Downtown SLC Economic
Benchmark Report

JULY 2026

Hello Downtown!

You came here to cheer, to shop, to sing along, to work, to build, to raise a glass, and to live. Perhaps you are among the fans and patrons who drove downtown venue ticket sales to an all-time high. You may be one of the young, educated professionals living downtown, or a hospitality worker, an artist, or one of the 400,000 Salt Palace conventioneers who poured billions into our economy. It is clear, Downtown vibrancy is crowdsourced.

Downtown has entered its most consequential decade in more than a century.

Over $10 billion has been committed to 26 projects. The Sports, Entertainment, Culture and Convention District is imminent; an all-new Salt Palace Convention Center is being designed to welcome more high-spend visitors; University of Utah is bringing student housing, programs, colleges and employees to the downtown core. And Temple Square is being readied for a six-month open house that will bring millions to the heart of our capital city.

Downtown-adjacent projects include the Western Governors University campus, a Major League Baseball stadium, the Power District and a 9-acre hospital campus. Perhaps it is time to expand our definition of downtown?

While the Downtown Alliance champions these projects, we recognize that our most impactful work is in the social domain in between the projects where people interact every day–the sidewalks, storefronts and public spaces. Downtown Alliance promotes and advocates for downtown merchants, venues and arts organizations. We rally stakeholders, activate parks and streetscapes, and attend to the incremental improvements that don't always warrant a press release but generate the conditions for a thriving city.

When you step into Downtown, you help create something that no single project can – humanity and vitality. We champion that too, block by block. The data that follows is evidence of your impact. As always, we welcome your input to guide our efforts Downtown.

Derek Miller
President and CEO

Dee Brewer
Executive Director

Downtown Customers

What is a customer day?

When someone spends more than 60 minutes downtown, the Downtown Alliance counts them as a customer visit. We use mobile phone data analytics to measure all visits by visitors, workers and residents.

Top customer visitation days are highly correlated with days when there are Salt Palace conventions, Delta Center events, and arts and culture programming at the Eccles, Capitol and Rose Wagner theaters, Abravanel Hall and other downtown venues.

Of Note

— Saturdays have the highest visitation.

— Sunday visitation is up 20% since 2019.

— Resident census is up 63% since 2019.

— Worker census is down 32% since 2019.

Acknowledgment
We have used Placer.ai data to measure Downtown visitation since 2020. As Placer has refined their data sets and measurements we have adopted these improved data for all years to make the most accurate measurements and comparisons. Some data that we reported in past years does not align with the new and improved measurements for those years.

Downtown Fans & Patrons

They came to play: downtown sports, art, and entertainment attendance

Downtown owes a round of applause to Mammoth fans, arts patrons and planetarium space nerds. They made up the largest segments of the 4.7 million attendees at Downtown venues in 2025–a 16.3% increase over 2024.

Continued growth in the social economy is expected with robust programming across the venues, the addition of a 6,000-seat performance venue in the entertainment district and Delta Center returning to year-round programming after final arena renovations in 2027.

Downtown Venues

Abravanel Hall
Capitol Theatre
Clark Planetarium
Delta Center
Discovery Gateway
Eccles Theater
Gallivan Center
LDS Conference Center & Tabernacle
Megaplex Theatre
Rose Wagner Theater
Salt Lake Film Society
Sky
Soundwell
The Complex
The Depot
Twilight Concert Series

Delta Center: The high 2025 ticket sales is notable given the venue was closed from April through September for hockey arena renovations. Go Mammoth!

Clark Planetarium: reported all visitors in 2025, whereas previous years reports included only ticket sales (IMAX and Dome).

Estimates: The Complex and The Depot, did not report data. The Alliance made modest attendance estimates based on a percentage of the venues’ capacity and the number of advertised shows.

Of Note

Beyond the venue data: Downtown Alliance produced or supported 161 activations and events in public spaces in 2025. This includes the Downtown Farmers Market, The Blocks Arts District performances and installations, and cultural festivals (Greek, Japanese, Italian, Utah Arts Festival). These activations attracted hundreds of thousands of visitors.

