Herriman • In the Salt Lake Valley’s still-surging southwestern corner, new homes back up on empty lots, construction crews lay down more asphalt for roads, and families clamor for nearby green spaces.
Herriman officials are trying to balance residents’ wishes with larger city plans to draw more visitors for sporting events and boost sales tax revenues.
To do so, they proposed building a new 56-acre regional park near the city’s northern edge to host youth sports tournaments, team practices and other activities.
But the booming suburb of 60,000 residents didn’t own the acreage its leaders were eyeing. The developers behind the controversial Olympia Hills project did.
So, last week, the City Council signed off on a suite of deals that swapped city- and developer-owned parcels, allowing the company to build nearly 450 new single-family homes and setting up a formal planning process for the park.
“This type of facility is beyond needed, not just in our city, but regionally,” council member Jared Henderson said. “Whether it’s an organized soccer practice, lacrosse, any field sport is what we’re targeting for this. … There’s no space at all.”
Henderson and other council members emphasized the importance of adding green space while also stewarding the city’s tight budget at the April 23rd meeting. The land deals drew a handful of residents concerned about adding new homes to a parcel that had been previously pitched as a large park. The council voted unanimously to complete the swaps and allow Olympia Ranch, LLC, to add more units in two other developments it is building.
The company will receive about 46 acres in three separate parcels from the city in exchange for the forthcoming 56-acre park. Council members granted the developer the ability to build 260 homes on those lots: 136 in Creek Ridge Cove at 12160 S. 6400 West, 113 in Sorrento at 5616 W. 12900 South and 11 in Big Bend Cove at 5860 W. Herriman Boulevard.
The park parcel had been entitled for 77 homes under an agreement between the developer and the city. The company had already completed some engineering and utility work on the parcel.
(Christopher Cherrington | The Salt Lake Tribune)
Two of the lots are marked as proposed green spaces in the city’s 2020 parks master plan. The planned Sorrento development seemed set to host a 5-acre neighborhood park or community center under the document. Now, Olympia Ranch plans to build two small green spaces at the north and south ends of the development.
The now-approved Creek Ridge Cove neighborhood at 12160 S. 6400 West seemed to be a part of a 43-acre Northwest Sports Park. City leaders have now scrapped that idea for the larger athletic complex under construction just across 6400 West.
At one time, Mayor Lorin Palmer said, the city hoped to extend a regional park there even farther west, but South Jordan ended up annexing that land, killing the idea.
The council also signed off on the addition of 150 units to the bigger Olympia project and 36 homes to the Creek Ridge development.
One resident supported the plan to build a bigger, more programmed athletic complex.
“As a growing community, Herriman is full of young families and talented kids who are eager to participate in sports and outdoor activities,” resident and soccer coach Amanda Axelson said during public comment. “But right now, we simply do not have enough quality space to support them.”
She added that the family sometimes had to commute to Bluffdale and Draper to practice because there aren’t enough fields in Herriman.
Other residents agreed that there weren’t enough places for kids to play. But they hoped for a smaller, more neighborly park next to their development, called Copper Fields, just south of the new Creek Ridge Cove project.
“The frustration is very real for our community at Copper Fields,” resident Loren Brewer said, “where there’s this perceived disregard from the City Council on our desires to have a park.”
Brewer said many in the neighborhood don’t want a trail, an open field or a big new complex where parents will have to pay for their kids to join a league. Instead, they want a traditional park with a playground, a pavilion and a place for youngsters to play pickup sports and get to know one another.
Brewer and others’ comments sparked a fiery reprimand from council member Steven Shields — at his last meeting, no less, before a planned move to Houston. Shields took issue with another commenter calling the council “liars” and Brewer’s assertion that the council wasn’t listening to constituents.
“If you want to be a part of this city, then get your a - - up here and run for City Council,” Shields said. “Don’t just show up at a meeting once every five years and think you have the right to call these men liars. That is just so offensive to me. I can’t believe it.”
Palmer, the mayor, said the city would seek Salt Lake County Zoo, Arts and Parks funding to complete the 56-acre complex and start to figure out what amenities could go in the green space. A 2023 analysis of the athletic complex estimated it would cost about $122 million.
Update · May 2, 2025, 9:59 a.m.: This story has been updated to reflect the developer’s previous plans for the athletic complex parcel.
