After years of discussions, Salt Lake City has finally unveiled its plans to overhaul Smith’s Ballpark and redevelop the site to include housing, green space and other areas for the neighborhood’s benefit.
The Salt Lake City Community Reinvestment Agency (CRA) released its final draft plans for the old ballpark Tuesday, outlining the plan to turn the recently-vacated stadium into a neighborhood hub with year-round activation. In total, the stadium and northern parking lot total 14.8 acres of space that’s ripe for redevelopment.
“I can’t think of another development I’ve been more excited about in my 11 or 12 years in City Hall,” Salt Lake City Mayor Erin Mendenhall told BSL on Tuesday. “I asked for a neighborhood library in this neighborhood … and I feel really personally gratified that moving forward with that.”
Details revealed Tuesday not only plans for a new library and fire station, but also an overhaul of the existing ballpark. The plans show the stadium’s southwest stands would remain intact and would be used as an entertainment venue, and the former Salt Lake Bees’ playing surface would be converted into multi-use fields.
In total, the plans estimate the stands would have a 3,700 seating capacity, and the adjacent fields could hold around 5,500 in standing-room capacity. The plans also show the grandstands could house small businesses on the ground floor, while the upper floor could house a suite level, which could host a restaurant, a roof bar or event space.
West Temple Street would become the area’s festival street, which would host community markets and other events.
On the north side of 1300 South, the city plans to create a creek park and resurface the waterways that currently run underneath the road, which include Red Butte, Emigration and Parleys Creeks.
Included in the draft plans are community assets that have long been promised by city officials, including a new fire station and a new library. The plans released Tuesday show a library would be situated at the base of a housing development at the corner of 1300 South and Main Street, while the fire station would be a standalone building just to the south along Main Street.
Plans also show a prospective hotel site on the corner of 1300 South and West Temple — situated near where the Smith’s Ballpark home plate is currently found.
The highest density would be found along 1300 South, as the prospective hotel site could be up to 200 feet tall. Two other buildings — the library and housing building at 13th South and Main and a housing building on the northeast corner of 13th South and West Temple — could be built up to 120 feet, according to the draft plans released Tuesday. A parking garage would separate the fire station and library, and it’s one of two parking garages shown in plans.
The city estimates the redevelopment overall would include 400 units of multifamily housing, 60 units for senior housing and a hotel consisting of 125 rooms, the draft plan says. Estimated retail space would total 75,000 square feet, and the adapted stadium would consist of around 20,000 square feet. The library and fire station are estimated to be 30,000 square feet and 25,000 square feet, respectively. Around 964 parking spaces are also shown in the plans.
“I love that we’re building home ownership into the future housing opportunities here, and (units for) aging in place,” Mendenhall said Tuesday. “This isn’t just a historic neighborhood with housing and the ballpark, there’s generations of people living here right now who should not be displaced by this development.”
City draft plans also give an outline of the ballpark’s construction phases. In the first phase, the city would start by demolishing the north and eastern sections of Smith’s Ballpark, leaving the western grandstands for preservation. Next, the plans call for building multifamily housing on the corner of West Temple and Paxton Avenue — which is currently a vacant parking lot — as well as building housing on the southern end of the ballpark along West Temple near 1400 South.
No timeline is given in the draft plans, and it’s not clear when construction could start or finish. Mendenhall said she’s hoping to see the north and east grandstands demolished sometime next summer. She added that she aims to have a RFP for phase one of the project out before the end of the year, and she’s hoping to have a contract done in the first quarter of 2026.
Until then, the city is planning to host events at the ballpark throughout the summer. Mendenhall said details of future events will be announced soon, but the first event is scheduled for July 11, when the city will host a family-friendly and pet-friendly movie night and play the 2001 animated comedy Shrek.
Public input on the project is open until July 15, and Salt Lakers can comment on the project online. The CRA will discuss the project during a meeting on July 8.
Council Member Darin Mano, who chairs the CRA board and represents the Ballpark neighborhood on the council, said Tuesday that nothing in the final draft plans surprised him — and that’s a good thing. He said the plan is the result of months of work and getting public input on what the neighborhood needs, and he’s happy to see that work come to fruition. Now, he said, the real work will begin.
“We have some pretty pictures, and we have some great ideas,” Mano told BSL. “But getting those to actually be built is a whole ‘nother ball of wax … some of them are going to take large investments from the city and and big investment from the private market.”
Mano said the question remains what the city’s investment would be in the project into the future. It’s not clear if developers would ask for the city’s help in financing different projects, or if the city would sell or lease the land, he said.
Local developers have been sitting on plots of land in anticipation of the city’s redevelopment of Smith’s Ballpark. Depending on their reactions to Tuesday’s plans and the ultimate result of the ballpark’s redevelopment, the overhaul could spark a number of developments in the Ballpark Neighborhood.
The new renderings are the latest updates in the city’s efforts to redevelop the ballpark, which has been without a main tenant since the Salt Lake Bees moved to their brand-new stadium in Daybreak earlier this year. The University of Utah’s baseball team played their season at Smith’s Ballpark, but their season ended in May.
Salt Lake City officials have worked for months to decide the fate of the ballpark. The city announced last December it had three redevelopment routes to choose from — preserve the stadium, tear down part of it or tear down all of it. Ultimately, Mayor Erin Mendenhall announced during her State of the City speech in January that the city decided to take the second option, as the city opted to keep part of the stadium and repurpose it.
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