Salt Lake:Official development news thread

[delts145]

Originally Posted by i-215

I don't know why it needs a sign, but it looks darn cool!

If they light it up, that'll be WAYYY COOL!

Isn't that taller sign the original on the building? If I remember right, that is how it looked historically.

[jedikermit]

Originally Posted by delts145

Isn't that taller sign the original on the building? If I remember right, that is how it looked historically.

I think you're right...

[Orpheum]

Originally Posted by delts145

Isn't that taller sign the original on the building? If I remember right, that is how it looked historically.

I dont know if it had the extra height at the time it was built, but I know that it had it at some point in the building's history.. I've seen old photos. I'd like to see it return.

[SLC Projects]

Originally Posted by delts145

Isn't that taller sign the original on the building? If I remember right, that is how it looked historically.

You could be right Delts. But that would be great if they build that sign back on top of the Tower. It add class to it I think. Makes it look more historical.

[arkhitektor]

Yep, its original... Well sort of. From looking at photos from the Utah Historical Society, it seems that the sign wasn't installed originally, but was added at some point before 1950 (when this picture was taken), then taken back down some time before the 1970's. I'd love to know more about it if anyone knows. I understand that the current sign forecasts the weather by what color the sign is and whether or not it is flashing.

[Viperlord]

yes, that sign will be on top of the walker bank building. Also if you look at the bottom of the building the awnings along 200 south will be removed as well. I posted that to the board a few months ago..... Sometimes I wonder why I even post things on these boards if no one reads them *rolls eyes* lol

[Viperlord]

oh, btw... that would add 64 feet to the top of the building according to the SLC council's agenda minutes.

[Viperlord]

[delts145]

The sign is also used as a Weather Prognosticator also,right? Something to do with blue and white,or flashing, who knows?

[delts145]

State Fairpark looks to ride into the 21st century
A new 70,000-square-foot arena is on the wish list for the 104-year-old Utah landmark

By Christopher Smart
The Salt Lake Tribune
Article Last Updated: 03/08/2007 12:15:37 PM MST


The Ferris wheel is silhouetted against the sunset at the Utah State Fairpark. (Danny Chan La/Salt Lake Tribune)

What's 104 years old, a favorite of big pigs and little girls, and where - for 10 days each year - you can catch a ride on a Ferris wheel?
It's the Utah State Fairpark, of course.
Often taken for granted, this grand old landmark at 1000 West and North Temple in Salt Lake City is no longer the subject of soccer-stadium talks. But it could be the site of a proposed 70,000-square-foot indoor arena that could pump $20 million into the local economy by hosting equestrian events, rodeos, RV shows and tractor pulls, among other things.
"We've been given the charge by our board to bring the Utah State Fair into the 21st century," said Fairpark Director Rick Frenette.
Funding for the proposed multipurpose arena has yet to be secured.
In the meantime, the Fairpark will remain, first and foremost, the home of the State Fair every fall. This year, the fair will run Sept. 6-16.
And there is nothing quite like the State Fair. A stroll along the midway is only the beginning. Barkers convince the willing to test their skills at the ring toss. Kids marvel at the mysterious qualities of cotton candy. And funny-looking jugglers defy the laws of gravity.
But don't forget, there are calves to be judged. Jams to be tasted. And quilts to be evaluated. Everyone wants that blue ribbon.
All those things don't even begin to define the modern-day fair, where such things as fine arts and digital photography are among a host of popular competitions.
And then, there's the fair's food court that boasts an array of Utah-produced food from Fat Boy ice cream to Colosimo's sausages - and everything in between.
"We bring it all together," Frenette explained. "It's an experience you can't get anywhere else."
Every year, some 330,000 ply the midway at fair time to taste this uniquely American activity.
During the administration of Gov. Mike Leavitt, there was some discussion of selling the Fairpark to private-sector interests.
That talk has died down.
"The future looks great," Frenette said. "We've done some studies and they all came back that people want to keep the fair here."
The State Fair moved to the then-new Fairpark in 1902, explained Assistant General Manager Judy Duncombe.
During the 1980s and '90s, building and grounds were renovated. In 1995, the Legislature privatized the State Fair organization and mandated that it become profitable so that taxpayers would no longer fund the annual fair.
The Fairpark has an annual budget of $3.5 million.
It "has always been about tradition and showing what Utah does best," Duncombe said. "And we've got something for everybody."
During the other 50 weeks of the year, the Fairpark hosts weddings, dances, company parties and birthday bashes - some 300 activities. Oh, and don't forget the annual December bull sale.
The challenge is to get the word out, added Denise Stanger, marketing and public relations director. "We're here to stay, and we're moving forward."
No doubt, the Fairpark's year 'round schedule would get a huge boost if the Legislature would fund the proposed indoor arena and multipurpose facility, she said.
The Fairpark staff is hopeful that could happen in the next three to five years.
Presently, however, the state Division of Facilities, Construction and Management has about $600 million in requests, but is funded only at $63 million a year. So, it's up to the Fairpark staff to convince lawmakers that the proposed facilities expansion is worthwhile.
"It takes state leaders to understand the need for the facility and the financial impact it would bring," Frenette said. "Our challenge is educating people to the economic development it would bring."

