Deseret News | Reader comments: Megalopolis: Urban sprawl slowly blurs Wasatch Front towns, cities

Reader comments
Megalopolis: Urban sprawl slowly blurs Wasatch Front towns, cities

Which is it ? | 1:27 a.m. May 18, 2008

Are the banks still lending money on all this new construction? I thought we were in a world of hurt. Which is it? I guess the contractors really do have nothing to worry about.

Anonymous | 3:43 a.m. May 18, 2008

The USA is adding 2 million people annually to its population as a result of immigration alone. The changes in the Salt Lake area is a choice we've made, consciously or not, in large part as a result of this country's immigration policies. Because - as we all know - we "need" growth.

And where will it end? I'm 32 and I can still remember when Draper was farm country and Herriman was nothing and when Southowne Mall couldn't get tenants.

Where will we be in another 25 years? Where will we get the water to feed the needs of the people?

Welcome to the misery you've created for yourselves.

Anonymous | 5:02 a.m. May 18, 2008

You go away for 24 years and what happened? Ogden used to be the second biggest city in the state and now it is Provo.

Comments continue below

Population Groth | 5:42 a.m. May 18, 2008

Soon we will have a bunch of empty houses
No jobs to meet demand and the pay sucks too
This is fron Ignorant City Council trying to get more money from taxes
The Country side is disapearing
These people need to buy existing homes in the City, Not ruin the Country

Welcome to CaliUtah | 7:44 a.m. May 18, 2008

What the article is describing is what has happen in the SF Bay Area for the last 30 years. There is one big difference though. The Bay Area had room to expand North, South, East and West and a first class mass transit system. We are only now looking at mass transit and we only have I-15 and 215, with Legacy coming on, but Legacy will only mitigagte an ongoing problem. If you think air quality sucks now, and commute time, wait for another 20 years, or even 10 years. Also, the SL Valley is very much like the LA basin surrounded by mountains forming a bowl or valley. Look for Wastch Front to become very much like LA in the future. Now, when are we (and I include myself) going to pull our heads out of the sand and look for answers to the problems we are facing?

Jeff | 7:50 a.m. May 18, 2008

It would be helpful if people would change their attitudes. Right now everyone needs a house with an acre of land. People need to quit fighting high-density housing. With higher-density housing we could have more open space. Also public transportation could be made more efficient.

liberal larry | 8:23 a.m. May 18, 2008

We need a new model for living in the future. The "Ponzi Scheme" model for eternal growth is not sustainable. We have had lots of growth in the Salt Lake Valley, over the 33 years I've been here, and it's not a better place to live. Traffic, air pollution, housing prices and sprawl have all increased with no appreciable corresponding benifits.

Jake | 9:02 a.m. May 18, 2008

Jeff is right. For some reason many people believe that they need a huge yard and few neighbors, which only increases the urban sprawl. Smaller plot sizes would do a great deal maintain the countryside. An efficient mass transit system is also important; it is good to see the state and local governments working on building the mass transit system now rather than wait until a real mess has been created (try driving in Atlanta or Southern California).

I do take issue with the title of this article. The Wasatch front is not a megalopolis. It only has 2.5 million people - relatively small population size compared to most major cities. Kolkata, India occupies a similar-sized area but has 15 million; Jakarta (larger land area) has 23 million; Tokyo 32 million; New York 19 million; etc. Each of those cities constitutes a megalopolis. The Wasatch Front does not.

Marc | 9:12 a.m. May 18, 2008

This topic has always been so interesting to me, it looks like to me the wasatch front is at a pivotal point in planning for the future, the decisions now are what will determine the quality of life for the masses in this corridor in the future.
I think UTA is doing a great job right now getting on track with Mass Transit.

Anonymous | 9:14 a.m. May 18, 2008

It is my God given right to a McMansion on a 1/2 acre lot and 6+ kids. The rest of you quit overpopulating and developing the countryside!

Lee | 9:18 a.m. May 18, 2008

Since when was SF able to expand to the West. I thought that was where the Pacific Ocean started. I lived in the North Bay area many years ago and there was a sense of community. It was definatly a bedroom community though. My father worked in SF and it was a 2 hr commute to travel 52 miles (and that was on an express bus). Growth is inevitable, but let's work on managing and directing growth rather than letting groth manage us.

Whoa be me | 9:38 a.m. May 18, 2008

Yep, you've all been robbed. I've heard less whinning from nanny goats. Get over yourselves. Change is the one thing that allows us to improve. When you're green you grow, when you're ripe you rot. We have millions of square miles of open space. Quit you're whinning. Go 10 to 20 minutes in any direction and you're in prestine mountain or desert country. Yep you've been robbed. And don't tell me that if things continue the way we are going that those areas will be threatend...you'll just prove you're ignorant. Remember millions of square miles...millions.

