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SALT LAKE CITY — It's almost been a year now since Salt Lake leaders gathered by the site of the old Raging Waters water park and drove shovels into a pile of dirt next to photos of what the site could become.
The groundbreaking ceremony signaled the start of a brand-new regional park, the city's first in over six decades. Salt Lake City Department of Parks and Public Lands officials had estimated back in October 2023 that the first phase of the Glendale Regional Park would be open by the summer of 2024.
However, summer has come and gone, and construction on the new park is only getting started for a phase that is now estimated to be complete by the summer of 2025.
Why the delay?
Not long after last year's ceremony, the project hit some fairly significant bumps. Project manager Katherine Andra, a planner for Salt Lake City Public Lands, explained that completing some of the required paperwork and other due diligence took longer than expected. There was also a lot of pressure to make sure they had got everything right in the construction bid so the project is built correctly.
In short, what was already considered a tall order when planning started turned out to be a larger project than initially estimated.
"This is the largest park project the city has undertaken in decades," Andra told KSL.com. "I think the source of the extended timeline is just that translation of a thorough but complex design into a set of documents that can be constructed as we and the public have intended."
The city was required to have a portion of the park open by this spring, based on federal funding the site previously received, but Andra said the city received a deadline extension after explaining the predicament to the Land and Water Conservation Fund, which oversees that requirement.
Construction picked back up earlier this month, as contractors started some initial work to demolish pieces of the old park and clear the land to build the new park's first features.
The delay did help to fine-tune some of the plans for the park, though.
Andra also gave the Salt Lake City Council a park progress update during a meeting on Tuesday. She noted that construction will begin in early 2025 to convert some of the underused tennis courts at the existing Glendale Park — a plot of land adjacent to the old water park — into 12 new pickleball courts. Those are expected to be open by the spring to match the high demand for pickleball, especially on the city's west side.
Four tennis courts will remain at the park. Phase one also includes an all-ages/abilities playground, a basketball court, looped pathways, shaded canopies, a picnic lawn and a new parking lot — all of which would be toward the west end of the old water park.
The project budget is $9.8 million, some of which is coming from fees developers pay for new construction that go into parks spending, while the majority will come from the $85 million general obligation bond that residents approved in 2022.
Salt Lake City Councilman Alejandro Puy, whose district includes the neighborhood, bemoaned the "roadblocks" that have delayed the park's opening. Still, he believes the park will become a "huge win for the community" once it opens.
"We are behind, but we are moving forward," he said.
Completing the park
Plans to build out the rest of the park are also underway. An initial design phase should be completed by the spring of 2025, Audra said, before a more detailed plan is ready in 2026, followed by more construction.
Current plans call for reimagining some of the old Raging Waters infrastructure, such as turning an old pool into a new skate park, making an amphitheater out of the abandoned wave pool, and turning the water park's old slides into artistic features found throughout the new park.
Eventually, a public pool will be built because that was one of the leading requests from residents once park design planning began. Other elements will focus on opening new recreation opportunities by the Jordan River, which flows through the park's eastern boundary.
About $20 million is allocated to the planning, design and construction of this phase, all of which will come from the 2022 bond. Andra said the remainder of the bond money should cover most future projects, but additional funds are likely needed to complete the pool.
However, she's aware that additional site security will likely be needed because a portion of the park will be open before any of these projects come to fruition. The department is working to have a security plan in place by next year, which may include fencing and on-site security personnel to make sure people don't cross into closed areas.
Making sure it gets done
That's not the only concern on the city's mind.
With one major delay in the books, and many other projects floating around Salt Lake City at the same time, Salt Lake City Council Chairwoman Victoria Petro said she wants to make sure that the future park doesn't become another example of a government "horror story," a project that doesn't deliver as promised.
That's also something she's worried about with other park projects as new ideas come online and existing parks face maintenance backlogs. Puy believes solving this may come down to lowering expectations every time a major new project begins, so residents are aware that progress will come in steps and not all at once.
Tom Millar, planning and design division director for Salt Lake City Public Lands, said it's also a challenge that the department dwells on regularly. Dealing with it all comes down to long-term planning through various avenues, including the city's Reimagine Nature master plan that it completed two years ago.
"I think that will be a transformative step for us so it does not turn into an every 10-year cycle where we're just preparing for the next big thing and leaving a lot by the wayside," he said.