[delts145]

Salt Lake's popular and reborn Little Italy is growing

This is becoming a great ethnic area in Salt Lake, especially for people like me who can't get enough of all things Italian. Stopped off at the Carlucci's bakery yesterday after a flick and update tour of Gateway. "Best damn Canoli this side of Chicago!"

Three-year-old beloved Italian Center to move soon
Viva Italia!
By Patty Henetz
The Salt Lake Tribune
Article Last Updated: 03/08/2007 12:45:06 PM MST


An Italian bust (possibly Caesar) watches over a Sunday afternoon meeting at the Italian Center. The center, which has been located rent-free in Tony Caputo's building for three years, is moving because Tony is going to convert the space to a restaurant. (Chris Detrick/The Salt Lake Tribune )

The 10 people who ignored blustery weather to go to the Italian Center of the West on a recent Sunday had a good reason: Hanno desiderato parlare italiano con a vicenda. They wanted to speak Italian with each other.
But more than that, they sought - as they do every weekend afternoon - to recapture the spell of the sunny Mediterranean country that has had such a big effect on the Western world, and to spread a little more of it around Salt Lake City.
"This is like the Italian home," said Clelia Centofanti. "If we don't have this, we don't have anything."
Gino and Bruna Secco, ages 92 and 89, agreed. They come, said Gino, "to remember our country or our town."
The center, tucked into a corner of Tony Caputo's building on 300 South at 300 West between Caputo's grocery store and Carlucci's Bakery, has been around for three years, ever since Caputo offered the unfinished space rent-free to a group of Italians and Italian-Americans for a community center.
This is, after all, where Little Italy used to be, and where the ethnic neighborhood is being reborn.
"We're trying to create an identity here. This is the ethnic end of the town," said Ed LaGuardia, a commercial real estate professional who serves as the center's president.
But more than creating identity, the center, as its Web site declares, aims to spread the best of Italian arts, culture & education.
"The influence is great. What we have is rich. We should share it," said LaGuardia.
This coming August, the Italian community will host its fifth annual Ferragosto, a street party on 300 South in front of the Rio Grande train station.
Last year, organizers declared Little Italy had been reborn. Now, it is spreading.
One of the reasons is necessity. The lease on Caputo's deli at 300 South and 300 West is due to expire, so Caputo is going to remodel the building next door that he co-owns. The specialty food store will incorporate the restaurant in the space that once held a Vespa showroom and the Italian Center's storefront.
Vespa already has moved to the south side of Pioneer Park, near Vina Distributing. LaGuardia said he and the other Italian Center organizers are negotiating to move their operations to the same area, probably in mid-April.
Meanwhile, the existing Italian Center will continue to welcome those who want to speak Italian on Saturdays and Sundays from 2:30 to 4 p.m. Sometimes the conversations are followed by Italian film screenings.
Italians came to Utah during the early 20th century as their home country experienced overpopulation, agricultural disruption and class battles between the "peasants" of the south and the more affluent northerners.
Utah, by contrast, was seeing increases in trade, mining and manufacturing and rail building and an accompanying need for immigrant labor. Italians didn't arrive here in large numbers, though they were one of the larger ethnic groups coming from southern and eastern Europe. Most of Utah's Italians settled in Salt Lake, Weber, Carbon and Tooele counties - homes to rail and mining interests.
Gretchen Mathis, who lived for years in Italy before returning to Utah and is a fluent speaker, said she likes the openness of the Italian Center, which prefers to spread Italian culture rather than just cater to the native-born. "A lot of these Italian groups just want [Italian] blood. We're not like that," she said.
"I'm an American," added Carol Berry, who also has lived in Italy. "My dearest friends are in this room. It's beyond speaking Italian. It's about the friendship."