Doc | 9:39 a.m. May 18, 2008

People in this culture need to stop having so many children and take some responsibility.

Fellow Westerner | 10:11 a.m. May 18, 2008

Most people agree that high-density housing is a necessity in large cities. And yet most people are unwilling to give up their own backyards to live there. Let us not relegate to others what we ourselves are unwilling to do. If you feel strongly that suburbs are a problem, then leave your own single-family dwelling. This issue is rife with hypocrites.

re? caliutah??? | 10:30 a.m. May 18, 2008

Caliutah? Oh no not another Utahn who has an idenitity crisis and thinks Utah is like California. Hello!!! Do you need a reference of california to make your point? California is nothing like utah in the terms of culture,size,diversity, and everything else. LA has more people than the state of Utah, Idaho, Montana combined. YOu really think that Provo will grow to that size? That's ridicoulis.

Mark of Albuquerque | 10:43 a.m. May 18, 2008

So Doc,your God now

It's your paradise. | 10:45 a.m. May 18, 2008

Once I took time and thought about returning to Utah. I traveled back once a year and I saw what I once liked ruined.

It's Biblical: casting peals before whine. You can lie to yourself s about progress. I grew-up in a crime free Utah. You can't drive a few minutes and find pristine anythings. Moab is marred with black tire marks.

I realized that moving to Utah would be like living here in California with a rotten climate, judgmental neighbors and a backward culture.

babe | 11:28 a.m. May 18, 2008

To: Doc We can have as many children as we want.
I've lived in the Salt Lake area all my life. People moving in here from other states (many, many from Calif) come here and then start complaining about the state. (not that I'm saying you are not a native of Utah). I just hope that there will be room in the State for my grandchildren.

to whoa be me | 11:30 a.m. May 18, 2008

Yes there are millions of square miles, but people need more than land to live on. They need water. Tell us where that is going to come from.

Cali Kid | 11:48 a.m. May 18, 2008

I have noticed that people complain about the problems in Utah and yet still try to fight change.

This is what urban areas do. They grow. Now do you want to be the tangled, weedy mess that SoCal grew into? Or the beautiful urban garden that the SF Bay Area turned out to be? The Wasatch Front can still add millions more people while preserving plenty of open space, having clean air, and having enough water to go around.

People who ask "How?!!" are thinking in terms of the current paradigm. Think beyond that. Think of an urban area with efficient, wide-spread mass transit; dense residential units such as apartments and condos; and plenty of high-rises. Efficient mass transit can cut emissions substantially. Dense residential units and high-rises can preserve more open space and add double the water available for use by eliminating grass lawns.

Cali Kid | 11:49 a.m. May 18, 2008

If you haven't noticed, these patterns are falling into place. UTA just made the largest-ever US order of 80 trains for its expanding routes, is converting to hybrid buses, and will soon operate 4-5 light-rail lines and an 80+ mile commuter rail. Projects like City Creek, the Proscenium, and dense developments in Lehi, S. Salt Lake, and Sugar House are springing up all over the place. Salt Lake County is adding over 1,000,000 sq/ft of office space every year! Many new developments out west include condos, apartments, and houses with smaller lawns.

Brigham Young said "This is the place!" for a reason. I am only beginning to see what he foresaw.

Ing | 12:03 p.m. May 18, 2008

Paradise?

I agree that a lot of what I once liked about northern Utah has been taken over by pavement, traffic, and masses of people... But come on. No place is actually crime free. Still, I'd take the climate, neighbors, and "backward" culture--good and bad--over what urban California has to offer. Yikes.

Planning for density to reduce suburban sprawl sounds fine, but it has downsides. In the Portland and Salem areas of Oregon, where I lived recently, they enacted zoning rules to that effect, and what they ended up with was all these houses inside the "urban" zone practically touching each other--and a virtual guarantee that wherever housing did get built, ALL the trees and preexisting greenery would get bulldozed and no trees replanted, because there just wasn't rooom.

It cut down on sprawl, but also made being in the suburban areas really tough. Every new housing development that went up looked like a sea of poisonous mushrooms devouring a once-green hill. Not good.

Greater population/housing density might be a good thing, but only if it's planned right.

Cali Kid | 12:11 p.m. May 18, 2008

It's your paradise, I am actually moving to Utah for college in a few months because I love it. I live in Walnut Creek, CA and was accepted to UC Riverside and UC Santa Cruz but instead decided to go to Utah. I love Utah and California. Are they perfect? Absolutely not! Loving a place is like loving a person. You love it for what it is; both the good and the bad.

If you guys weren't complaing about what you are now, I'm sure you'd find something else to whine about. If we all just whine about the problems, how will we ever find solutions?

