New expansive construction plans for point of the mountain announced

DRAPER  — Construction on a new living and working community where the state prison once stood in Draper is set to start next spring.

Plans for phase one of The Point were unveiled Monday. The plan includes 100 acres of office space, retailers, restaurants, an entertainment venue, housing, parks, trails and more.

The Point of the Mountain State Land Authority and the private development company Innovation Point Partners (IPP) formally signed an agreement to begin construction on the project that spans 600 acres. IPP will invest $2.3 billion in the project and report to the land authority annually.

Alan Matheson, executive director for the state land authority said they took 16,000 responses from Utahns into account.

“This is a state project, which means all residents of Utah are owners of it and we wanted to make sure that what we do makes their lives better,” he said. “This will be years in the development and the speed will be based on the market we’re trying to move it along quickly and provide the benefits to the people of the state as soon as we possibly can.”

The Utah Legislature invested $165 million which will be paid back with interest over time with revenue from the property.

That funding will be used for infrastructure and major utility installation as well as a new river-to-mountain range trail which will connect the Jordan River Parkway to other trails that lead to the Provo Canyon. The funds will also be used to create a new FrontRunner station.

Other parks and open spaces will be built, including one that surrounds the former prison chapel.

About 3,300 housing units will be built which includes 400 affordable housing units.

“That’s based on the median income of the area,” Matheson said. “We’ve also created a housing trust fund that will take money generated from the site and use it to create affordability opportunities throughout the region.”

The project also aims to be more sustainable by using low-water landscaping and low-water use appliances, rating buildings on energy efficiency.

“I think a lot of people are concerned about what population growth means for the state. We’re not going to be able to stop it but we can grow in more thoughtful ways,” Matheson said.

Development plans for phase one include:

• Housing — Over 3,300 multi-family residential units, including approximately 400 affordable housing units
• Parks and open space — 16 acres of parks, including a Central Green, where every home is within two blocks of a park or a trail
• Roads — 6 miles of roads
• Trails — 10 miles of sidewalks and trails, including the River-to-Range trail
• Office space — More than 2.32 million sq. ft.
• Hospitality — 540 hotel rooms
• Events center- 60,000 sq. ft. venue that seats 2,000 people
• Retail — 356,000 sq. ft. of world-class shopping, restaurants and grocery stores
• Convergence hall — A building that represents the first piece of the Innovation District at The Point.
• Water — 100% drought-tolerant landscaping
• Jobs — 14,000 high-quality local jobs created
• Parking — 12,650 stalls in multi-level parking garages