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Salt Lake City Purchases Open Space Land Including Piece of Bonneville Shoreline Trail

Salt Lake City Mayor's Office

Salt Lake City completed its last land purchase using money from the Open Space Fund Bond Thursday. 

The Department of Public Services used the last of the Open Space Fund’s money to buy the 145 acres of land north of Ensign Peak called Hell Canyon. This purchase completes the city’s ownership of the Bonneville Shoreline Trail. Before today a piece of the trail was owned privately. Matthew Rojas is a spokesman for the mayor’s office.

“Now it puts the control of the Bonneville Shoreline Trail into the city's hands" he says, "so it does protect our, sort of, access to our trails.”

As part of the same purchase, the city also bought open space in City Creek Canyon ridge through the city’s Watershed Fund. Rojas says these two land purchases will benefit people and the native species on that land.

“It's land for the public to use, but a lot of the land there is native wildflowers, it's native space for wild turkeys year round, mule, deer," he says. "It’s not just the people who are benefiting, but it's also the natural wildlife that exists in that area.”

The public voted on the Open Space Fund Bond in 2003 to buy land surrounding Salt Lake City. It’s set to expire in September. The city has already purchased several parcels of land through the bond, including land along the Jordan River Parkway, Bonneville Shoreline Trail, Emigration Creek and Parleys Creek.

Rojas says the city plans to continue to buy open space as land becomes available. But the city will have to find new funding sources for each of these purchases. 

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