Timpanogos visitors center may finally be within reach

HIGHLAND — Forest and park service officials are getting pumped.

There are only 36 steps and two years to go until the groundbreaking for the Timpanogos Interagency Visitors Center.

That's the home stretch for a project that has been under discussion for more than a decade and in serious negotiation for five years.

"We are now getting things together, working with the regional offices and with the Open Space Property Group corporation, who is interested in swapping lands with us," said Loyal Clark, spokeswoman for the Uinta National Forest. "This is still proposed, but it's looking good."

Clark said planning and design meetings are under way so that once the legal reviews, appraisals, title clearances and details are sorted through, work can begin almost immediately on the planned multistory, multiuse facility that will serve as a visitors center and administrative office complex.

"We want the draft document done by the end of this year and the design final by the end of 2004 so we could hold a groundbreaking in 2005," Clark said.

The proposed 37-acre site is adjacent to the east side of an LDS church building on U-92, near the mouth of American Fork Canyon.

OSPG Corporation is trading the land for parcels totalling 266 acres that include the current Pleasant Grove Ranger Station property, an office site in Beaver, a commercial site in downtown Provo that houses a sign and radio shop, a landlocked parcel in Provo Canyon, a similar parcel near Springville and a parcel in Draper.

Craig McCullough, manager for the limited liability corporation, said some of the property acquired will be kept as open space.

"I think as a practical matter, both sides benefit here," McCullough said. "It makes sense economically."

Until recently, it wasn't possible to exchange resource lands such as forest area for administrative lands such as an office or residential property.

The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee last week endorsed by a voice vote a land trade bill sponsored by Sen. Bob Bennett, R-Utah, that makes such a trade legal.

In addition, Clark said the lands and their individual histories have all been thoroughly researched to make certain there are no historical or sacred elements involved and no water source problems.

Clark said a public comment period will be part of the remaining 36-step process.