Salt Lake City: Official Development News Thread - Part 5

[zurich]

Originally Posted by Comrade

The City Council voted 7-0 to approve the Smith Plan. It now heads to the state committee, where it will certainly pass, then back to the council for a final vote.

Yippie!! This is going to be a game changer for downtown. I cannot wait to see these blocks finally connected. Here is a link to the meeting if anyone is interested. I have a lot of respect for the council members as they really worked hard negotiating with SEG.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SZzQ2OcCqAk

[Orlando]

There should be some publicly available documents of the presentation by SEG. Can someone pull them up?

[Atlas]

Originally Posted by Orlando

There should be some publicly available documents of the presentation by SEG. Can someone pull them up?

There was no presentation or new information yesterday, just prepared statements by the council and a vote.

The text of the deal came out last week. Here's the city's information page.

[rockies]

I am still recovering from the disastrous IHC plans... one of the projects I was looking forward to the most

Unrelated but here are some pics of 218 W 300 S from today albeit different times. It is really coming along and it looks much taller to me than it did in renderings. I want more wall-to-wall so bad



Rendering

[bob rulz]

No surprise at all at the unanimous council vote for the SEG plan. That was basically just a formality at this point.

Originally Posted by i-215

You make me pose a question I hadn't considered.

Let's say there are new high and mid-rise buildings in the Entertainment District. And then, in some future year, more mid and high-rises along the Rio Grand Plan area (assuming it happens). And the Power District project.

Will one day new the SLC skyline hide the entire old one? Like, the COB, Wells Fargo, temple, etc. all no longer visible?

I doubt it. I don't see having the level of skyscraper development needed in the next 20-30 years to block the view of our current tallest buildings. It could definitely look quite a bit different though.

[SLCHenry]

Im assuming that the Sundial is dead; JLL removed it from their website and you can no longer pre lease it.

[Comrade]

Bummer. That was my favorite of the planned towers.

[Rileybo]

Sundial could’ve been really cool despite the massing being wide and stubby like most other high-rises here. The new architecture in our skyline needs more colors and angles, and most importantly more textures.

[Tippy]

Originally Posted by SLCHenry

Im assuming that the Sundial is dead; JLL removed it from their website and you can no longer pre lease it.

What about the 15? story residential that was going to be built near it? I think it was next to the court house. Also, I believe someone on here had a part in its planning. Any idea if that one is still going forward?

[Tippy]

Originally Posted by rockies

I am still recovering from the disastrous IHC plans... one of the projects I was looking forward to the most

Unrelated but here are some pics of 218 W 300 S from today albeit different times. It is really coming along and it looks much taller to me than it did in renderings. I want more wall-to-wall so bad



Rendering

Does this one have ground floor retail?

[Orlando]

https://www.deseret.com/utah/2024/07...entertainment/

taking 300 West underground to build a plaza extending east to connect to the Salt Palace Convention Center

[i-215]

Once they get the engineering estimates for actually building that "tunnel," it's quickly going to evolve into:

• Plaza moves to "Level 2," which is entirely private and (other than a few owner-sanctioned purposes) is more or less closed to the public who aren't there speeding money (e.g., City Creek)
• 300 W stays at ground level. Thru traffic on foot is shoved into the tunnel with everybody else (see: 200 West)

Only Jazz/mall "pedestrians" (customers) win. All other pedestrians will probably lose.

A person commuting on their bicycle at 12-18 miles per hour will not be welcome to ride across the plaza. They're gonna disappear inside the tunnel with the cars. Hope the come out the other side in one piece.

[i-215]

I know I'm a Debbie Downer on this design. But honestly, if it's basically the same footprint as the existing convention center, and they clearly aren't committed to making the area better from an urban design point of view...

Why not just put the plaza on Level 3 and shove all this on the rooftop of the convention center? Problem solved. Keep it where it is.

(Yes, there are engineering reasons why they can't actually do this. But from a layout perspective, this is effectively what the new development will do.)

[Orlando]

I found this image on a LinkedIn post:
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/patri...member_desktop

[Comrade]

Originally Posted by Orlando

I found this image on a LinkedIn post:
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/patri...member_desktop

What's frustrating about this view is that you can tell there's new towers but just a cursory glance and the skyline still looks similar to what it did 20 years ago because of the lack of actual heigh diversity:



I think the biggest standout after all these years remains 99 West but not because of its height - rather that it's by itself.

[Rileybo]

^^^

Agreed. 99 West remains the best “recent” addition to the skyline solely because of its location. (Also kinda helps that it’s a relatively attractive design. As I’ve stated before, texture matters)

Changes to the skyline are obvious to those like us on this forum, but to the average visitors and even residents.. SLC looks the same as it did in 2000.

[bob rulz]

I think the difference is noticeable, though yes, certainly not what I think we wanted to see after 20 years.

[zurich]

Originally Posted by bob rulz

I think the difference is noticeable, though yes, certainly not what I think we wanted to see after 20 years.

Google Austin skyline from 15-years ago. It's like a mini Dubai. I wasn't able to insert an image, but it's just an amazing transformation. I was there last week and they currently have at least 10 cranes, tons of building and the construction is moving to the east of I-35 now - its just nonstop development.

When looking at these pictures of Salt Lake, it's really depressing, especially with all of the same, bland architecture and lack of creativity. I sure hope the new entertainment district will jump start something bold and whatever new tower, its not just another 350 ft rectangle with more apartments (I can almost guarantee what this will look like.) IMO, a good comparison to Salt Lake is San Antonio. San Antonio has a lot of downtown shopping which does bring in the tourism, it also has the San Antonio spurs - but the downtown has almost zero new high rises, because there are NO jobs and no condos which = no one really cares or wants to actually LIVE downtown.

Until some of these tech companies move their HQ downtown and developers build condos (NOT APARTMENTS) where people actually invest their OWN money downtown... Salt Lake will continue to grow at a snail's pace at best and will look very similar for the next decade.

[wrendog]

Originally Posted by zurich

IMO, a good comparison to Salt Lake is San Antonio. San Antonio has a lot of downtown shopping which does bring in the tourism, it also has the San Antonio spurs - but the downtown has almost zero new high rises, because there are NO jobs and no condos which = no one really cares or wants to actually LIVE downtown.

I live in San Antonio. I get very jealous of Austin just up the road. That said, in the 10 years I've lived here, there have been probably a similar amount of towers built as SLC. At least 3-4 and more coming.