S.L. Council backs Rocky on Fairpark stadium

(by Kersten Swinyard desnews.com 6-7-05)

The Salt Lake City Council officially agreed with Mayor Rocky Anderson about pitching the state Fairpark as a location for a future stadium for the Real Salt Lake soccer team.

The council voted for a resolution that puts it on the books as supporting the Fairpark, but the council expressly said that its support depends on securing future financing and resolving issues such as possible noise problems.

Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson has been campaigning intensely for Real Salt Lake to choose Salt Lake City as its soccer stadium site. Anderson had previously backed a stadium on Block 22 at the corner of 600 South and Main Street but has recently shifted focus to the Fairpark west of the city because it may be a more viable option than immediately downtown, he said.

Council member Dave Buhler said that the Fairpark did not come at the expense of the downtown site but that the Fairpark seemed more immediately viable.

"If there were a viable option more downtown, I'd be in favor of that, but I just don't see that in the cards right now," Buhler said.

The major league soccer team, which has a contract to play in the University of Utah's Rice-Eccles football stadium until it builds one of its own, has said that it wants to remain downtown if possible but is considering all options. Real Salt Lake wants to be playing in a new stadium by the beginning of the 2007 season, team spokesman Trey Fitz-Gerald said in an earlier interview, but it wants free land and for the public to shoulder $30 million of the expected $60 million price tag.

Earlier in the meeting, a preservation advocate asked the council to consider endorsing the Fairpark for the stadium but to keep in mind the historic buildings that would need safeguarding.

"We have a greater vision for the Fairpark," said Kirk Huffaker, assistant director of the Utah Heritage Foundation. "But there needs to be more use of the buildings in order for that vision to take place."

Salt Lake City is competing against Murray and Sandy to host the stadium. Anderson said that the tax benefits of the stadium — wherever it is built — would be relatively small for the coffers of the city that eventually wins it. The allure lies in the prestige of the stadium and the foot traffic it would bring to neighboring businesses.

"We already have the infrastructure in the downtown area — the hotels, the restaurants, the transit," Anderson said. "When you have all that and a soccer stadium, it helps benefit the entire area. We have enough sprawl throughout the Wasatch Front without scattering all these kinds of facilities. They work best if they are centrally located."

Murray has suggested that the best place for the stadium is near I-15 and 4500 South, near TRAX and a future commuter rail stop, just off the interstate and in the middle of an area that Mayor Dan Snarr would love to redevelop.

Sandy officials have been quiet about their exact location for a stadium. The city has said that it may use $20 million to construct a parking structure that would be used jointly by the existing Expo Center (roughly at 9400 South and State) and the proposed stadium.

But to share the structure, the stadium would have to be close to the Expo Center, which is surrounded by a high school to the south, Jordan Commons to the north, houses to the east and an office complex for BD Medical on the west. At the northwest corner, however, there is 20.6 acres of land for sale by the trustee of a family estate.

That trustee, who did not want to be named, wholeheartedly supported the soccer stadium in Sandy.

"I have young grandchildren who are growing up and they have a hard time finding places to play," the trustee said. "There's nothing else in the world I'd rather see than this. This is a beautiful piece of land. There's nothing I'd rather see go in here."

Ryan Mecham, Sandy's spokesman, said the city would not be responsible for purchasing land for the stadium — that would fall to Real Salt Lake or the Salt Lake County government. Mecham said no one in Sandy has spoken with the trustee about the 20.6 acres.