I\’m going to look into this and let you know what I find….

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Sorry, it just sounds like a crazy idea for me :)…

I couldn’t understand some parts of this article, but it sounds interesting…

Wanted to jump on the parking lots. We have way too many of them down town. As a pedestrian, the negative energy coming off them just sucks the life out me. At the same time, I don’t want to be naiive to the fact that not everyone will take alternative transportation into town. A few multi-level parking structures on the edges of downtown, near Trax stops might do the trick. These structures would have to be attractive and have street-level businesses (with the awnings — great idea) to keep up the walkability.

I would love to move my family of 4 (with a 13 y.o. and a 3 y.o.) downtown, but I’m wary of the City Creek condo development. What kinds of pressures will be on those who live there who aren’t Mormon? Will the GLBT community or other types of diversity be able to live there without discrimination and harassment? Will it be bland and ugly to live in? Will it be affordable for someone like me who is on the lower middle class scale economically?

I don’t want to be completely judgmental about the project until I’m able to see how it will all work, but I’d rather see some living spaces developed by a neutral/non-religious entity.

Want to see a beautifully planned downtown? You guys are talking the big cities and Europe, for pete’s sake! Meanwhile, the city council and some of the rest of you, need go no farther than….can you believe it….my hometown of Grand Junction, Colorado,just a few hours away.
Their downtown is one of the most beautiful you will see anywhere.

City Creek Center: Planned to “protect” the Temple, I believe and I am very angry, as a strong but independent thinking LDS. Why would Jesus Christ want a high end shopping center to honor Him?? So, I sent my ideas early on to Downtown Rising, but I think I was totally rejected. Here they are: All of downtown would benefit if CCC had the real creek surfacing, if the housing there was inexpensive enough for clerks in the stores to live there with their families, if an updated and expanded version of the Deseret Gym were built there with low membership fees for lower income people living downtown, if there were lots of free parking and bike racks, if there was a free/low cost health clinic (cooperation with IHC), in short, if the kinds of people Jesus loves and ministered to felt welcome downtown. And the air bridge above Main St. to separate the rich shoppers from the lowly unwashed is an insult to humanity in general, and to the walking public in particular.

More public transportation, more downtown housing, more trees (like Grand Junction), more encouragement of foot traffic all over downtown but free parking for those who drive, diverse shops that are not part of a “development,” all of these things would recreate the SLC many of us knew and loved.

How affordable will the tony condos being developed with City Creek be for immigrant families or the young people that Holly is rightly concerned about? If one wanted to assemble some modular (i.e. pre-fabricated; i.e. INEXPENSIVE) multi-family units somewhere close to downtown SLC, how easy would it be? How easy is it to open a club or restaurant downtown? What if one wanted to tear down a old building to build a modular apartment building or a new building for a nightclub? Would that be easy?

I join the many herein saying that the downtown needs more residents. To get them, they need to be able to afford to live downtown.

My suggestion is that the next mayor reduce the rules, restrictions and regulations concerning the development of SLC. To the greatest extent possible, see what the people, left to their own devices, come up with.

I grew up in Western Europe where many apts have balconies that run the entire length of the place. People need light, air, and to feel some closeness to nature. Affordable housing shouldn’t be cheap.

Someone suggested asking Main St. businesses for their recommendation. What Main St. businesses? We’ve run most of them out of business. As to Rocky “trying,” if he’s tried and I don’t think he’s really tried anything, he’s failed miserably at this as at everything else. Main St dies under his leadership–I use the term losely here.

I don’t shop the funky Sugarhouse businesses but why, in Heaven’s name, did the city council allow 7 story buildings in that area? It will totally ruin the “square.” It will take all the light out of it, even if the developers only go 5 stories. How generous of them! By the way, I’m a conservative!

For those who value time and money (me), going to the store, or the park, or the festival nearest to where they live makes the most sense. Add to that the rising costs of real estate and gasoline and you’ve got a lot of people who can only afford to live further away, which just keeps them away.

So downtown’s battle has to be won by creating value, something to rival spending an hour and $$$ traveling there. It’s got to be something that we can’t get anywhere else, that we care about.

City Creek, with it’s creative design and trendy retailers seems like a pretty good start for many. Will it be enough?

Now that I’m editing City Weekly, at the ripe old age of 49, I’m learning that revitalizing downtown includes so much more than the old constraints of Mormon/non-Mormon interests. As my youthful editorial staff constantly reminds me, and as I’ve seen for myself at some of the events my newspaper sponsors, there is huge interest in night life, live music and clubs.

One of the problems with urban planning in this and most cities is that the folks with authority and power over the issues are frankly, pretty old. Any elected official or planner who has the power to make decisions about downtown’s future should work extra hard to draw in the 30 and under crowd. They have fantastic ideas, they are more unfettered by convention than the oldsters and after all, it’s going to be their city sooner or later. Shouldn’t they have a bigger say in its future?