There are a couple of hundred businesses, give or take, depending on how broadly you draw the circle around the “generational opportunity” at least some of us have attached to the dusty, dystopian 5.25 acres abandoned for a decade now at the corner of Kearns and Bonanza.
You’ll forgive me, I think, for thinking I’d walk into a crowded hall at the Blair Education Center at the hospital on Friday morning for a robust briefing and Q&A among leaders in the business and lodging community.
Hmm, I counted 18 people in all, including organizers, dedicated opposition, one of the property managers of the Prospector district, me. Not a big room. Not a lot of people. There was a handful who said they ran businesses, only not in the Bonanza Park or Prospector areas. Their establishments are on Main Street.
Oh, wait. There was me! My office is right across Bonanza Drive from the 5 acres. Probably why I’m a fan of moving City Hall to the people where they live now and doing something with the Marsac Building that helps with that dwindling foot traffic along decaying Main.
Was I the only one from a nearby business whose view will be ruined, parking spots all taken up, unable at all times to get in or out of our location, having to contend with those affordable renters spoiling the neighborhood, lost in the shadows to new business competition?
Yes, I’m sardonic here. Again. Someone has to point out the absurdities, after all. But I also recognize that some of the arguments against the development plans have at least grown a little more more resonant and cogent with time: the sense of a kitchen sink development, questions about the financing and city’s stake, whether there’s really enough public benefit in the deal.
Unfortunately, cool rationality wasn’t much in evidence at the briefing Friday. Instead of Q&A, this was Rant & Roar. The opposition squandered an opportunity to gather ammunition for later. A question might have been nice. The speechifying sent several people early for the door, and there wasn’t much from that audience to lose.
Just as well the business community at large wasn’t there.
But all wasn’t lost. I did learn a little more about the plan. For instance, that 1,200 more car trips daily would be offset by better circulation, along with bus lanes added to Bonanza Drive. The impact during peak commuting times would be negligible, with 100 more cars maybe, mainly going the other way, I think. The workers already in town would not be joining the commute in, a point pretty much missed. The bigger traffic problem is more about Snow Park than this corner. I have first-hand daily knowledge of that much.
I also learned a little more between long rants about mostly unrelated this and that about how Brinshore could lower the height to within the requirements. Basically, that’s 8-foot ceilings, down from 9. And more-squat gables that break up the roof line. If the Planning Commission grants exemptions, it will be to provide closer to regular Park City steepness to those. And trees on the property will still be taller than all but one building in the back.
For more of a clue about how neighboring business owners look at the 5-acre plan, I turned to a recent letter from two attorneys to the Planning Commission. Ryan McConnell and Matthew S. Boyden lay out over 4,300 words the concerns and objections of Auntie Em owner Emily Burney on the east side of the 5 acres and Mack Tilling of Mack’s Finest Gelato, a frozen dessert place across Bonanza Drive.
In lawyerspeak, the letter expresses concern about height limits and possible exemptions, Auntie Em’s strip mall being in the shadow of the four-story building next to it and more of a stretch at the east end, literally, with shadow possibly reaching across the street near sunset. It also contests the open space allowance and the parking math, and mentions the toxic soil that must be cleaned up whatever the city does with the land.
Mostly, to me at least, it’s so much blah blah, devolving in one passage into alleged shadows near sunset stretching from across Bonanza Drive and a parking lot to darken the gelato shop’s door (maybe the mountain should be leveled in this argument). But there is a compelling part, too. Auntie Em’s borders the 5-acre site where the largest building at four stories is planned. Besides winter shadow until noon, the attorneys list concerns about the proximity of garbage pickup along with loading and delivery to the building Auntie Em’s inhabits.
The use of the underground parking would be interesting to see, and Prospector’s parking lots across Bonanza would be tempting, I think. Critics have a point here. For whatever reason, going underground is a friction point that makes it easier to park on lots across the street. This seems like solvable inconvenience, though, rather than a deal killer. Also, so what if overflow parking for a weekend or after-hours event happened? The lots are largely empty then.
What strikes me by far the most, though, is the business community’s silence on the 5-acre plan. A few businesses on Main Street chirping, mainly the usual suspects. Two of a couple of hundred businesses around the 5-acre site speaking up in any public way.
This does not sound like a business community exactly galvanizing. More like a few stray crickets amid the NIMBY chorus.
Don Rogers is the editor and publisher of The Park Record. He can be reached at [email protected] or (970) 376-0745.
