There was a time not so long ago when the Marmalade district just west of Utah's Capitol was a bad area of town.
Bad in the sense that tough crowds roamed the streets. Bad in the sense that most of the homes, some of them more than a century old, exhibited the effects of decades of neglect and dilapidation."People living there tell the same story of the first time their mothers would come to visit, they'd just sit down and cry at the thought of their children living there," remembers Connie White, who with her husband, Rob, bought a house at Quincy and Apricot when they returned to Utah in 1983. "It was that bad."
Today, the Marmalade district is in the midst of an Avenues-like renaissance as young professionals are slowly erasing the symptoms of blight with trendy restorations and architectural face lifts.
Slowly, the neighborhood is recovering.
Like the Avenues to the east, the Marmalade district today appeals to young urban professionals who relish the historic architecture. They also relish the fact the district is walking distance to downtown Salt Lake City where most work and play.
There is no doubt that growth contributes to urban sprawl, traffic congestion, pollution and myriad other problems. But growth has also fueled a revival of historic preservation.
In many respects, history reinforces people's sense of connection to an area's past. Urban planners call it "a sense of place."
"Take a neighborhood like the Avenues and compare it to a new subdivision in South Jordan, and it's easy for people to recognize that one has a sense of place and the other does not," said Rob White, whose experience restoring a Marmalade house has since evolved into a position on the board of trustees for the National Trust for Historic Preservation, the nation's largest and most politically powerful preservation organization.
It is that sense of place that is revitalizing older neighborhoods. Quite simply, urban planners are coming to the realization that not everyone wants to live in a shiny new suburb where every house comes with two-car garages and mammoth yards that need to be mowed every weekend.
Will Fleissig, a planning consultant and former city planner for Boulder, Colo., argues that about one-fourth of urban residents are "cultural creatives" - people who are environmentally active, self-employed, retired, single and/or practice alternative lifestyles.
And these people are often the ones most attracted to historic districts where the homes are smaller, mass transit is a more acceptable means of transportation, there is a greater appreciation for cultural diversity and there is healthy respect for history.
More often than not, they are newcomers. "I believe people moving into the state actually appreciate the heritage of the state more than those who have been here," said Lisabeth Henning, executive director of the Utah Heritage Foundation. "They look at things in a different way, bringing with them a greater sense of how precious these resources are."
But while growth has been and will continue to be a catalyst for historic preservation, growth nonetheless contributes - directly and indirectly - to the loss of community heritage.
The reality of historic districts is that the conveniently located real estate is often more valuable than the historic structures sitting on it. Developers often find it less costly to simply raze the old structures.
That reality has prompted some cities around the country to enact strict historic preservation zoning ordinances that actually prohibit the razing of historic structures. Utah communities have chosen less mandatory historic preservation ordinances, and state lawmakers have encouraged such preservation through tax credits.
But historic restorations are expensive propositions usually requiring a combination of two incomes, plenty of sweat equity and a healthy respect for history. In other words, those engaged in the revitalization of older neighborhoods are typically different - socially, economically and culturally - than those who choose to live in subdivisions.
Growth also contributes indirectly to the loss of community identity. Since the 1950s, the pattern of growth has been toward suburbs and away from traditional downtown cores that were once the centers of social and commercial activity.
Don Stromquist, chairman of the board of trustees for the Utah Heritage Foundation, remembers growing up in Bountiful and the magical attraction of Main Street there.
"I'm not sure I could find my way to Main Street today," he said. "I can find my way to shopping malls and discount retailers and gas stations and fast-food restaurants. But probably not Main Street, yet I'm sure it is still there somewhere."
Stromquist says virtually every town from Nephi to Brigham City and Coalville to Tooele has a traditional downtown core that has been negatively touched by growth. In some cases, the old buildings were demolished to make way for new structures. In other cases, the downtown districts were allowed to become blighted as families and businesses moved to the suburbs.
In effect, the individual identity of communities like Bountiful and Farmington and Murray and Midvale was swallowed by the larger entity known today as metropolitan Salt Lake City.
"I do feel regret about what has happened in Davis County, and it's the same regret I hear expressed about other areas along the Wasatch Front," Stromquist said. "For those of us who grew up here a couple of decades ago, there were once large segments of rural character. Those segments have been subdivided, and now people are saying they miss that quality of life."
Part of that quality of life is the disappearing open space. Part of it is the loss of community identity.
"All of our towns have an interesting history, about the people who founded those towns," he said. "And there is evidence of those people in all of our towns. That is what people miss about where they live now . . . there is no history."
For example, how many people living in Midvale today appreciate the history of the Bingham mine and the generations of families who made Midvale a thriving mining town?
How many people living in the Avenues and Marmalade districts appreciate the fact these homes were built and lived in by the same craftsmen who built the South Temple mansions?
How many people living in Sugar House appreciate the fact it was once home to the Utah State Penitentiary that housed an array of notorious criminals, labor organizers and polygamists?
Historic preservationists believe it is the sense of history that is drawing people back to traditional neighborhoods like Sugar House, Murray, downtown Ogden, the Academy Square area in Provo and the Avenues and Marmalade district in Salt Lake City. The history gives people a sense of permanence that is absent in newer subdivisions.
In a sense, the same growth that first drove people to live in sprawling suburbs may create the problems that eventually drive people to reinvest in the traditional downtowns.
As Stromquist and Henning both noted, part of that reinvestment may be driven by people's need to feel connected with the past. But another part is that these older neighborhoods are also less expensive to acquire (before restoration), are much closer to work and offer access to cultural amenities and eclecticism.
"People start adding up how much their time is worth, how much time they are not on the freeways, how much more time they have with their families, how much they save on commuting costs, and all of a sudden these old neighborhoods start looking very attractive," Henning said.
Georgia Ball, principal broker for the Ramsey Group and past president of the Utah Association of Realtors, couldn't agree more.
People are looking at older neighborhoods where housing prices are reasonable, and where sweat equity can compensate for the lack of a hefty down payments.
Just as the Sugar House, Avenues and Marmalade districts are now trendy for young professionals, she is predicting a renaissance for Rose Park, Central City and old Murray - all somewhat blighted areas where the houses have an appealing architectural character and convenient location.
"I don't think we will ever totally lose them (historic areas)," Rob White said. "Wherever you see growth, you also see groups seeking to safeguard it, like Park City's ferociousness in defending their Main Street and Ogden with the Egyptian Theater."
Growth causes people to say "let's save what's good about the old and remember what the city used to feel like because we liked it that way."
The irony of urban sprawl is that it pushes people farther and farther away from traditional community centers. And further away from the sense of place that has defined Utah communities for 150 years.