For more information: http://www.italiancenterofthewest.com

[SLC Projects]

Originally Posted by Viperlord

Wow with that 64 foot sign added to the top the walker tower will be almost as tall as the one Utah center to it's south. Very cool.

[wrendog]

not quite SLC... it will still be over 100 feet shorter than utah one..

[delts145]

Upscale subdivision plan
'Green' homes to create own power

Duo wants to make a statement about architecture, environment and the future
By Heather May
The Salt Lake Tribune
Article Last Updated: 03/12/2007 01:38:52 AM MDT




Architect Bill Arthur says his inspiration for home designs comes from the land they sit on.
So how do you make a 5,000-square-foot minimansion mesh with a hillside surrounded by forest and a nature preserve?
To start, you color the houses "green."
Arthur and developer Steven Keyser are collaborating on an unusual subdivision in Salt Lake County's Emigration Canyon that will include seven "zero-emission" homes powered by the sun and maybe the wind. In other words, they should generate as much energy as they use.
And all of the homes' architecture must be contemporary - typically characterized by open floor plans, seamless indoor/outdoor spaces, natural materials and floor-to-ceiling windows.
The latter will take advantage of the panoramas from the ridgeline. On this unfortunate day, the view looks out at a smoggy Salt Lake Valley. The homes also will face Forest Service land and a preserve.
"We want to do something nobody's done," Keyser said during a recent trip, in his Hybrid Highlander, to the subdivision site.
There are other so-called zero-energy homes. Up to 10 such houses are planned in Cedar City. Sacramento sports a subdivision with 95 houses. And a Santa Fe-based nonprofit group called Architecture 2030 is calling for all new buildings to be carbon-neutral in 23 years. Buildings are responsible for 48 percent of all energy consumption.
Keyser's research found the average four-person home annually generates almost 19 tons of carbon dioxide, which is primarily blamed for global warming. Building seven carbon-neutral homes would be equivalent to eliminating 30 cars from the road, he said.
His project, dubbed Snowberry Ridge, was born out of frustration.
Keyser, who considers himself "extremely design conscious," couldn't find a contemporary home to buy. And he struggled to find a suitable green builder.
He bought 70 acres about four miles up Emigration Canyon, sitting above the Emigration Oaks subdivision, and planned to build one home for his family. Then he decided he wanted his two children to have friends to play with. "I might as well make sure all the homes are impeccably designed," he figured, so he learned about solar technologies and resolved, "We might as well employ them."
Arthur has built about 15 contemporary homes the past 20 years and lives in one of them in the canyon. He has created three models for Snowberry Ridge and is prepared to design all seven. Buyers can use their own architects as long as the designs meet Keyser's standard.
The lots will cost at least $1 million and the homes will range from $2.5 million to $3 million.
Keyser recommends the owners install solar thermal heating, which creates hot water to heat the house. The system heats an antifreeze solution that snakes through tubes installed in floors throughout the house. Such radiant floors are more energy efficient than forced-air systems, which heat rooms from the ceiling down.
And solar cells called photovoltaics would supply electricity to the house.
Keyser estimates the systems will cost around $50,000.
The houses also will be designed to use less energy, with energy-efficient appliances and lighting along with well-placed windows with proper shading and insulation.
Over a year, the homes should generate as much energy as they use. But depending on the weather, the solar systems will generate more or less energy. Through net metering, the homes will gain credits for excess energy that is put back into the grid. If they generate more power than they use, their monthly bill would be zero. On days of inclement weather, the tab would be more.
The typical Rocky Mountain Power customer uses 750 kilowatt hours of electricity a month. To date, 109 customers use the net-metering system.
Vicki Bennett, environ- mental-programs manager for Salt Lake City, praises the Snowberry Ridge concept.
"I'm all for it. You can always say, 'Do you need homes this big?' That's beside the point," she said. "You can build homes right now that will be able to be net-zero carbon emissions. And in every case I've seen, you're going to get your money back, even if it's a 30-year payback."
Keyser and Arthur know they are limiting their buyer pool with their design restrictions. Not everybody likes contemporary architecture. But the two believe it's right in a natural setting.
"The Georgian home wasn't made to go on a hillside. It was made to go in a little village," Arthur said. The goal with his designs: "It's really meant to be an object on the landscape that looks like it fits there."
And to fit in, the homeowners will need to be green.
"We really want to make a statement," Keyser said, "by designing an entire subdivision that shows you can do it."
[email protected]


