A Saturday evening bike ride through Ogden while it’s still real.
By Bob Sawatzki
SL City Weekly - 9/28/06
Utah Highway 89 runs like a river through the heart of Ogden, where its name changes to Washington Boulevard and “crusing the ’Vard” is entertainment in itself. As the parade of vehicles flow past, we sit on mountain bikes in front of a vacant storefront, waiting for the gondola. According to the map, it will pass right over our heads—hard to imagine, considering what the area looks like now. Since the fall of the Ogden Mall, most of the stores on this section of the ’Vard are closed. There’s graffiti, litter and dubious characters (like me) lurking in the shadows.
All this will change when the 21-acre brown field where the Mall used to be is reborn as The Junction, a mixed-use development of residences, retail, entertainment and office buildings. And when the gondola comes, it will be possible to catch a lift with our bikes to the top of the mountain and roll downhill all the way.
Until that day, we’ll have to pedal uphill on our own power, as we always have. So we geared down and started biking up 23rd Street, following the proposed route of the gondola. It will continue in a straight line up this quiet, residential street to Harrison Boulevard.
But it made for a dull, steep bike ride, so when the terrain leveled off at Jefferson Avenue, we did too, heading toward Lester Park and the historic center of Ogden. This part of Ogden will not be seen by gondola riders, almost as if planners were trying to keep tourists from seeing what the real Ogden looks like.
Read the Rest of Mr. Sawatzki's thoughtful piece.
This City Weekly article was linked last night by Bob Sawatzki in one of our lower comments sections. We're always fascinated by the viewpoints of "outsiders" who aren't wholly immersed in the sheer wierdness of the MattGodfreyWorld/Land of Oz experience, so we're promoting it to the main page for today's discussion, for the benefit of those readers who don't bother to read the what's often the best part of this blog -- the comments sections.
We think Mr. Sawatzki for the most part "nails it" with this. But then we hear that $500 million investment "thingy" again. Amazing how that deceptive little meme continues to pervade the public consciousness, innit? We thank Mr. Sawatzki for the submission.
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33 comments:
Rudi:
Yes, I saw that $500,000,000 bit too. But what also bothered me in the City Weekly piece was the assumption that the gondola is a done deal. It's not, however much Hizzonah and Lift Ogden are trying to create the impression that it is.
This article – as is most newspaper people's work – is vacuous. "Gee, if Ogden did this I could ride my bike better and it would be like Disneyland." It's the same level of intelligence applied to the issue that the mayor uses - total superficiality masquerading as knowledge and intelligence.
Nice tour about town. But, his point is?????
An excellent observation on the artificial front Mayor Godfrey wants to create to present to the world as Ogden.
My concern is that Salt Lake City will be doing the same artificial creativity when their downtown area is razed and rebuilt per the grandiose plan the LDS Church has presented for replacement. Then Salt Lake will look like a New York or any other big American city.
Every American city already looks like every other city with all the big box stores and the same chain restaurants. Why the desperate need to destroy all individuality and charm?
Why do City and Church officials think they know what is best for us in destroying our history by razing old buildings.
Americans have this concept that if it isn't the current mod fashion that everything has to be torn down.
Why have Americans for years gone to Europe to sightsee and explore the old marvels of history.
It is good there has been a different perspective over there to preserve the Romans' marvels of aqueducts and road and bridge consturction.
We are destroying our heritage to put in the latest developer's concept of what we should have that we don't want.
Where do i find the Utah League of Cities Resolution re resurrecting eminent domain that has been posted somewhere in the Blog?
It is in these comments.
I just checked and don't see them on the ULCT website for which rudi has a link on the front page.
I imagine you could get on there and find an email address for someone at the league and ask for it. I don't know that it is something they are trying to keep secret.
I don't think it's appropriate to compare the gondola/gondola land grab scheme to what the LDS Church is about to do in downtown SLC. First off, the church will be redeveloping land it already owns with its own money. Second, I don't really think the project is taking anything away from the city. No parks or open space will be compromised, only old (not historic) buildings which will be replaced with newer development. Unlike the proposal here in Ogden, there don't appear to be any losers in the Church's SLC redevelopment.