New City Planning | 12:13 p.m. May 18, 2008

Utah needs to rethink it's city planning. I'm glad the new project downtown will include housing and the continued sprawl in the Oquirrhs was abolished.

Vibrant, safe communities are diverse in mixed use. Having both residents and business owners that have a sense of obligation towards the community. We need more high rise apartment buildings ala Manhattan.

Many people in the burbs are afraid of downtown, but the more eyes constantly on the street at all times, the safer it becomes. An empty street is a dangerous street. Criminals generally like to work in anonymity.

A combination of strangers coming to an area for restaurants, bars, entertainment etc. along with residents that invested their future there make a dynamic community. That is why mixed use planning is so important.

The other issue is a far more extensive mass transit system with high density housing built within close proximity meaning walking distance, to encourage regular use. Trax needs to expand service not only in areas, but also in schedule.

J. in London | 2:21 p.m. May 18, 2008

Recipe for beautiful city:

1. Density
2. Narrow streets (easy in SLC: cut through large blocks)
3. Preserve old buildings: don't knock them down
4. Avoid shopping malls, esp. indoor variety
5. Pedestrians thronging streets = safety
6. Cafes by the score with street seating
7. Extensive public transport, esp. trains
8. Mix of residential and commercial

Any city or even town that contains these elements becomes a thriving destination.

Recipe for urban wasteland:

1. Wide streets
2. Precedence given to cars
3. Shopping malls (esp. indoor variety)
4. Modern 'developments'
5. Buildings spread apart and set back from street
6. Exclusively chain restaurants and shops
7. Isolation of residential from commercial
8. Low density

Sad that Salt Lake thinks that Recipe 2 will help, when in fact it has destroyed the fabric of the city.

Recipe 1 is so easy.

Anonymous | 2:36 p.m. May 18, 2008

*** "When you're green you grow, when you're ripe you rot. We have millions of square miles of open space." ***

The Colorado River already dries up before it meets the Pacific Ocean. During the last drought cycle Lake Mead and Lake Powell were on their way to drying up, too.

36 states in the US - not just the arid Southwest - are facing water shortages now or in the next few years. It takes a whol lot more than "millions of square miles" to meet the needs of 300 million - no, wait, make that 400, 500, 600, 700 million people. Lumber, brick, sand, gravel, coal, metal ore, and, oh yeah - water.

We may be able to fit more and more, but don't bother riding your horses or ATVs anywhere. Don't try to get into a nationa park without a reservation 4 years in advance. And Lake Powell? It won't exist anymore.

Do Mormons have "too many kids"? I don't know. But I do know that nobody has a lick of business telling them to have fewer kids so long as our immigration policies are what they are - 2 million a year, every year.

Thomas | 4:02 p.m. May 18, 2008

Anonymous has a major point: water. My family is trying waterwise, native planting and reduced-water-using grasses. I can't convince my neighbors to get rid of their water-sucking Kentucky Bluegrass and excess use of commercial fertilizers. True, houses are being built on smaller lots, but the water use in the valley is increasing while the reservoir capacity in the mountains isn't. Now, all we need next is a good drought.....

Taylorsville Resident | 4:57 p.m. May 18, 2008

The article indicates that Las Vegas is larger than Salt Lake, but if you look at US Census 2006 population estimates, the Wasatch Front's 4-county area of Weber, Davis, Salt Lake, and Utah (which combined are less than half of Clark County, Nevada's land area) have a population that is roughly 1,931,000 compared to Clark County's 1,777,000. Interesting comparison.

Water Water Every Where | 6:21 p.m. May 18, 2008

We can get the water from you. Apperently the water you have is too much. Actually, why don't we just recycle grey water. Serious. How many gallons of pretty good water (washing machines, dish water, bath water, shower water, sink water) could be reused on our properties for watering gardens, trees, lawns, bushes, flowers, etc. Instead we send it to a processing plant that costs 100s of millions to build. Seems pretty simple.

George | 6:31 p.m. May 18, 2008

That's true. Salt Lake is indeed smaller than Las Vegas. Clark County is quite large and much of it unpopulated, but ninety-nine percent of the residents of the county live in Las Vegas, North Las Vegas and Henderson, and you can't combine half of the Wasatch Front in comparing statistics on Salt Lake to Las Vegas.

Stewart | 6:47 p.m. May 18, 2008

Wait, isn't progress determined by population growth? The U.S. has doubled in population in the past 40 years. If this growth rate continues by 2045 it will be over 450 million and over a billion by the end of the century. At this point U.S. population growth is entirely driven by immigration (both legal and illegal). Native reproduction is at 2.1 children/family. If this growth rate is projected on, U.S. Population would be 2 billion by 2140. This is really no problem since none of us will be around by then and we can leave it to our grandchildren to deal with.

