The LDS Church, which is redeveloping the core of the two blocks that formerly housed the ZCMI Center and Crossroads Plaza, is investing between $1 billion and $2 billion to remake the heart of downtown. It has not asked for public funds. It has listened to public concerns and substantially redesigned the project in response.
That public-spirited commitment deserves a vote of confidence in the form of final approval from the City Council.
Because of the way TRAX bisects Main, there is no easy way to knit the two halves of the City Creek project together for pedestrians. The developers have studied the alternatives, as the city required, and the bridge clearly makes the most sense.
Indeed, given the two-level galleria plan for retailers in the interior of the two city blocks, City Creek won't work without the bridge. To deny approval now would jeopardize, if not kill, a project that will provide a mix of 750 housing units, mostly in condominium towers on South Temple and 100 South, together with offices, restaurants and retail shops and stores. There will be about 775,000 square feet of retail.
The beauty of the design is that it will open the interior of Salt Lake City's large blocks to sunlight. A faux creek will splash through the heart of the project on both blocks, providing a variety of water features.
The sky bridge, spanning Main and its center-line TRAX station, will allow shoppers to move seamlessly from one block to the other on the second level of the retail galleria, but they also will be able to cross Main at ground level in the existing crosswalk. The bridge must clear the overhead electrical wires that power TRAX, so the bottom of the span will be about 25 feet above ground. The top of the enclosed bridge will rise another 16 to 18 feet.
The bridge itself will be faced with glass, with a transparent viewing space at its center. Though it will partially obscure the views up and down Main, those vistas are mostly of existing high-rise buildings, not the spectacular Wasatch peaks that define the city.
Critics say this plan, with its sky bridge and east-west axis, will draw pedestrian traffic off of Main, sapping the remainder of downtown of its vitality. But the developer has gone to great lengths to open the project at mid-block points to surrounding streets. One anchor store, Nordstrom, will face West Temple. Another, Macy's, will face Main. Given the existing corner buildings that must remain in place, it is hard to imagine what more the developers could do to open the development to surrounding blocks.
The sky bridge is the vital link in this, the most important downtown redevelopment in a generation. The City Council, in the same spirit of compromise and good faith displayed by the developer, should approve it.
The sky bridge is the vital link in this, the most important downtown redevelopment in a generation.