Actually I think that the old ZCMI building might be considered historic, but they are going to save the facade from that to replace when they rebuild.
And as for the 'current mod fashion' comment, seems to me that they are trying to find something that will attract shoppers cause what they have isn't working well enough to keep the merchants in business renting the space. That sounds like business to me.
If disgusted's comments had only focused on Ogden then maybe he would have a good point but the point seems lost when comparing SLC to Ogden.
What the LDS Church is planning in downtown SLC will be lovely. Turdust rightly claims that the Church is using its own money, not the taxpayers'.
Also, 'open space' will be maintained there. It sounds peaceful. As Mayor Godfrey likes to say..I think it will be the only development "like it in the ocuntry!" Ogden ain't SLC and vice versa.
Here's something to give you all indigestion.
The mayor wants the entire Council to fly to Telluride, CO on a private Lear jet. Whose jet????
They're to go see 'a gondola!!'...Please tell me the comparisons between Telluride and Ogden...PLEASE???
Here's how Matt will save money on this trip (other than sack lunches from home?)
Everyone will pitch in to pay for the fuel!!!
omygosh...wouldn't it be great to show up with a 5 gallon can of gas?
I talked to Dorrene after I heard this and she told me she emailed Cook and the Council that she will NOT be going...why are Safsten and Stephenson bringing up Peterson's scheme? There are no plans, no studies, no show of his money...we all know the non facts.
So how the *&^^%$$#^&* can the little one even THINK of such a hare-brained scheme as to fly to Telluride?
NO comparison to Ogden in the least unless Telluride has a mad mayor too.
Biz jets are a very powerful tool of seduction. That is why there are so many of them. They are mostly rich boys toys used to seduce business associates, employees, sales prospects and starlets. Oh, and they are gigantic tax write offs as well.
Look what happened to our intrepid city beat reporter after he breathed the rarified air at 30,000 feet in luxury with the thousand dollar empty suits. He became an ad copy hack and spit out three major gondola sales pitches masquerading as news stories in as many days!
I am glad to see at least one council person recognizes this jet to Colorado idea for what it is.
You can learn all there is to know about Telurite by going on their web site. It is a little town of about 1500 permanent residents all of which subsists on the the winter tourists who visit the resort that has two centers thus utilizing a free gondola ride between them.
There is nothing in Telurite that will teach any lessons on stringing a gondola for 4 miles over the inner city of an old industrial town of 80,000, a great deal of whom are poor or of modest means and need real transportation options not amusement park rides.
And Mr. Critic - my apology for being wrong about your gender. You not knowing the hand shake and all, well I just assumed. . . . .
Oh, and the current ZCMI facade is just that. It wasn't too many years ago that the place was totally rebuilt and they did Salt Lake's first facadomy. The second was the old bank building facacade facing east just across Main. More recently this method was used on the old sand stone building on State and 3th South, the Brooks Arcade which is now the graphics company headquarters.
And lastly I would agree with those that point out the major difference between what the Church is doing in Salt Lake, and the rape that Godfrey and Peterson are trying to perpitrate on the citizens of Ogden.
The Church project is much vaster than what the Peterson proposal contemplates, the Church, unlike Peterson, has the money to do what they propose, and yet the Church in all its power has not asked Salt Lake to completely re-write the way they have historically done planning, permitting, inspections, etc - like Peterson is presently doing with Ogden.
Sharon:
I think Ms. Jeske may want to rethink her decision to decline. If I were on the Council, I would accept the invite and make damn sure I made the trip. I would want to be there to make sure that somebody was asking the right questions as the Godfrey [and presumably Geiger?] Gondola Sales team went into their spiel.
I'd want to be there to ask, in front of all the other members, what relevence a ski lift gondola servicing a town of three thousand and a well established large resort is for a gondola that would run from downtown Ogden over a cityscape to WSU to connect with a gondola to an as yet unbuilt very very small ski area the economic viablity of which is very much in question.
I'd want to be there to ask this, when they talk about the Teluride gondola having reduced the need for thirty polluting buses to make trips from town to slopes every day: "Well, since there is currently no vehicular traffic to Malan's Basin, how would a gondola from someplace in Ogden to Malan's Basin reduce exhaust emissions in Ogden?"