The American economic model is based on a continuous and rapidly expanding population passed on to us from the 18th and 19th century United States, an echo of "Manifest Destiny," and the Industrial Revolution I wonder how long it will be able to sustain its self?

Condos | 7:02 p.m. May 18, 2008

There is so much vacant land around that can still be developed. What we need to do is cut the states in half so that people dont feel like thay have tolive in one city or region to have there voice heard. If we was able to get the states smaller there cpould be more regionalization of people and less congestion into large cities.

To: Cali Kid | 8:11 p.m. May 18, 2008

Shut up and go back to where you came from. Oh and by the way, might want to wait till you graduate and earn a little before you make suggestions about how others sould run therir affairs. WE NEVER ASKED YOU! Thank you! AND...next time you wish to brag about the "beautiful urban garden that the SF BAy" is...you might want to add how the recent housing slump has pretty much devested the same area, and how extrememly high crime permeates the area. Oh and don't forget that very few can even afford to ive there. Not for much of a comparison, heh?

Jess | 9:00 p.m. May 18, 2008

There isn't a right answer here: I live in suburbia and love having my own fenced-in yard that my kids can play in largely free from strangers. I love having my plot of land to take care of and improve. But I recognize the problems with urban sprawl.

Planners just need to realize that there has to be a mix. Urban living may be perfect for some people and unbearable for others. The same holds true for suburbia. Recipe #1 doesn't fit for everyone.

Amazing, To Me! | 9:46 p.m. May 18, 2008

My family moved from Phoenix to West Bountiful in 1978. It blows my mind to see the massive growth of the Wasatch Front. It is even more evident to me since I've been in the military for 17 years and return to Utah to visit family about once a year.

When I was 13 (the year we moved) there were farms all along the Wasatch Front in BETWEEN the cities: North Salt Lake, Bountiful, Centerville, Farmington, Kaysville, Layton, Clearfield, Riverdale, Ogden, etc and the same for all the towns from Lehi on down to Payson.

I had a job for a North Salt Lake wholesale flower company before and after my mission and I saw all the open spaces and farm fields first hand. It just blows my mind to see all the homes, well, EVERYWHERE! And when I was home at Christmas the homes now between Lehi and the prison as well as those starting to crowd the NORHT side of the Point of the Mountain amazed me.

Good luck planning for all the growth intelligently. The Bay area I might be able to live in, L.A.?.....not so much.

Utahn and Former Arlington res. | 9:53 p.m. May 18, 2008

I live in Arlington VA for 4 years and saw how well Arlington used the metro as compared to the rest of the capitol area. Arlington is filled with nice homes, but has built up significantly around its metro stops creating a very nice mix.

Utah would do well to mirror this pattern and build up around the TRAX system.

Pro Development | 12:24 a.m. May 19, 2008

As long as the quality of life or perceived quality of life exists in Utah, people are going to come from other states. I agree with Utah and Former Arlington res's comments. We need higher density close to Trax stations. Building well designed mixed-use lifestyle centers near transportation hubs makes a lot of sense and retiring baby boomers seem to like the product. I moved from Phx 19 years ago and know that Utah could look similar in 10 to 15 years, so our City planners need to take aggressive steps now.

re: Cali KID?? | 10:00 a.m. May 19, 2008

Hey CAli kid are you really from the state known as California not CALI. If you hate "Cali" so much why don't you spend your vacation dollars elsewhere and go to Idaho or Arizona, that's even closer.

Z | 1:21 p.m. May 19, 2008

The simple truth is you can 'plan' for higher or lower density all you want, but in a free market it is the consumer who decides which model lives or dies. The consumers mind may be driven by many different factors: cost, access to transportation, aesthetics, maybe even a sense of responsibility. But if you try to dictate to the consumer what to buy, the consumer will simply go somewhere else to find what they want.

We are about to see how this works in practice. A new high-density housing development is being put in place in the core of Salt Lake, not by the government but by a private entity. No one will be forced to live there. If the consumer likes it, it will succeed, and inevitably others like it will be built. If the consumer hates it, it will fail, and no amount of hand-wringing can make it otherwise.

Go ahead and make plans for higher densities. But don't believe for one second that they will succeed until consumers vote with their pocketbooks to make them succeed.

joeindt | 11:50 a.m. May 21, 2008

For better or worse, Wasatch range resembles Colo's front range right now. You should see them both from an airplane. Growth will eventually densify along that swath as will the dependency on that route for all kinds of travel. Then suddenly getting from A to B along that corridor will be a nightmarish stop and go ride for about 100 miles. What do you do? You live with it or move. Politics and peoples desire for land will never allow intelligent land use in this country.

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