Library could open new chapter for Marmalade - Redevelopment » After shop-condo deal fell apart, city officials envision a community center along 300 West.
By Derek P. Jensen
The Salt Lake Tribune
If Salt Lake City's oldest neighborhood becomes its newest, it may rely on a new library as the anchor. In the interim, it may become a sculpture garden.
Marmalade plan dies A developer's five-year effort to buy and develop acreage west of the Capitol appears to have ended after his appeal for an extension was denied.
City officials are picking up the pieces of a dismantled deal intended to have a developer erect shops, a bank and perhaps a grocery store on the dirt lot east of 300 West between 500 North and 600 North.
That "Marmalade" blueprint used the "oldest" and "newest" slogan.
Developer Rick Howa's original plan also called for 80 condos and townhomes before the commercial-lending market collapsed.
This spring, the oft-delayed project died after Howa failed to submit design materials before a Redevelopment Agency-imposed deadline.
But the City Council sees the breakdown as a blessing. Instead of selling the property on blind hope that a builder could buck the recession, city leaders have a new strategy.
"I'm intrigued with exploring the opportunity of a library," says Councilman Stan Penfold, a sentiment echoed by multiple members at a meeting earlier this month.
The neighborhood needs some kind of community center, Councilman Carlton Christensen argues, to give it a focal point. And that means more than the condos-atop-boutique-shops formula.
"We literally have a blank slate there."
City Hall long has targeted Marmalade, along with Glendale, as future locations for library branches. But Frank Gray, the city's director of economic and community development, notes modern libraries can be built with a mix of uses, including housing above. Gray encouraged the council, acting as the RDA Board, to think "three dimensionally."
A library committee has proposed a standalone branch, designed to last 100 years, for the empty patch bordering west Capitol Hill. But Library Director Beth Elder says her board would remain flexible on both uses and design. A community center, she adds, "is an interesting concept to explore."
Historically, the neighborhood has clamored for both a library and a grocery store. But it may be waiting for a while. Funding for new branches is a long-term prospect -- well over a decade, and counting, for Glendale.
For now, the city has some money set aside for landscaping. Council members Luke Garrott and Jill Remington Love like the idea of a low-maintenance sculpture garden, while others floated a community garden. The council concedes it will be two to three years before construction on any new building is likely.
Councilman Soren Simonsen says any plan must ponder a population boom in the area if a streetcar to Davis County comes online.
Even so, given the city's problems with stalled commercial projects, Garrott suggests the RDA should let the market "organically" dictate what goes there.
"The commercial should go away," Councilman Van Turner insists. He points to Howa's still-empty buildings across the street as "a chilling thing."
"There's no commercial there, and it doesn't look like any's coming," Turner says. He says a library-anchored community center could benefit Marmalade, Guadalupe and Capitol Hill -- especially if the city finds the money to restore the hot-spring-fueled pool in the former children's museum building a few blocks north.
"There was a thriving community there," Turner says, name-checking Swede Town as well. "Maybe there will be a thriving community again."
In other words, the oldest turned newest.
[email protected]
Prev
Linear Mode
