[Ed. note:<\/b> this topic is well past its prime — which was way back around the second week of December, if you’re keeping track — but it’s something I still wanted to talk about, so here we are…]<\/p>\n
I write fairly often on this blog about the changing face of the Salt Lake Valley, how places and landmarks I’ve known all my life are disappearing, and how difficult it is for me to see them go. I’m not sure why this so-called “progress” affects me so deeply, but it does. Watching yet another familiar old house or historic commercial building fall, or an alfalfa field get paved over to make way for yet another WalMart-Home-Depot-Chili’s-cell-phone-store cluster, fills me with a genuine sense of despair. And it makes me downright angry<\/i> that the local Utah culture, collectively speaking, pays so much lip service to its heritage by throwing a parade and fireworks every July 24th, but seems so disinterested in preserving any of the tangible<\/i> aspects of its past, namely the buildings and landscapes of earlier times.<\/p>\n
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Part of why I feel these losses so keenly, I think, is just my nature. I’m one of those people who doesn’t handle change very well, and I have been ever since I was told that my beloved kindergarten teacher wouldn’t be there when I moved on to the first grade. (Man, was that ever traumatic!)<\/p>\n
But the thing that really gripes me about these landscape changes is the sense of inevitability that surrounds them. No, more than inevitability… impotence<\/i>. The feeling that there’s not a damn thing I can do about it, that no one else cares and that there’s something downright odd<\/i> about my emotions on this subject. It often seems like I’m a lone voice shouting into the wind, and all the reasonable<\/i> people can’t wait to see that nasty old stuff bulldozed so they can on with the all-important business of shopping.<\/p>\n
Every once in a while, however, there comes a moment when I find I’m not<\/i> the only voice, when the investors and developers are shocked to learn that a sizable number of citizens oppose their plans, and they’re forced to reconsider the value of old things. Case in point: the LDS Church, which had planned to demolish the historic First Security Building in downtown Salt Lake as part of its new City Creek Center development, announced<\/a> in December that, due to public outcry, the 87-year-old tower would be preserved after all. I was — and still am — elated by this news.<\/p>\n I should explain for my out-of-town readers that the Church owns several blocks of downtown real estate that radiate outward from Temple Square, the very center of both Salt Lake City and the Mormon faith. Two of these blocks are currently occupied by moribund shopping malls, the ZCMI Center and Crossroads Mall, which were built in the early 1980s and have both been in decline for years. As part of the city’s ongoing effort to revitalize downtown — which is virtually deserted after 6 PM and on weekends — the Church has planned to replace these malls with a mixed-use, pedestrian-friendly complex of shopping, restaurants, housing, and office space, the aforementioned City Creek<\/a> development.<\/p>\n In general, I support these plans. Although I have fond memories of hanging at Crossroads when I was a teenager, the existing malls are depressing, decaying eyesores, and downtown on a Saturday is like the opening scenes of The Omega Man<\/i>. I’d love to see Main Street bustling with activity like 16th Street in Denver<\/a>, and I have hopes that City Creek Center might lead Salt Lake in that direction. The problem is that the malls aren’t the only<\/i> structures on those blocks.<\/p>\n The First Security Building — originally known as the Deseret Building because it housed the Deseret National Bank — has stood at the corner of First South and Main since 1919. To be honest, it’s not one of my favorite buildings in Salt Lake. Its facade has some interesting decorative elements, but it’s really something of a plain-jane in my eyes, at least compared to the spectacular Boston and Newhouse Buildings a few blocks south. For me, its most appealing element is the big red neon First Security Bank sign on the roof, which I believe dates to the ’40s or maybe early ’50s. First Security Bank ceased to exist a long time ago, but the sign has been glowing away up there for so long that Salt Lake would look really strange without it, like there’s a hole in the skyline. Plus, there’s the principle of the thing to consider: the building is one of the few oldies left right in the very heart of downtown. Most everything else of its vintage — or of any vintage before 1980 — came down when Crossroads and ZCMI were built. I believe that alone is cause enough to save it.<\/p>\n At this point, the Church isn’t entirely sure what to actually do<\/i> with the building, since the original plan was to put a big office tower on that corner. Personally, I think it would make for some spectacular residential space. I’d love to walk through the marble-tiled lobby every evening on my way upstairs to a condo or apartment, and to give directions to my place by teling people to look for that awesome antique neon sign. We’ll have to wait and see what actually happens to the old girl, but the important thing is that the preservationists actually won for a change.<\/p>\n