On a cold November afternoon last year, the operator fired up the backhoe and swung a wrecking ball into an abandoned industrial warehouse.
Former Mayor Deedee Corradini, Mayor Rocky Anderson and U.S. Sen. Bob Bennett looked on smiling and clapping as the ball knocked holes in the wall. It was the groundbreaking of Salt Lake City's spiffy new intermodal hub — the main building of which was slated to be finished by Thanksgiving 2003.
Nearly eight months later, other abandoned warehouses remain, and no work has been completed on the much-anticipated hub, which is supposed to join Amtrak trains, Greyhound buses and public transportation such as commuter rail, light rail and bus service in one central locale.
While annoying to hub advocates, the delay has been a good thing for underdog hub opponents, who continue planning to thwart the sprawling development.
The delay comes from a couple factors — uncertainty of federal funding to keep Amtrak operating in Utah and indecision on how big the hub should be, said D.J. Baxter, senior adviser to Anderson.
Now construction on a much smaller portion of the hub — the Greyhound bus depot — is scheduled to begin in August and should be finished a year later. There are no plans for when the rest of the building, near 600 West between 200 and 300 South, will be built, Baxter said.
With construction delayed indefinitely, an attorney for the Poplar Grove Community Council, which stands adamantly opposed to the hub, recently wrote a letter to Lee Waddleton, regional administrator for the Federal Transit Administration — the federal body that oversees federally funded local projects like the hub.
The March letter noted that the Poplar Grove area has been adversely affected by several major projects, including I-15 reconstruction, light rail construction, The Gateway project and the Salt Lake City Rail Consolidation plan.
Attorney Steven Christiansen wrote that the hub will bring buses, trains, cars, taxis and shuttles into the industrial area, which rests just outside Poplar Grove's boundary. He said Salt Lake City, the Utah Transit Authority or the Wasatch Front Regional Council need to conduct an Environmental Impact Study for the hub. The three local agencies have already conducted a less-involved Environmental Assessment for the hub. That EA delivered a "finding of no significant impact," but Christiansen argues a more in-depth, costly and time-consuming EIS might uncover some impacts the EA missed.
He cites a pair of 2002 federal court cases from Utah — the Legacy Highway suit and a lesser-known Davis v. Mineta case — in which judges ruled that federal bodies, in conjunction with local agencies, attempted to circumvent the National Environmental Policy Act by preparing an EA instead of an EIS or doing a sub-standard EIS. This illustrates a pattern that is seemingly being continued with the intermodal hub, Christiansen wrote.
While impassioned, the letter has fallen on deaf ears at FTA headquarters in Washington, D.C. There Greg McBride, deputy chief counsel for the FTA, says his agency has no plans to make anyone do an EIS. Instead, the FTA feels the completed EA is sufficient and the hub can go on when local leaders complete final plans.
"There has been an environmental process on this matter," he said. "We think that it was properly done and we are standing behind the results as they are."
That leaves Poplar Grove residents one last resort.
"I'm sure that we would go to court," Poplar Grove Community Council secretary Michael Clara said.
Beyond the courtroom, Poplar Grove, through state Sen. James Evans, R-Salt Lake City, has contacted their freshman Congressman, Rob Bishop. While Clara said he expected Bishop's office to pen a similar letter to FTA asking for an EIS, Bishop's spokesman, Scott Parker, said no decision has been made.
Already much of the federal funding needed for construction has been secured, including the lion's share of the money needed to connected the hub to Salt Lake County's existing light rail line, Baxter said.
Clara, along with a vocal few in Poplar Grove, insist that construction of the hub, rail consolidation and The Gateway project all contributed to Union Pacific's decision to activate freight trains along the formally abandoned 900 South rail line. Since that line was activated in late 2001, property values near the line have plummeted and residents say they have been miserable — having their homes shaken regularly and being awakened from sleep by train whistles.
E-MAIL: bsnyder@desnews.com