Community Visioning Recap

Upon the January 2023 Bees relocation announcement, Salt Lake City launched the Ballpark NEXT Design Competition, inviting residents, students, and professionals to submit their ideas for the future of the Ballpark Site. The competition garnered 123 creative and insightful design concept submissions, with the public voting on the finalists to select three winners. The overarching themes heard throughout all of the submissions were collected and formed the basis of the next community engagement step, Community Visioning. (For a full recap of the Design Competition process, click here.) 

Kicked off in August 2023 by the Redevelopment Agency of Salt Lake City (RDA), the extensive Community Visioning process was built on the themes gathered from the Design Competition, as well as previous neighborhood planning efforts such as the Ballpark Station Area Plan and the Ballpark Community Council Ideas Document. In partnership with GSBS Architects, the RDA worked with City residents, Ballpark neighborhood members (residents, businesses, organizations), and area stakeholders to collaborate via in-person events, online tools, and a working group where they discussed pertinent issues, provided feedback, and identified existing positives, challenges, and aspirations. These are engagement steps taken in the Community Visioning process: 

From the gathered Community Visioning feedback and data, the Ballpark NEXT Guiding Principles were created. The Vision and Guiding Principles reflect the community’s values, objectives, and preferences for the Ballpark Site:

The Guiding Principles Report document summarizes the Community Visioning process that took place including, but not limited to, how the process was built on previous engagement, who participated and in what roles, the engagement steps, and the collaborative process that took place to arrive at the final Guiding Principles. 

The Guiding Principles are being utilized as the foundation for the next steps to outline the Ballpark Site’s future. To learn more about the current status and next steps, please visit the Ballpark NEXT home page.