The Gateway planning to add several stores

The Gateway is expanding, making way for as many as three new stores, but none of them are Target, which Gateway managers have been pursuing for months.

If it can gain expected approval from the Salt Lake City Planning Commission, The Boyer Co. will begin expanding the northwest section of its mixed-use mall soon after the New Year.

Boyer will add two more stores on the lower level and add space for one more store on the upper level, next to the SkyBox Grill.

Boyer already has tenants lined up for the two lower stores but isn't making the names of those stores public yet.

"We haven't signed the leases yet, so I can't tell you what they are," Gateway project manager Jake Boyer said.

City planners, who have been given the names of the new stores, say one of the new retail stores will be the first of its kind in the Salt Lake market.

The area where the new retail stores are going was originally set aside for a hotel, but Boyer has since scrapped its hotel plans.

The expanding mall seems to be doing well financially. Same-store sales increased 23 percent in June 2004 compared to the same month of 2003.

Boyer said he continues to be in talks with Target about building in the north end of The Gateway, but it's been a long process as the retailing giant has switched real estate personnel.

In the past, however, Target representatives have met with city planners to discover what sort of architecture they would need to use to build at The Gateway, which has higher architectural zoning standards that other places in Salt Lake City.

The Planning Commission will hold a public hearing on the Gateway expansion at 5 p.m. Dec. 8. All new construction in the Gateway Mixed Use zone is subject to a public hearing before the commission.

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E-mail: bsnyder@desnews.com