Learn more

* To find out how to sign up for net metering, call Rocky Mountain Power at 888-221-7070.
* To find out more about solar power in Utah, go to www.utsolar.org.
* For more information about the subdivision, go to www.snowberryridge.com.

[i-215]

It's sunny enough here, I'm sure they can do it.

But isn't that the last thing we want? A home that can be bought by some yuppie rich guy so he can drive his hybrid SUV and turn his/her nose down at the rest of us who can only afford a swimming pool-less home that doesn't have a built in power plant.

However, if it means practical application for regular homes, I'm cool with it. The prospect of it does seems facinating.

[SLCforme]

Does anyone know what's going on with the Broadway Park Lofts development by Allen Millo? the website (www.allenmillo.com) used to have renderings and such for the project but now it is just a page that says something like "the broadway park lofts will be bigger and better than ever". When I drove past last december or so it seemed like they were constructing the project out of an old existing building, just adding height and renovating it. I drove by yesterday and the whole thing was rubble. I wonder what happened and why they changed their plan. Maybe the building was structurally unsafe so they had to scratch the project and start over, IDK. The other interesting thing is that the site, before it was changed said the units were completely sold out. so maybe they just wanted to go bigger to provide more units.
Anyone have any inside info?

[Viperlord]

March 12, 2007

Major furniture showroom 'mall' to be built next to IKEA

By Barbara Rattle
The Enterprise

A pair of Arizona real estate developers has purchased 6.7 acres at 63 W. 13490 S. in Draper where they plan to build a 108,000 square foot retail furniture showroom mall called Draper Design Center.

The project will be patterned after Emerald Design Center, a Tempe, Ariz. development that has grown to nearly 450,000 square feet next door to an IKEA store just outside Phoenix. Draper Design Center will also be very near Utah's IKEA, slated to open in May.

"The IKEA in Tempe gets about 2.2 million visitors a year," said Christopher Haws of Groberg & Haws Development, which will create Draper Design Center. "The Draper store will be about 60,000 square feet smaller than the one in Tempe, but I think the market is a little better actually in Salt Lake than Phoenix. The concept is to build off the IKEA traffic. The Draper IKEA is probably going to get in the range of two million visitors the first year. It's unbelievable, the traffic. When the IKEA opened [in Tempe], for the first six months it was tough to get a parking spot, they had a line going down the street. When people are driving to IKEA with the intent to buy furniture, they'll have to drive by our property on the freeway, next to IKEA. This is why its so successful in Tempe. If they don't buy at IKEA they're going to stop off across the street on the way out, too."

