Study aims to address transportation barriers between east, west Salt Lake

SALT LAKE CITY (ABC4) — There is a lot of talk about the east/west divide in Salt Lake City. Neighbors say the railroad tracks and freeways split the city in two, and a new study is looking for ways to change that, starting with a series of open house meetings.

Some might say they’re on the wrong side of the tracks. 

“You can’t drive anywhere in my neighborhood and find a coffee shop,” resident Ricardo Mejias said, “You have to go over the train tracks to the nearest coffee shop.”

Mejias has lived on the west side of Salt Lake City for nearly four years. 

“Most of the places I use every day are all located on the east side,” Mejias said. 

Which is inconvenient in more ways than one.  

“If a train is passing, I’ll be waiting 40 minutes unless I take one of the only two ways out of the west side to the east side,” Meijas explained.

East and West Salt Lake City are separated by railroad tracks and Interstate 15, and some residents are feeling the barrier. 

“The train, literally something that divides the east and the west,” resident Rob Cramer said, “We have to sit behind these trains that are increasingly longer and longer, hundreds of cars wide that we have no tracking over and don’t know when they’re going to pass. They divide us from the other side of the town. I’ve gone grocery shopping and had to wait behind trains.”

Transportation officials are studying the problem, and the first step is asking the neighbors how they feel. 

“The biggest problem we have with Transporation is the divide with the east and west parts of the city,” Joe Taylor Transportation Planner in SLC said. 

This is the first open house of many where neighbors can voice their frustrations. 

“Change or pass policies that will provide more resources for more funding or grants to help build up the west side,” Mejias said. 

At the end of the 2-year study, they plan to have a road map for change.