Conservation of Wasatch County’s North Fields won’t protect it from potential bypass

It’s an effort to take traffic off the town’s busy Main Street, which also serves as US Route 40.

Attempts are also being made to protect the North Fields open space through which two of the bypass options would pass.

Wasatch County Manager Dustin Grabau said government leaders, including the Wasatch County Council and Heber and Midway city councils, still can’t agree on a specific bypass route. And now Midway is calling for something completely different.

In a recent letter to Wasatch County, Heber City and Wasatch County School District officials, Midway leaders wrote after a recent discussion, they lack confidence that any of the UDOT alternatives for the bypass meet their desired outcome of providing significant relief to the traffic problem.

The letter states, “It is difficult to envision how it [the bypass] will help rather than simply relocate the traffic problems on State Route 40.”

Midway is now suggesting other options be considered like something akin to Legacy Parkway along the Wasatch Front. It's a no-access highway that parallels Interstate 15 and can only be used for through traffic.

Grabau said the Wasatch County Council has not discussed that idea in detail.

“I think we would generally be supportive of things that try to mitigate that impact,” Grabau said. “But ultimately, it's not up to the county to decide what is the best alternative. Really, we're just hoping to end up minimizing any of those negative impacts while maximizing the positive ones.” 

Grabau said the county will continue to wait for UDOT’s analysis from the environmental study now underway. That’s expected to be released by the end of the year.

UDOT

Utah Open Lands Executive Director Wendy Fisher said more than 100 acres have been preserved in Wasatch County’s North Fields and another 300 acres are being considered for conservation.

At this point, she said none of the preserved property would be impacted by the bypass road. But even with the North Fields area protected through conservation easements, she said the land is not safe from eminent domain. 

“Conservation easements are not safe from condemnation,” she said. “I think one of the threats that we have is poor planning, something that threatens all our community character.  That's, I think, the thing that's toughest about the work that we're doing is that if we really think about where the growth is going to occur and how we can grow smart, thinking about really 10, 15, 20 years into the future, how are things going to change. If we don't do that good planning, then those are continuing threats.”

Utah Open Lands is hopeful that its fundraiser this week will help protect even more property in the North Fields.

Fisher said the group will share the highlights of its efforts at the Portraits of Preservation Gala Thursday, Sept. 5, at the River Bottoms Ranch in Midway.

The $250 tickets are almost sold out. They include a cocktail hour, dinner and auction to help preserve open spaces throughout the state.

Fisher said she chose to host the fundraiser in this location because it’s in the heart of the North Fields and surrounded by one of its major campaigns.

“That is adjacent to not only the Kohler Dairy that we protected several years ago, but also the Provo River Restoration Project,” Fisher said. “So, it just expands that amount of open space.”

Utah Open Lands

She said $10 million was raised for the first phase of the North Fields initiative through a combination of federal grants, private foundations and landowner contributions.

Fisher has submitted a $17 million grant application to help protect an additional 300 acres. She expects to know whether that grant money will be awarded in October.

More information about the Portraits of Preservation Gala can be found here.