GRANARY—Not many years ago, there was little reason for a typical Salt Laker—let alone Utahn—to find themself in the Granary District, beyond getting lost on the way to Kilby Court or what was then called Frida Bistro.

Roughly bordered by Interstate 15, 300 West, 1000 South and 600 South, the area was once a hub for industrial activity, with businesses sprouting up around the freight rail lines that branched off of 500 and 400 West. But the railroad moved and business dried up, with the Granary falling into a decades-long period of decline and neglect.

It's a far different picture today, and visitors will find diners enjoying pizza on the Slackwater patio or a cocktail at Woodbine, entrepreneurs and young professionals buzzing in and out of the Industry co-working space, sports enthusiasts enjoying the Granary Campus and Evo hotel or music fans rocking out at Granary Live.

Or, maybe they're not visitors at all and instead are among the hundreds—and potentially thousands—of new residents lured in by Granary and the surrounding area's proximity to downtown, its walkable trails and transit access, or its unique blend of brand new and very old, retrofitted housing.

"We're moving at full speed here," said Andrew Dasenbrock, founder of Kiitos Brewing. "I genuinely believe that even with all the changes you're seeing now, you will not recognize this neighborhood in two years—down to the sidewalks, trees, grass, all the things that just haven't been here for decades or maybe even a century."

Kiitos opened in 2017—as did the nearby Fisher Brewing on 800 South—and Dasenbrock has had a front-row view to the evolution of the Granary District. While still a work in progress, he said he can't help but be amused when customers comment on how rough the neighborhood appears, since he remembers picking up trash and discarded needles, being chased by men swinging chains and throwing rocks or dealing with open-air drug sales and prostitution near his doors.

"This is absolutely paradise compared to seven years ago, and I absolutely believe that trajectory is going to continue," he said. "It has been two years since I've picked up a needle in the parking lot."

Blank Slate
The Granary District's already hot trajectory seems poised to shift into a higher gear, with the opening this summer of Granary Live (742 S. 500 West, SLC) and with several long-gestating infrastructure and development projects nearing their respective finish lines.

Vaughn Carrick, a partner with the company that owns Granary Live, said his team was looking for a space close to the city center that could compete with the suburbs' large outdoor venues, like Saltair and the Usana Amphitheater. "At the end of the day, the music and the talent on stage is what drives people anywhere," Carrick said. "But to have the luxury of being downtown—to be able to Uber, ride bikes, even walk—I think it is appealing to people who want to get out and enjoy the music but also to get out and be social."

The venue is off to a strong start, with its inaugural season including big names like Ludacris, Shaggy and Sean Kingston, the day-long Utah Is For Lovers Festival and, in August, the Utah Beer Festival, presented by Salt Lake City Weekly (tickets on sale now!).

"There's just kind of a cool energy about Granary that I think is going to drive more and more people down there," Carrick said. "We're very thankful to be in this position and the support that we've seen thus far has been more than we've expected."

Some of the more overt changes to the neighborhood are centered around Industry, the city-block-sized warehouse space revamped for any number of new tenants. A massive parking structure is under construction across the street, which will eventually be enveloped by additional retail, housing, plazas and landscaping.

"We are working on about 40 acres," Industry co-founder Jason Winkler said, "some of it ourselves, and some of it in partnerships."

Critics of urban growth often paint pictures of once-sleepy streets stuffed with car traffic and imposing apartment complexes replacing quaint bungalows. But the shift in the Granary is much closer to the strategies promoted by urbanists, with historic structures updated when possible rather than being razed, with high-frequency transit decreasing the need for car travel and with mixed-use housing and commercial investment filling in the gaps left behind by shifts in the economy.

Winkler launched the first Industry in Denver's River North—or "RiNo"—neighborhood, a once-struggling part of that city Winkler described as "a close cousin" to the Granary.