I'd want to be there to point out that the Teluride experince might have some relevence for the gondola Mr. Peterson wants to build from the head of 36th Street to Malan's Basin, but it has little or none for the downtown gondola the Mayor wants to build. I'd want to be there to point out that Teluride's experience lends some support to former Councilman Jorgensen's "Option B" plan [i.e. Mr. Peterson buys five acres or so at the head of 36th Street for his base station, and then builds his gondola and develops Malan's Basin with his own financing.]
And so on.
And I'd keep asking those questions over and over and over as the sales spiel went on. Absent members on the trip who properly approach proposals with a proper critical eye and skeptical proof-demanding regard for the public treasury, the members of the Council who seem not to want to ask any questions might be more easily swayed by the sales team.
So I'm not sure refusing to go is necessarily the wisest course in this instance.
Curm,
For heaven's sake...all those probing questions you just posed, and you haven't even gone on the Lear jet with the mayor to see that CO gondola!!
So I guess it really isn't necessary to join the littlest guy and his pal, is it? Most folks can just get on the internet and take a 'peek' and make the comparisons. Then the questions just flow, don't they?
It's unconscionable to spend taxpayers money, AND give credence to the Peterson/Godfrey scheme which is no more than an "But I WANT it' vision of these two numbskulls. Make it three or four or five...the Geigers' and Allen ? are in on it also.
Our firefighters and police had to beg and resort to a damn van to get across that the police are underpaid and unappreciated. They do REAL work! Their lives ae in danger on every shift! They drive old cars and have bills to pay and their arrogant Chief publicly calls them 'whiners'.
The city can't find enuf money to pay these courageous men and women a comparable wage to their brothers in blue, yet this littlest person with the massive ego and teensy brain cells proposes taking the entire Council to CO????
I think we have the most corrupt administration in the state of Utah!! Move over Cicero, IL.
Ozboy got it right when he pointed out that most of our town are poor and of modest means. What the &&^%$%^&*& are they going to do with a gondola? We all need good transportation. It's a proven fact as demonstrated in similar cities that streetcars prosper businesses all along their routes.
This gondola scheme cannot and will not help any businesses UNDERNEATH the bloody thing gliding OVER them.(if any).
Let's get real. A lot of money has been expended on Peterson by this littlest person. Money that should be set aside for road repairs, clean water, infrastructure shoring up where needed.
I get sick to my stomach when I see the scams this littlest person of massive ego is perpetrating on the citizenry.
Curm, you already posed the questions. Why don't you get up at Council meeting NEXT Tu and ask them there? And wait for the answers.
There has been no plan, feasibility study of any type, solvenecy of the 'wanna be developer'or any show of good faith from these scam artists. There has been a double speak demand for the city to rezone and amend our Gen'l Plan so the two , three, five....scammers can pillage and rape our virgin greenspace.
Thank you, Dorrene, for once again showing all of us what INTEGRITY is! I do believe you have more than 'anyone in that room'.!
Sharon:
My concern was with the [I think] two members of the Council who have, historically, seemed uninterested in asking questions about mayor-proposed programs. It would not be a good thing to have them going on the trip with the sales team and no one along willing to ask questions, there, on the spot, mid-sales-spiel, in their hearing. That's all. Not to mention that visiting the Teluride operation might provide very good, concrete, examples and illustrations for other members of the Council of why the Teluride experience are not applicable to Ogden's situation.
And so I would not necessarily conclude that any council member who agreed to go is necessarily lacking in integrity, or even that he or she was engaged in an unwise action.
Well, dearest Curm...and I do mean that with deep admiration...I disagree with you. I DO agree that IF this foolhardy trip goes forth, that a good questioner go along. How aobut Kristen Moulton of the SLTrib???
But aren't we putting the gondola above the tracks so to speak?
Petie, Matt, and pals have not produced one shred of evidence that this scheme is good for our town. NOT ONE!
WHY are we (City) spending money and time on a project that is only the mayor's yearning for a legacy and Petie's drooling hope for our land?
I still say he will never build a 'resort' in Malan's Basin. I don't think he ever intended to have a gondola go up there. I think, in MHO, that all he wants is our land.