Haws said Emerald Design Center, developed by a friend of his, "is like a regional mall, really, for furniture. That's the draw. It's almost as powerful as a mall. In Tempe most of the space was pre-sold."

O.C. Tanner Co. sets sights on buying former planetarium building

By Frances Johnson
The Enterprise

The O.C. Tanner Co., a family-owned jeweler and manufacturer of employee recognition products with a long history in Salt Lake City, has expressed interest in purchasing the former Hansen Planetarium building at 15 S. State St. in downtown Salt Lake City.

"We intend to respond to an RFP [request for proposal] and to try and purchase the planetarium from the city," said Kent Murdock, CEO. "We expect maybe some others would be interested, but we hope not."

If successful in purchasing the former planetarium, O.C. Tanner would relocate its retail jewelry store to the historic building once the remaining three years on the company's lease at its 20 E. South Temple retail location are up.

"We think it would be a beautiful, unique institution in the city and it would be a wonderful thing to have a locally owned business there," Murdock said. "We just determined that we're going to contribute to the well-being of downtown Salt Lake. We can park some money in the planetarium and leave it there for a long time to do that."

The company has examined the city's appraisal of the building and plans to offer a fair market price for the structure. If and when the building is purchased, millions of dollars in renovations would be necessary, Murdock said.

$10 million to be invested in Utah's first 'China Town'

By Frances Johnson
The Enterprise

A slice of the Far East is coming west with Utah's first China Town, which will replace the Rocky Point Haunted House at 3390 S. State St. in South Salt Lake.

Hong Kong developers Yue So and Wai Chan have purchased a 5.54-acre parcel, which includes the haunted house, as well as some accompanying undeveloped land, and hope to purchase additional property nearby.

The 63,000 square foot haunted house building will be converted into 48,000 square feet of retail space for vendors from all parts of Asia, including Japan, China, Korea and the Philippines. Retail options will include clothing, shoes, nail salons and video rental stores.

"They're going to haul everything out and rebuild the inside and the whole outside is going to be Asian-style," said Tracy Doong, associate broker with Pentad Properties Inc., who handled the real estate transaction and acted as interpreter for the developers. "Retail, it can be anything, but they want an Asian kind of mix."

The back of the building will be converted into an 8,000 square foot formal Chinese restaurant, with the balance of the building's square footage dedicated to common areas.

[Viperlord]

I would guess that they are going to add more lofts. I would bet that the north "tower" stays the same though.

[delts145]

Viperlord, those were some very positive announcements. I would really look forward to O.C. Tanner owning the former planetarium. That is one of my favorite buildings this side of Paris. Like many forumers I'm also anxious to see a growing and thriving China Town in Salt Lake.

[Orpheum]

Originally Posted by SLCforme

Does anyone know what's going on with the Broadway Park Lofts development by Allen Millo? the website (www.allenmillo.com) used to have renderings and such for the project but now it is just a page that says something like "the broadway park lofts will be bigger and better than ever". When I drove past last december or so it seemed like they were constructing the project out of an old existing building, just adding height and renovating it. I drove by yesterday and the whole thing was rubble. I wonder what happened and why they changed their plan. Maybe the building was structurally unsafe so they had to scratch the project and start over, IDK. The other interesting thing is that the site, before it was changed said the units were completely sold out. so maybe they just wanted to go bigger to provide more units.
Anyone have any inside info?

You are correct. The office building was deemed structurally unsound and had to be razed. This is good because it gives the developer freedom to configure things a little more freely,. and yes they will be adding more units. But it's bad because they wasted over a year of prep work on this. They're basically starting over from scratch. And although it was just an old office building that wasn't very unique, I thought it was nice that they were trying to save what was there because the trend is always to bulldoze everything and start over. At least they tried. I just hope they can work a little faster this second time around.