The latest plans for a new stadium district in Salt Lake City’s Fairpark neighborhood to lure Major League Baseball have moved a little closer to home plate.
In a public airing Tuesday, a number of neighbors and business leaders told the City Council they are enthusiastic about the chance at transforming that industrial area along North Temple by the Jordan River into a west-side gem.
Others are voicing worries over worsening gentrification and other impacts on existing residents amid a push to include more affordable housing as part of the massive remake of that neck of the city.
(Larry H. Miller Real Estate) Conceptual rendering of potential land uses in Salt Lake City's Fairpark neighborhood as part of a new baseball stadium and residential and commercial development along the Jordan River.
“This represents a shift from planning to doing,” noted Tim Tingey of NeighborWorks Salt Lake, a housing advocacy group on the west side. Emphasizing home construction for all income levels, he said, “will bring essential amenities like grocery stores, restaurants and other services that create a vibrant, sustainable community.”
Intense talks are ongoing, meanwhile, among the city and the developer, The Larry H. Miller Co., over a set of custom-made zoning rules put in motion by state law for developing those 93 acres of fairgrounds, utility yards and river corridor.
The Miller company says it is seeking to overhaul that area just west of downtown into a more walkable, mixed-use community with retail, entertainment and residential pieces — all centered around a future baseball stadium nestled on a refreshed segment of the river.
New zoning for the land — bounded by the Jordan, North Temple, Redwood Road and Interstate 80 — would allow buildings up to 200 feet tall, or 400 feet with city review. It also would waive or loosen a range of regulations on setbacks, minimum lot sizes, signs and other design standards, while giving the developer wider latitude on how the neighborhood gets built.
The Legislature’s shot clock on the city to cut a deal with the developer — or see its regulatory power over land use in the area erased — is set to run out Dec. 31.
Still ‘at the same table’
(Salt Lake City) Map of the portion of Salt Lake City included in a new Jordan River Fairpark District.
The council has already sought tweaks to set aside up to 18% of the land as open space and for design standards on new buildings along roads such as North Temple and Redwood Road, as well as requiring pedestrian walkways where taller buildings might go.
Council members and staffers are said to be busily pushing to guarantee added community benefits in writing before the state deadline expires.
Member Alejandro Puy said the council shared the public’s goals of wanting to give that area an economic lift, add more housing for families at a range of incomes, and ensure the larger neighborhood is safe and freely accessible to all residents.
“I’m excited we’re sitting at the same table” with the developer, Puy said, “but we didn’t set up the table. We were invited to this table. We’re not going to leave it.”
(Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) Some 180-degree views of the Power District from the Archuleta Bridge in Salt Lake City in October 2024.
The council foresees a vote to finalize and formally create new zoning for the new Jordan River Fairpark District as soon as Dec. 3.
Most of the residents who spoke up Tuesday said they strongly favored the rezoning along with the sizable residential and commercial neighborhood it could foster.
Longtime west-side resident and former council member Carlton Christensen said the plans might help realize long-held dreams for revitalizing and overcoming development barriers on land devoted to industrial uses for nearly a century.
In addition to improving infrastructure, Christensen said, the district will also help empower individual residents. “Time has a way of correcting mistakes,” he said. “... I see this as a synergism that will be very effective in strengthening the community I’ve always called my home.”
Business interest in the plan was notable, with many pointing out how the North Temple corridor and its gateway between the city and the newly expanded Salt Lake City International Airport have languished economically for decades.
Scott Sommerdorf | The Salt Lake Tribune The popular Red Iguana restaurant on North Temple in Salt Lake City.
Along with the Salt Lake Chamber, leaders from groups representing Latino-, Black- and Pacific Islander-owned businesses, along with several shop proprietors along North Temple and nonprofit advocates, all said they favored the changes.
“I have been waiting for dynamic businesses to move into my neighborhood,” said Lucy Cardenas, co-owner of the popular Red Iguana Mexican restaurant. “I want to walk and feel proud of my neighborhood.”
The plans are also drawing support from Søren Simonsen, who heads of the Jordan River Commission and called them “a multigenerational opportunity to transform what has been one of the more industrial parts of the Jordan River for generations.”
Key warnings
(The Larry H. Miller Co.) Renderings for its plans for the stadium district near North Temple.
The planning commission gave mixed reviews to an earlier version of the rezone, with two members warning the council that the package needs vital changes.
Bree Scheer, who is also a professor emeritus of architecture and city and metropolitan planning at the University of Utah, suggested the city add a clause to its pending development agreement with Miller “in the sad event” that the company scraps its plan for a stadium and bringing in a major league team.
“To demand the site remains a perpetual lawless zone, no matter who owns it and no matter their intention is not addressing a very real, though unhappy, contingency,” Scheer said, “and it is irresponsible planning of the city if we give up all oversight on this 100 acres.”
(Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) Housing in Salt Lake City's soon-to-be-redeveloped Power District in August 2024.
“The ‘anything-goes’ attitude,” she cautioned, “could mean motels, strip shopping centers, cheap apartment complexes, a big-box store or even acres of surface parking.”
Fellow planning commissioner Brian Scott told the council that while the Miller vision for the site “is great, the zoning is very, very thin. It basically just allows anything.”
He noted that Miller already had among its legacies “an abandoned baseball stadium that we’re still trying to figure out what to do with” — left, of course, when it moved the Salt Lake Bees out of Smith’s Ballpark in favor of new facilities in South Jordan’s Daybreak.
“They’ve moved on,” Scott said, “to this Power District and to a new stadium.”
(Rick Egan | The Salt Lake Tribune) Construction of the new Bees ballpark in Daybreak in March 2024.
Of most concern, Scott continued, was a key portion of HB562, dubbed the Utah Fairpark Area Investment and Restoration District, which calls for properties within 200 feet of the district’s boundaries to be automatically given the same zoning upon purchase by the Miller company.
Scott, also an architect, called it “the most dangerous part of this to the neighborhood and to the surroundings” — with potential to greatly elevate nearby land prices and hasten additional development.
“It’s really hard to overstate how much pressure developers can put on the surrounding areas,” he said, “to grow and push people out.”
