With enough patronage, Knowlton said, walkable communities with smaller shops can give a boost to cities and generate more sales tax per square foot than big-box stores that waste space on parking and inventory storage.

Officials in West Valley City have just such an economic upswing in mind as they work to turn a 100-acre area on 2700 West into a walkable town center.

City manager Wayne Pyle said West Valley has suffered from an image of being a city plagued by crime and blight. He said that image has "become a little bit better" but that it can still be improved, and the town center idea "lends itself to that identity that you look for in a community."

Transit lines

West Valley's plans also include a light-rail spur and an intermodal transportation hub, which UTA consultant Alice Steiner said are critical to the success of the walkable communities popping up throughout Utah.

Steiner said suburban towns need to incorporate mass transit options into town centers so people can get to pedestrian-friendly atmospheres without having to first get in their car and drive to them.

"Those communities that have transit will thrive and grow and succeed. Those communities that don't will atrophy," she said.

UTA is currently working on several projects that will facilitate an east-west emphasis to the light-rail including an extension to West Valley and South Jordan. If people could more easily access the suburbs by mass transit, Steiner said cities could establish themselves as activity centers through the Salt Lake Valley.

"We don't have any psychological anchors that help people organize the valley. These walkable community landmarks will give us a better sense of who we are in the community," she said.

Several cities, including Murray and Sandy, are trying to take advantage of the light-rail stations in their cities by anchoring walkable town centers to the stops.

To better use mass transit in Salt Lake, Dansie said he is working to pass an ordinance that will cluster development along the TRAX line. His proposal would increase the height limits of buildings along 400 South, allowing apartments to be built on top of retail.

"It's been a highway, auto-oriented zone with things like fast-food drive-ins and car washes, but it has to be accessible to transit and pedestrians," he said. "It's not meant to penalize people with cars. It's just acknowledging that pedestrians are important too."

Building up instead of out will give developers more options and will give more residents access to transit. While Dansie noted that some Salt Lake residents oppose taller buildings, he said it is just a matter of time before they get used to the idea of an "urban village."

"A lot of Salt Lake residents think four stories is ungodly and that they're living in Manhattan," he said. "There's this fear of density. But density's not the problem, design is the problem."

Combined with attractive design codes, Dansie said clusters of walkable communities at TRAX stops could open up the valley to people without cars and allow the city to accommodate growth without sprawling horizontally.

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E-mail: estewart@desnews.com; dsmeath@desnews.com