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Luke Garrott
There are many stories to tell about the decision to align TRAX along 400 West or 600 West in downtown Salt Lake City. The two-year narrative could be seen as Gateway developer vs. affordable housing developer, out-of-touch experts vs. the people affected, engineers from UTA vs. engineers from the City - and now, renegade city councilman vs. everybody who thought this issue was done.
    Unfortunately, none of these scenarios has provided the conditions necessary for a decision that is best for the neighborhood, the west side and the city as a whole.
    Several weeks ago at a City Council meeting, I shocked a mobilized and articulate group of citizens who oppose the 600 West TRAX alignment with the statement that the city administration intended to keep the alignment decision open until the end of the year.
    While I apologize for the impolite timing, I did so in the spirit of transparency and neighborhood development. The provision might have been snuck through with few people noticing. I didn't think that was right.
    Last November, I was elected to the City Council to represent this area, the west Gateway which includes the Intermodal Hub. Right now, the Hub isn't much to look at and there's not much of a neighborhood on 600 West. But whenever I'm in this area, I see not only its past but its possible future: Utah's first transit-oriented neighborhood, thriving with the diversity of healthy
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urban ecology. A diversity of housing types, pedestrian-scaled blocks, thriving small businesses - all made possible because we laid the TRAX up 600 West.
    I have serious misgivings about both the process and the outcome of the 400 West decision. My main complaint is that there were no advocates for a positive vision of 600 West TRAX. Missing were two key perspectives: neighborhood planning and economic development, which would have presented a completely different picture for the immediate west Gateway neighborhood; the neighboring Guadalupe, Euclid, and Jackson neighborhoods; and the greater west side.
    In all public discussions, TRAX was framed as a negative needing to be mitigated. Not once in the three public hearings on the topic conducted by the city Planning Commission was TRAX presented as a neighborhood-building asset or investment. Had it been framed as an investment and an asset, we would have been considering options different from the cheapest and most efficient, such as the 600 West viaduct with no station for the neighborhood.
    But that can change. Mayor Ralph Becker is bringing back neighborhood planning. We may still get options for either alignment, like rebuilding - or eliminating - the North Temple viaduct, or an underground station on 600 West between South Temple and 100 South. If we stall our rush to put this all-too-important decision to rest, we will be able to construct a truly excellent gateway to our downtown that best serves all parties currently involved - and future residents of the neighborhood.
    I believe that a neighborhood designed around transit offers better personal and planetary health, more face-to-face interaction, more community trust, more small businesses, and less expensive housing (because parking costs developers dearly). I believe that connection to the Hub - if we do it right - will be an asset to the west side. All this can happen with TRAX up 600 West, with a tunnel and a stop, and the city government supporting a neighborhood planning process.
    This is no dream. West Gateway as transit-oriented is in our planning documents. But those documents have not contributed to the discussion because they are either too old or too general, and because there have been too few advocates.
    Y'all, please step forward. I know I'm not alone.
   
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    * LUKE GARROTT is a member of the Salt Lake City Council.