Development trends and constraints in Denver made it clear to him that RiNo was primed to explode, and he recognized a similar dynamic at play in the former railyards of the Wasatch Front. "It's not like we had to knock a bunch of houses down," Winkler said. "You can't have unbridled growth, but you also can't be anti-growth. You have to find that balance, and I think Salt Lake City is doing that."

Developer James Alfandre said the goal isn't to create a brand new neighborhood but, instead, to create a thriving version of the neighborhood that already exists. He said the Granary is an example of why Utah shouldn't fear growth, but instead should look to get ahead of it and capitalize on its opportunities to improve quality of life overall.

"That's why we have to get the Granary right. We can show that it can be done here in Utah, it can be done in Salt Lake, we can grow in a way that plans for this growth and this housing shortage," Alfandre said. "It's not quite a blank slate by any means, but there's a lot of opportunity to do something special—to fill in the missing teeth and to keep the Granary the Granary."

Bumps in the Road
Back in the early 2010s, Alfandre was part of a group of Granary stakeholders who began pushing for change. Seeing the potential for a vibrant, mixed-income space, they began hosting formal and informal events aimed at bringing eyeballs into a forgotten part of town.

A block party was held in 2011, and organizers hung silhouettes in the windows of abandoned buildings to simulate occupancy. That block party morphed into Granary Row, which saw shipping containers dropped into the middle of 700 South along with a beer garden, small shops and a performance stage.

"At this point, we didn't have any permits," Alfandre said. "No one even came down there anyway so we knew we weren't going to get caught."

Those efforts helped get the attention of private investors, who began scooping up empty, undervalued parcels. But the street improvement envisioned by Granary Row has yet to motivate changes from City Hall.

Alfandre said the Granary is best experienced on foot or by bike, but the large streets and imposing city blocks make it challenging to get around. But that same space can be an asset, he said, if it is used effectively, a sentiment shared by others.

Industry is asking the city to effectively cut 500 West in half, while Dasenbrock is adamant that the decommissioned Union Pacific rail on 400 West be removed, arguing that its corridor could be quickly converted into a walking path or parklet.

"These humongous streets in Salt Lake City are currently a bit of an eyesore and they're a little silly, because they're so car-forward," Industry's Winkler said. "But they're also a huge opportunity if developers and the city can work together to make them developable space, linear parks or whatever that might be."

Salt Lake City has made major improvements to 900 South—reducing vehicle lanes and building the 9-Line trail—and added painted bike lanes to 700 South, which helps to slow traffic and boost pedestrian activity.

But 400 West and 500 West have remained stagnant in the midst of the Granary explosion, in part due to larger ambitions for the area. The city wants 500 West for its Green Loop linear park project, while the Utah Transit Authority wants the rail on 400 West for a Trax line.

Dasenbrok said he worries about how the Granary will fare during the decade of bureaucratic battles—at best—that would precede those or other projects.

"That [rail corridor] is an absolute cancer for the Granary District," he said. "You could put the most beautiful buildings on both sides of that and it's just awful. Your entrance and greeting into the Granary District is a decrepit, rundown train line filled with trash."

He also noted that street lighting and tree cover are near zero in the Granary. Private development is helping by adding lights and planting trees as new builds go in, he said, but the city needs to address the remaining deficits as soon as possible.

"We're not going to be resting under that shade for a decade or two," he said, "but the sooner and bigger trees go in here, all the better."

Winkler also emphasized the need for long-term planning, saying that he and other stakeholders are perpetually looking five to 10 years into the future. The previous state of the Granary shows how dramatically a neighborhood's fortunes can change, but Winkler described a "virtuous cycle" that can self-perpetuate under the right conditions.

"We just need to keep doing what we're already doing—and that means continuing to build the right mix of housing, office, retail and getting some hotels in here," Winkler said. "If you get the formula right—the right mixture of those types of spaces—you just continue to attract more and more people. And as long as you're bringing more people with every passing month and every passing year, the area continues to get cooler into the future."

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