He hasn't done any studies...at least any that he and Godfrey are willing to share.
STOP TALKING ABOUT THE BLOODY THING and get talking about the issues that matter and impact our citizens! This city does not need an 'amusement park' attraction as Ozboy pointed out. This administration needs to be courting businesses here. Making sure the sewer, water, etc are in place and ready for an influx of businesses.
I read that the Junction is going forward...apts and condos and the megaplex theatre. Yippee! But where are the retail shops in the Junction? I didn't see any mentioned. Did you? Did I skip over that part of Schwebke's reporting?
Will the climbing wall and bowling alley generate a LOT of revenue? Don't we need stores and restaurants in the Junction? The median strip sounds very nice. However, is this a ploy to keep streetcars tracks off WA Blvd?
Do you realize that Ogden does not boast a good shoe repair shop? No fine book store downtown? Are we so blue collar that the populous doesn't want a bookstore? Is Matt right, that our people don't read?
If true, he should just put all his schemes and scams on paper...none of us would read them.
But, I still maintain that Godfrey's 'plan' to go to Telluride to see a gondola that has nothing in common with the lord's vision for Ogden and in no way would have the same visionary function is an unconscionable waste of the taxpayers' money. He is a terrible steward. His whole focus is out of focus and does not benefit anyone but himself, Peterson and sycophants.
Hooray for Dorrene, and any other level-headed Council members who follow suit.
Has anyone noticed the growth in So. Ogden, Layton, Riverdale? Do they have an ego driven mayor who appears to be out of touch with reality? Is a Geiger or two bending the ears of those mayors??
Integrity: "Firm adherence to a code of moral values."
Unless the other Council members subscribe to a RELATIVE code of moral values...I still say that, so far, only Dorrene has publicly placed hers on the line.
I hear Peterson is giving our millions of dollars; just ask him and he will give you some?
Really?
Ya!
I think all Ogden residents would feel better if Peterson paid for and gave out a feasibility study or two. After Don Wilson's feasibility study and talking with others (mostly ski pros) who know the Malan Basin and the slopes area, it seems in reality, that a resort in Malan's Basin is no feasible for the reasons:
1st. It is TOO SMALL. The plan is for CP to have a lodge, condos, retail shops, restaurants, a fire station, security housing, housing for the paid help, a maintenance facility, sewage container, and he would need to provide a water system to support the resort and fire dept. All that needs to fit on about 170 acres,
2nd. Building all the above facilities to make it a viable resort would also make it cost-prohibitive.
3rd. The Basin would have to made level in order to build which would create all sort of land problems from slides.
4th. The ski runs would be of such a dangerous nature that they should be used by expert skiiers safely only.
I am more convinced than ever that CP will NOT build a resort in Malan's Basin, and therefore, the rest of the project is unnecessary and illogical.
So why don't we all stop pretending that it COULD happen and end this charade!
A few months ago, a resident of Ogden offered to pay for the entire Council to travel to Boulder Colorado so that they could see a city that emphasized the preservation of open space. This offer was made at the Smart Growth meeting held at Wasatch elementary, which was attended by over 300 people, including at least three Council members.
To my knowledge, this offer was ignored.
Boulder is very similar to Ogden and has solved its problems and enhanced its assets in ways which have made it a very desirable place to live. If the Council doesn't want to see it for themselves, they should at least look at its webpage.
By the way, they don't have a gondola there.
The Junction is such a joke. The retail planned for there will only draw traffic away from the fledgling 25th street area. These businesses are not exactly booming. The Flowrider and Air Chamber planned for it cost over $40 at other installations. A concrete skatepark in that area would cost a fraction of these novelty rides and draw youth and their parents all day, all year. Skatepark plazas have been installed on the Chicago and Manhattan waterfront redevelopment areas. They are a proven enhancement. I was shocked at the mayor's statements at the Union Station recently. He viewed the frontrunner as simply a way for people in Ogden to leave the area go to Salt Lake. He seems to miss the obvious draw of living in Ogden and commuting to work in downtown SLC. These future commuters will bring good money to Ogden and investment. More than some "empty nesters" who would buy homes on our parklands. The mayor has serious problems equating the successful commuter transit infrastrucures that make places like...say.. Westchester County, New York, Home to some of the most affluent in the country, and that these areas would have no appeal except for the train that allows a rapid commute to Manhattan. These same commuters will park in downtown and get coffe there in the morning and arrive there after work and maybe pick up some wine and groceries...If we had a grocer downtown... can't the city provide incentive to a GROCER. Groceries are ESSENTIAL. This is what gets overlooked in the hyper planning of redevelopment and the desire to create trendy municipal caricature old america mainstreet style.