Downtown Visitors

Supercharging the Downtown economy

OF NOTE

— 255 hotel rooms were added at the beautiful Asher Adams in the historic Union Pacific Depot. 216 Kimpton Hotel rooms are under construction. –

— 512 rooms were retired as the Sheraton and Plaza hotel properties were repurposed for other developments.

— The Salt Palace Convention Center will be closed September 2027 to 2031 for construction of a new state-of-the-art convention center with a second ballroom, right-sized exhibition space and integration with adjacent sports, arts and entertainment amenities.

Downtown Residents

Downtown residents are the first Downtown customers each morning. Residential population in the Central Business District grew 9 percent this year and has increased 63 percent since 2019.

(Below) Downtown residential developments, like The Charles, are marketing their amenity rich rooftops and common areas.

Of Note

— After a construction surge in recent years, downtown rental rates are down 8.25 percent and landlords are offering creative concessions to capture market share.

— Domain Companies started construction on a new residential tower this year at 400 South West Temple.

(Left) 99 West (South Temple) luxury condominium tower.

(Above) The Worthington apartments at 275 South 200 East.

Downtown Workers

We're gonna brag: Downtown's broad, stable mix of law firms, energy companies, financial firms, and state government hubs is a resilient career network. Most downtown workers commute less than 10 miles. 15 minutes is all you need to reach SLC International Airport, the number one airport in the nation with more than 300 daily flights. Downtown is also a great place to come home to with dozens of award-winning bars and restaurants, 16 venues for music, sports, arts and entertainment, and access to 150 miles of trails about a mile from the heart of downtown.

Of course, we have competition: Denver, Phoenix, Reno, Boise, the silicon slopes of Draper and Lehi. Sorry–not sorry–Downtown SLC is winning! Our Utah talent is more educated, multilingual, economically diverse. We have more destination dining and bars on one block than either of the slopes. Our economic diversity and tier-one urban evolution–including NBA, NHL, professional symphony, opera, ballet and varied performance venues–handily distances us from Boise and Reno. Also, workers in Denver, Phoenix and the slopes are painfully car-dependent and traveling on interstate highways that can't grow any wider.

Downtown's position as the hub of the Wasatch Front will continue to enhance our competitive profile.

Economic Praise for SLC

  • #1 Easiest City to Do Business in North America

    Arizona State University’s Center for the Study of Economic Liberty

  • #1 Best State in the Nation

    2023, 2024, 2025 U.S. News & World Report

  • #1 Best State Economic Outlook

    18th consecutive year, Rich States, Poor States 2025

  • #1 City for Young Adults

    MoneyGeek

  • #1 Best Mountain City in America

    Fodor’s Travel

  • #2 Best State to Start a Business

    WalletHub, January 2026

  • #3 Best-performing Large City

    Milken Institute, January 2025

  • #4 Best US City for Job Opportunities and Earning Potential

    Checkr 2025

  • Top 50 Best Places to Travel in 2026

    Travel + Leisure, January 2026

Downtown Office Market

Class A supply-constraint is driving rate increases

The Downtown Class A office market vacancy is 16.1% (direct) or 17.1% including sublease inventory. These supply-constrained conditions are accelerating annual lease rate increases. "Fifty is quickly becoming the new forty for the top-tier Class A office space," quipped one Downtown commercial real estate pro, noting that Downtown's annual rate-per-square-foot is not a barrier for the financial, professional, and Fortune 100 companies actively evaluating Downtown SLC options.

Downtown office product owners are leaning into hospitality and adding amenities to compete for Class A tenants. New Class A inventory from new construction is at least three years out. Our commercial real estate advisors tell us that Downtown will likely miss opportunities without enough Class A square footage to suit high-value tenant needs.

Of Note

— Five Class B office buildings in the greater downtown area were converted to residential and other uses in the last four years.

— In-office and remote work schedules continue to evolve. Fidelity Investments, one of downtown's largest employers, is moving from fifty-fifty in-office/remote schedules to five-day-a-week in-office schedules for all staff.

Transportation

To Downtown; Through Downtown

Resilience is built into downtown SLC's multimodal transportation network to accommodate an extended workforce of 56,000–two interstate highways, light rail, heavy rail, buses, bike infrastructure, free-fare zones and a generous parking supply.

