The Salt Lake Tribune -- Sandy, Midvale Tie Joint Development to Light Rail

Sandy, Midvale Tie Joint Development to Light Rail

Sunday, October 3, 1999

East of State Street, a TRAX train passes an open field near 150 E. 8400 South on Friday. A mixed-use development is being planned here. (Al Hartmann/The Salt Lake Tribune)

BY BRANDON LOOMIS
THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE

    SANDY -- If ever there were a test plot to prove transit-friendly development can reshape car-bound Utah, this is the place.
    The strip of south State Street where Sandy meets Midvale is an ode to the automobile. Asphalt-enshrined business signs beckon motorists: Bob's Auto World, Black's Auto Sales, Phillips 66, Enterprise Rent-a-Car, Cash Loans on Car Titles.
    But across State Street, next to Maaco Auto Painting and Body Works, is a weedy, 30-acre pasture rare to Salt Lake Valley's inner suburbs. Along its eastern edge runs an even rarer sight, the Utah Transit Authority's new light-rail commuter tracks.
    On this urban frontier, Sandy and Midvale have united to forge a new standard for development that includes a walkable residential neighborhood mixed with attractive shops, all catering to people who want to ride the train as much as they drive.
    The project is the first to test the theory that a 17-mile rail line for commuters can attract investment and reinvigorate the dilapidated neighborhoods it crosses.
    "A grocery store would be nice," said Brenda Hart, who lives just east of the pasture. "You have to drive three or four miles to get to one." She would rather walk across the street.
    Hart really hopes for a park to keep some of the area open, but said she could support some development if it cleans up the area's appearance. "As long as it's well-planned."
    At the least, it will be planned uniquely. Sandy and Midvale, each containing about half the property, have agreed to jointly make zoning changes to allow a mixed-use neighborhood. They even have agreed to split sales and property taxes from the entire project -- a first in Utah -- eliminating traditional rivalries about which city gets the lucrative business and which gets only the homes.
    This spirit of cooperation earned the cities $20,000 in grants from the state Quality Growth Commission and the nonprofit Envision Utah planning partnership. The cities pooled that money with $10,000 of their own to hire California-based planning consultants Fregonese Calthorpe Associates.
    That firm, which also guides Envision Utah's effort to curb urban sprawl along the Wasatch Front, is a nationally recognized proponent of "new urbanism." The theory holds that mixing high-density housing and shops along transit lines encourages friendlier neighborhoods where people are inclined to walk and ride instead of clogging the roads.
    Walking is something longtime residents remember fondly, before the State Street businesses replaced homes and pressed the few remaining houses between cinder blocks and chain-link fences. One resident remembered the "neighborly" time 50 years ago and contrasted it to the "riffraff" that now seems drawn to this State Street commercial zone.
    Newcomer Charlene Boucher, who has lived in the aging subdivision east of the vacant property since May, said her home already has been burglarized twice.
    "There's so much crime on this street alone," she said. Maybe, she hopes, a light-rail station and a nice shopping district will spruce up the neighborhood.
    Val Murray, who lives in the mobile-home park south of the property, shares that hope.
    "They've got to have some parks or something for people," he said. "They don't have anything down here."
    The area also offers little to anyone who wants to walk, and adds few attractions to those who might buy a home or condominium in the new development.
    "The State Street frontage is definitely not an asset at this moment," said Timothy Rood, a senior associate with Fregonese Calthorpe Associates who is handling the firm's work on the project.
    The blight and the constant din of traffic make planning for a walkable neighborhood more challenging, he said. The likeliest scenario is a plan that orients large retail centers toward State Street to capitalize on car access, then sites a village of rail-oriented homes, smaller shops and possibly residential lofts over shops behind.
    Sandy and Midvale officials are not saying exactly what they want until they hear from residents. But Sandy long-range planner James Sorenson said all are convinced they must work across city boundaries if they want something besides the miles of State Street strip malls and car lots that surround the vacant land.
    "We know it's going to develop, and we've got to be working together," he said.
    Adding to the cities' optimism about changing their landscape is the name of the property owner: Utah Transit Authority.
    UTA bought the land, blighted only by an abandoned lumberyard, four years ago when the agency wanted to put a rail maintenance yard there. The cities objected to the location, so UTA ultimately built the maintenance yard farther north. The land is dispensable and owned by an agency with an obvious interest in promoting light-rail transit.