Dian, Yes Boulder has hit the jackpot with the Pearl Street Mall. I remember when Pearl Street was being redeveloped. It was trashy. It is now several blocks of pedestrian only streetlife. There is everything there including groceries.
I forgot to comment on the SL weekly article.
Typical urban, arty, newsweekly, toilet reading. The guy did nothing to examine anything about this proposal, thus wasting a chance to do just that. The papers need to provide an even mix of stories prevents them from running another gondola story for several months. Maybe the next time they will do some reporting with an angle to inform. His referencing some of the LO BS only entrenches these fantasies in the minds of the casual readers. Why not ask questions??
Dian:
Thanks for the reminder about the Boulder trip at the Mt. Ogden meeting. I'd forgotten that completely. Good point. I notice Hizzonah is not organizing a private plane trip for the Council to visit Portland to see how streetcars there have fostered downtown growth, and improved property values all along the line.
Thanks again for the reminder. Good catch.
I think the Council should take the trip to Boulder. They should be open to several options for a transportation system and developing downtown. I know that is not what the Little Lord Mayor wants -- it has to be his way or no way. I also think that the Council should go to Portland -- they have both streetcars and a very expensive short gondola. If the Council wants to talk to other City Developers, Portland is an ideal place -- they could receive input and perspectives on both a street car and a gondola. They might receive some enlightenment of what NOT to do when installing a gondola system. If that is truly their purpose then Portland would be the ideal place to go to receve input on a gondola. To use the excuse that a council member wants to go to Telluride because he's never been there, does not serve his constituents nor the City well. He's up for re-election next year, folks!
Tod transit wrote: "The papers need to provide an even mix of stories prevents them from running another gondola story for several months."
Why should this be the case?
Many newspapers print letters to the editor in proportion to the number received on both sides of controversial issues. I've noticed that the SE has buried several excellent letters, some containing totally new input, that criticize the gondola project in their web-only "Flowers & Darts" section. A particular favorite of mine is written by a descendant of John Daniel Malan.
Several months ago, a Guest Contributor was told by Don Porter that if her article were to be published, it would have to wait until there was a pro-gondola Guest Contribution to balance it. This same policy, I suspect, led to the juxtapostion of Mr. Martin's excellent feasability article with the Mayor's totally uninformative ramblings.
Of course we want all sides in an issue to have equal access to the media, but to hold one side back because the other hasn't got anything new to say is doing the public a disservice. Particularly in a case where the Mayor has a monopoly on other means of public access.
Dian,
Thanx for the Boulder link. What a lovely city! THREE shopping areas...can you imagine?
I don't think the Council needs to go to Portland. Invite some Portlanders here and let them tell the story of that money eating monster gondola. How about the controversy on thsoe pricey condos, supposedly for the University profs?
Lots of lessons to be learned there.
IF a benefactor will take the Council for a ride to Boulder...GO! See a lovely, pedestrian friendly city WITHOUT A GONDOLA!!!
Going to Telluride makes no sense. A waste of money. A gondola for Ogden, absent any facts to the contrary, makes no sense. From the very little we know of it, it will do nothing economically for Ogden. Quite the reverse.
Let's get on with dealing with real life here, folks.
So, let it go. See Boulder..see how it has prospered.
Sharon:
Well, Sharon, if you approve of the Council taking a privately financed trip to Boulder to gather information about transit and growth and how they relate, I'm hard put to see how you can oppose a similar trip to Teluride. Six of one, half dozen of the other, seems to me. I presume gondola adovocates on the Council would draw from a Boulder trip reasons why the Boulder experience is not relevent to Ogden's situation, just as I would expect gondola skeptics would derive from a Teluride trip reasons Teluride's experience is not relevent to Ogden's circumstances. Hard put to distinguish between the two trips. If one is justified, so is the other. If one is not, neither is the other.
