tried the Wells Fargo bldg., One Utah, Walker Center, US Bank, Sam Weller's, Hotel Monaco, Scottish Imports, Rite Aid, Subway, Gateway West, Zions Bank, and none of them had public restrooms. I nearly wet my pants before I found a bathroom I could use in the South Visitor's center on Temple Square.

Am I crazy or does it seem like some of these places on Main St. could have a public bathroom? Do they have problems with security and homeless folk or something?

Hotel Monaco has a restroom on the groung floor. Just walk in as if you're a guest and it's halfway down the hall.

[paddyirishman]

Originally Posted by arkhitektor

Its great that Gateway is bringing people to the city center, I just wish they were all coming to the real downtown, not a stucco version of it a mile west of Main Street.

why would anyone go downtown to shop when there is nothing there and hasn't been for 10 years at least? Unless you need something from Deseret book.

When ccc is finished people will go downtown but im sure the gateway will keep much of its business.

[jedikermit]

Originally Posted by urbanboy

I like that mini-Rockefeller Center with a New Year's Ball Drop on the roof. I assume that's what that would be used for. Hopefully we'll see some action there in the next five years or so...