North Salt Lake's bid to take governmental control of 80 acres from Salt Lake City was thwarted by the Salt Lake City Council on Tuesday night.

The council not only denied the bid but decided to create a new zoning category dubbed "natural open space." The council would like to include the disputed 80 acres in the new zone, forbidding any development there.

That move caught North Salt Lake Mayor Kay Briggs by surprise.

"I'm absolutely shocked by this resolution," he said.

Briggs said rezoning the land as natural open space — as opposed to regular open space, which would allow North Salt Lake to build a city cemetery there — would be an unconstitutional "taking" of property value.

Still, Briggs remained hopeful that issues surrounding the 80 acres — a level shelf of foothill land above the gravel pits east of Beck Street — can be resolved through further negotiations between politicians before possibly moving to the court system.

The City Council's vote Tuesday was politically motivated, Briggs said, noting that four of seven council members are up for re-election in a city whose residents have an affinity for natural open space.

"They've been very uncompromising," Briggs said. "They are all afraid about getting re-elected."

The 80 acres of untouched open space lies inside Salt Lake City's boundaries but is owned by North Salt Lake. The Davis County city can easily provide services like fire protection, police response, sewer lines and other amenities to the land, but Salt Lake City can't access the land for similar services.

In many court cases, judges have decided that disputed land better serviced by a neighboring community should be given to the city that can provide services to the land. North Salt Lake had requested that the 80 acres be disconnected from Salt Lake City so it could be annexed into North Salt Lake.

The council's vote Tuesday was 6-1 with Councilman Van Turner siding with North Salt Lake, saying he was voting in favor of property rights.

Most Salt Lake leaders maintain the land is valuable to residents as natural open space.

"I believe that members of the council believe there is significant value to this land as open space," council member Eric Jergensen said.

According to their original petition, North Salt Lake leaders want to set aside 47 acres as natural open space, develop 10 and preserve the remaining 23 as a city cemetery.

Now, Briggs said, North Salt Lake is still willing to set aside roughly 50 acres as open space but would like homes on 20 acres with 10 acres for a park or cemetery.

But North Salt Lake's definition of open space is different than Salt Lake City's. North Salt Lake would like to install grass and paved trails on the 50 acres, keeping it as improved open space, while Salt Lake City would like to keep the land as untouched grasslands.