    "We could own it and lease it, or we could sell it outright" if the cities develop attractive plans, said UTA Property Manager Richard Swenson.
    The only problem is the property -- near 8300 South -- lies between rail stops at 9000 South and 7800 South. The transit agency might approve a new stop for the right development, but Swenson said the cities may have to pay to build it.
    "If they show that it will be a great place for a light-rail station, then we've got to figure out who would pay for it," he said.
    Before taking any position, UTA plans to wait for an Oct. 6 workshop, when Sandy and Midvale will present their ideas and hear the public's desires.
    If the cities can hitch the neighborhood's future to the train, it could prove a model for other vacant and decaying lands along the TRAX route. UTA even could help repeat the effort on 20 acres it owns at 10600 South if a proposed rail extension to Draper goes forward. UTA needs about 7 acres for a stop there, but the rest could be developed.
    Still, some light-rail skeptics and opponents doubt the line is enough to generate widespread urban renewal.
    "It [light rail] is going to be very detrimental to business in the long run because it forces people off the street," said Mark Hale, part owner of the Hires Big H eatery on 400 South in Salt Lake City and co-chairman of the Committee to stop East-West Light Rail. "We are a Western city. Everybody's mobile with their cars."
    Hale's committee represents businesses along 400 South that want to stop the first rail spur proposed to link with the existing north-south line. The proposed extension, which awaits a funding decision by the Federal Transit Administration, would run along 400 South-500 South from downtown Salt Lake City to the University of Utah.
    Hale worries that construction and the resulting traffic disruption would stress businesses the same as north-south light rail did Main Street shops last year. In the years after construction, he fears, reduced car access would cause customers to dodge downtown.
    As evidence, the committee points to a report by an Orange County (Calif.) grand jury last May. The grand jury compared the experiences of 12 cities that have built light-rail systems in the past 18 years with the Orange County Transportation Authority's claims about the benefits of light rail. It found those benefits were overstated.
    For instance, the report disputes claims that a rail line lured a new NBA basketball arena to downtown Portland, Ore., when in fact tax incentives drove that development.
    "Light rail is not a catalyst for private developments except where governments provide subsidies to developers," according to the grand jury.
    Peter Calthorpe, a partner in the firm that is helping Sandy and Midvale, said light rail has been an important component of redevelopment in other cities, including Portland, San Diego, San Jose and Sacramento.
    Government also can help -- or hinder -- development through tax policies and zoning decisions surrounding stations, he said.
    "It's important that cities recognize these are special spots," Calthorpe said.
    Portland appears to be one city that has done that. There, the TRI-MET transit agency issued an analysis of the region's 20-year-old light-rail system and found substantial private investment along the tracks.
    The system is 33 miles long, and 18 of those miles opened just a year ago. It has attracted $1.9 billion in development next to the tracks since 1979, and projects worth another $500 million are planned, the agency reported in a study called At Work in the Field of Dreams. The title is a reference to the Kevin Costner baseball movie that popularized the axiom, "If you build it, they will come."
    It is true that light rail did not build the new basketball arena, said TRI-MET strategic planner G.B. Arrington. But it did help determine the location.
    Tax policies, aggressive planning and light rail have worked together to shape modern Portland, he said. The pattern around the country varies according to the importance cities place on developing near the train.
    "The most important question for any community is how do we want to use light rail to shape our future," Arrington said. "It's a tool."
    It is not a tool that would do Sandy and Midvale much good unless they worked together to change their rules. The kinds of mixed-use developments that are most successful near rail stations were effectively banned when car travel allowed cities to separate housing from business without creating hardships.
    "We don't even have a mixed-use zone in our zoning ordinance," said Christine Richman, director of community and economic development for Midvale. She is eager to change that and discover whether putting homes near shops can get people to walk more.
    Clerece Neil equally is eager to see some homes encroach on the motorized world of south State Street, but she has simpler reasons. She manages storage units and lives on-site a few doors down from the vacant property. To her, a few more neighbors would be a welcome and lively addition.
    Besides, building homes in an otherwise commercial district would be good for business.
    "You know darn well if it's housing, they're going to use the storage facility," Neil said.

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