Nah, I don't agree. We WANT Ogden to be pedestrian and business welcoming and friendly.
We should want all businesses that locate here to have a good shot at seeing shoppers or others WALK into their stores and offices. I thot we wanted to preserve our beautiful trails and greenspace?
Boulder has done all that without a gondola! Not only that, but they have THREE thriving and lovely retail areas!
No gondola gliding overhead unable to drop off any interested shopper!
Let's be serious here. I oppose a trip to Telluride when there is absolutley nothing about that enterprise that in any way would give Ogden an edge. And someone, Matt, Brandon, or Rick??? suggested that the Council members who go could possibly chip in on the fuel. oyvey.
Boulder's population is pretty close to Ogden's. WE have scenic beauty that can be hiked! We're close to wonderful skiing and winter fun. We're close to fishing. We have affordable housing, and a great university. A very playable and affordable golf course. Why NOT see what Boulder has done that makes it so inviting? WITHOUT A GONDOLA!
Matt and his pals need to get their feet on the ground and serve the best interests of the citizens. Pushing this gondola which would be up to twenty years out (as admitted by Peterson's att'y) and cost MILLIONS, is assinine to the extreme.
The more we allow Godfrey to propose goffiness like a trip to Telluride to see a gondola only gives credence to this mad little mayor's schemes and 'visions'.
Without one plan, study of any type, list of investors, Chris's solvency, etc....this little person is still attempting to ram the gondola down our throats. Just like he did the funding of the Rec center so that Neilson and Fat Cats could 'anchor' the country's first ever mall with a climbing wall and bowling alley!!
Ever wonder why no other city did this? Now the folks are bonded for a couple decades so that two operators could fulfill Matt's dreeeeeam! Always' first in the country'....how sophomoric can one person purporting to be a 'leader' act?
How about being remembered as the mayor who gave clean water to all the residents?
Sharon:
I agree about the gondola being very ill advised, a huge gamble and not what Ogden needs or wants. But clearly, some on the council evidently do not think so. And so, if a trip to Boulder makes sense to show them, on the ground, what an Ogden sized city can achieve by smart planning for growth, then a trip to Teluride makes sense to highlight how little Teluride's transport and allied problems correspond to those in Ogden, and how a gondola may well have been a fine solution for the situation Teluride faced [resort town of three thousand needing good, and free, transport to an already well established ski resort up mountain] but a gondola running four plus miles over flat urban terrain that will not connect downtown with any resort at all, and only may connect downtown to another gondola that may run to a very small resort not yet built is not a good solution for Ogden, and in no conceivable way is justified by Teluride's gondola's success.
Something valuable to be learned by the undecided at both locations, I'd say.
[And if the previous sentence but one is not the longest sentence I've ever written, it's damn close.]
Boy! I'm impressed!!
Curm, dear...may I address you in such an intimate manner?
Sometimes I feel like the beleagured mother who has finally been pestered to the point of exhaustion by, "but, WHY NOT, mom, huh, mom?" It's at this point that so many mothers just pour another shot of diet coke and whimper...."Oh, go talk to daddy. Whatever he says....".
Curm, dear, if YOU can figure it all out without a trip to Telluride, don't you think those Council members who are 'seducable' (did I make up a new word?), may just want the thrill of being in the private jet with amenities up the wahzoo, I'm sure, and the mayor KNOWS this, so he's on a Foley quest for 'victims' to play along and be beholden? "Come into my web, said the spider to the fly."
Gimme a kiss, honey, I spent a lot of dough on you tonight. Sandy's ain't cheap, you know.
We have too many tailors fashioning the emporer's new clothes with their magic needles.
All the discussion and reasoning in the world will not stop a person with a vision no matter how ridiculous that vision is. The Lafferty brothers come to mind.
Truth and reality are just minor inconveniences to people like Godfrey and Peterson.
So tilt on at these windmills and gondolas, the people with the visions that are foisting these schemes onto the public could not care less.
Six more gondola-related letters (4 opposed, 2 for) to the editor are buried in the SE's latest "Flowers & Darts" online only section today.
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