Downtown Retail

Retail rents climb with customer volume and investment Downtown

Downtown's retail landscape is evolving away from standalone storefronts toward more retail being integrated into cohesive urban projects with residential and office space. Fans of the Utah Mammoth and other Delta Center programming are already boosting foot traffic and energizing the Sports, Entertainment, Culture, and Convention District.

Adding to the momentum, Western Governors University is developing a large-scale mixed-use campus on nearly 10 acres downtown and bringing 3,000 new employees to the campus. This increased activity and investment is contributing to strong rent growth, reflecting growing confidence among retailers and investors in the downtown's long-term trajectory.

OF NOTE:

Downtown consumers spent $2.1 Billion on shopping, dining, entertainment and accommodations in 2025; up 6.1% over 2024.

Looking Forward

26 projects, $10 billion in investment,
a dynamic decade for Downtown

We are entering the most consequential decade of investment in Downtown’s history, as we become a tier-one city, with a lift from Utah’s elite statewide economy.

  • Sports, Entertainment, Culture & Convention District

    Sports, Arts, Culture and Convention District

    The Utah Jazz and Utah Mammoth will anchor this $4 billion investment. It will include an additional 6,000-seat performance venue, new hotels, residential tower, and arts venues.

  • Convention Center

    A Modernized Convention Center

    The Salt Palace Convention Center will undergo a generational rebuild to delight meeting planners and accommodate more high-spend visitors. Growing upward, the new center will have more versatile space, a second ballroom, and improved accessibility and amenities.

  • Downtown SLC at night

    A Six-Month Open House at Historic Temple Square

    The walls around historic Temple Square have come down and the public can already see new visitor centers and gardens. As renovations of the iconic Temple are completed in 2027, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints will open the Temple to the public during a massive six-month open house. The Alliance estimates $320 million in additional spending at downtown merchants, restaurants and venues.

  • Airport in SLC with 2034 Olympic logo

    2034 Olympics and Paralympic Winter Games

    The Winter Olympics Games are eight years away. In addition to the entertainment district investments and other new hospitality amenities, Salt Lake City is exploring infrastructure improvements to welcome the world back downtown and support long-term visitation and economic development.

  • Library Square rendering

    Library Square / Civic Center Green Space

    Salt Lake City’s Vision study of the blocks that contain the Main Library, former Leonardo and City Hall aspires to make it “Downtown’s front yard … a shaded, people-first destination … comfortable throughout the year” and a venue for public events.

  • UMOCA

    Utah Museum of Contemporary Art

    UMOCA is among the jewels set in the Sports Entertainment, Culture and Convention District. Leaders are in the early phases of developing a right-sized, welcoming and artful new home between Abravanel Hall and the Salt Palace Convention Center.

  • Rio Grande Neighborhood renderings

    Rio Grande Neighborhood

    This SLC Community Reinvestment Agency project proposes a new Downtown neighborhood on 11 acres between the landmark Rio Grande Depot and Intermodal Transit Hub.

  • University of Utah students

    Welcome Utes!

    The University of Utah is developing housing for 5,000 students downtown and developing programming at the historic Rio Grande Depot, City Centre complex and other properties downtown.

  • WGU rendering

    Western Governors University Plants a Flag Downtown

    The former Sheraton block is being developed by WGU with multiple uses designed for 3,000 employees, student programs and other community assets on their HQ campus.

Development Pipeline

1.   Power District

2.   UTA offices and Intermodal Hub

3.   Rio Grande District

4.   Sports, Entertainment, Culture and Convention District

5.   Japantown

6.   West Quarter Phase 2

7.   Greek Orthodox Church Community Center

8.   Pioneer Park renovation

9.   Post District

10.  Historic Temple Square

11.  UMOCA

12.  Salt Palace Convention Center

13.  The Domain Companies, hotel and residential tower

14.  Western Governors University HQ

15.  Pioneer Trail

16.  City Creek Center tower

17.  Hines project

18.  Hines Sun Dial Tower

19.  City Creek Center tower

20.  Kensington Investment Company

21.  University of Utah project

22.  Northwest Pipeline Building residential project

23.  Library Square/Civic Center

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