SALT LAKE CITY — A group representing Team USA climbers says it strongly endorses a plan to build a new training center in Salt Lake City’s budding Rio Grande District.
Members of the USA Climbing Athletes’ Commission published an open letter on Friday, saying it desperately needs a training facility to remain competitive on the international stage, while offering new opportunities to grow the sport, which the proposed new headquarters seeks to do.
“American athletes have risen to meet that moment, earning medals and respect at the highest levels of the sport. But the reality behind those results is that our athletes have done so on their own without a permanent, purpose-built training facility,” the commission wrote. “While other nations and other sporting bodies invest heavily in dedicated centers for their national teams, American climbers have relied on borrowed gym time, temporary warehouse setups, and personal resourcefulness.”
The proposed facility, which would be located near 535 W. 300 South, would provide competition-level terrain for bouldering, lead, para and speed climbing, as well as resources to improve strength, conditioning, nutrition and recovery, and space for hosting events.
Salt Lake City Community Reinvestment Agency’s board of trustees, earlier this month, approved $250,000 toward the rebuild of the historic Salt Lake Mattress Company building that would be incorporated into the project. That came after it was found that preserving the 119-year-old structure would cost an additional $1.3 million.
The board previously allocated $6 million toward its preservation and reuse. USA Climbing is close to completing its design for the full facility, Reinvestment Agency planners added in the board’s March 10 meeting.
Salt Lake City’s Reinvestment Agency approved a 99-year land lease for the facility in 2024. The planned facility would include a commercial gym operated by Utah-based Momentum Climbing, on top of all the space needed for training.
The latter sparked concerns from other commercial gyms, which the USA Climbing Athletes’ Commission acknowledged in its letter on Friday. However, it says the facility is needed to build the sport that was added to the Olympics in 2021.
“We expect the (national training center) to be a resource for athletes across the country, not just for those living in Salt Lake City, providing for the broader climbing community through the programming and opportunities it plans to offer,” the organization wrote. “We are proud that this project has included athlete voices throughout its development, and we believe that continued engagement will only strengthen the outcome.”
It’s unclear when construction will begin. Salt Lake City also finalized a rezone of the Rio Grande District this week that seeks to spur development around the facility.
The Key Takeaways for this article were generated with the assistance of large language models and reviewed by our editorial team. The article, itself, is solely human-written.
