Trolley Square is a partially enclosed

shopping center A shopping center in American English, shopping centre in English in the Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth English (see American and British English spelling differences#-re, -er, spelling differences), shopping complex, shopping arcade, ...

located in

Salt Lake City Salt Lake City, often shortened to Salt Lake or SLC, is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Utah. It is the county seat of Salt Lake County, the most populous county in the state. The city is the core of the Salt Lake Ci ...

Utah Utah is a landlocked state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is one of the Four Corners states, sharing a border with Arizona, Colorado, and New Mexico. It also borders Wyoming to the northea ...

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

. It is considered to be a trendy high-end center. The center is near downtown Salt Lake City and the UTA TRAX light-rail system.

History

Description

Trolley Square is composed of barns that were built in 1908 to house Salt Lake City's

streetcar A tram (also known as a streetcar or trolley in Canada and the United States) is an urban rail transit in which vehicles, whether individual railcars or multiple-unit trains, run on tramway tracks on urban public streets; some include s ...

s. The streetcar system was dismantled in 1945, and the barns were converted into a two-story shopping center in 1972. The center is noted for its unusual architecture consisting of winding hallways, brick and wooden floors, fountains, old-trees, and wrought-iron balconies. Prominent tenants includ
Weller Book Works
Pottery Barn, Cabin Fever (a popular card store),

Williams Sonoma Williams Sonoma is an American retailer of cookware, appliances, and home furnishings. It is owned by Williams-Sonoma, Inc. and was founded by Chuck Williams (author), Charles E. (Chuck) Williams in 1956. History In 1947, Chuck Williams settle ...

, Old Spaghetti Factory, The Desert Edge Brewery at the Pub
The Spectacle
and local boutiques. The mall historically was home to a four-screen cinema and an

amusement arcade An amusement arcade, also known as a video arcade, amusements, arcade, or penny arcade (an older term), is a venue where people play arcade games, including arcade video games, pinball machines, electro-mechanical games, redemption games, mercha ...

. The Trolley Square

water tower A water tower is an elevated structure supporting a water tank constructed at a height sufficient to pressurize a water distribution system, distribution system for potable water, and to provide emergency storage for fire protection. Water towe ...

is a 97-foot water tower that is a prominent feature of the

skyline A skyline is the wikt:outline, outline or shape viewed near the horizon. It can be created by a city's overall structure, or by human intervention in a rural area, rural setting, or in nature that is formed where the sky meets buildings or the ...

, and is able to be spotted from miles away at night. The tower originally held 50,000 gallons of water, and was used to supply the sprinkler system for the trolley barns. In 1972, it was converted into a landmark, and covered in red and blue neon lights. For many years, the tower was a

weather beacon A weather beacon is a beacon that indicates the local weather forecast in a code of colored or flashing lights. Often, a short poem or jingle accompanies the code to make it easier to remember. The beacon is usually on the roof of a tall build ...

, giving the local weather forecast based on the colors of lights, with solid blue being fair weather, flashing blue being

overcast Overcast or overcast weather, as defined by the World Meteorological Organization, is the meteorological condition of clouds obscuring at least 95% of the sky. However, the total cloud cover must not be entirely due to obscuring phenomena near ...

, solid red being

rain Rain is a form of precipitation where water drop (liquid), droplets that have condensation, condensed from Water vapor#In Earth's atmosphere, atmospheric water vapor fall under gravity. Rain is a major component of the water cycle and is res ...

, and flashing red being

snow Snow consists of individual ice crystals that grow while suspended in the atmosphere—usually within clouds—and then fall, accumulating on the ground where they undergo further changes. It consists of frozen crystalline water througho ...

. The Trolley Square water tower was renovated in fall 2014, after years of disuse. During the renovation, the neon lights were removed - and were subsequently replaced with

LED A light-emitting diode (LED) is a semiconductor device that emits light when current flows through it. Electrons in the semiconductor recombine with electron holes, releasing energy in the form of photons. The color of the light (corresp ...

light strips which allowed for a wider spectrum of

color Color (or colour in English in the Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth English; American and British English spelling differences#-our, -or, see spelling differences) is the visual perception based on the electromagnetic spectrum. Though co ...

availability. While the tower coloration is seemingly no longer used to display the weather forecast, different colors are now used decoratively during different

seasons A season is a division of the year based on changes in weather, ecology, and the number of daylight hours in a given region. On Earth, seasons are the result of the axial parallelism of Earth's axial tilt, tilted orbit around the Sun. In temperat ...

holidays A holiday is a day or other period of time set aside for festivals or recreation. ''Public holidays'' are set by public authorities and vary by state or region. Religious holidays are set by religious organisations for their members and are often ...

, or events. Another prominent feature of Trolley Square is the sky bridge that connects the main building to a small parking lot located across the street. The bridge was made from a salvaged ore conveyor bridge formerly in use at the International Smelting and Refining Company facility in Tooele, Utah. The bridge goes over 600 South, and it features neon lights shaped in the form of a trolley.

2007 shooting

The Trolley Square shooting was a

mass shooting A mass shooting is a violent crime in which one or more attackers use a firearm to Gun violence, kill or injure multiple individuals in rapid succession. There is no widely accepted specific definition, and different organizations tracking su ...

that occurred on the evening of February 12, 2007 at the mall. A lone gunman, identified as Sulejman Talović, killed five bystanders and wounded four others before being shot dead by several members of the Salt Lake City Police Department. Authorities were not able to determine a motive.

Location Influence

Trolley Square is a prominent and well-known

landmark A landmark is a recognizable natural or artificial feature used for navigation, a feature that stands out from its near environment and is often visible from long distances. In modern-day use, the term can also be applied to smaller structures ...

in the

area. As such, many surrounding businesses and locales borrow or incorporate the name "trolley." For example, Trolley Corners is a small office building located on the block directly to the east of Trolley Square, as is a small collection of houses that have been converted into businesses - known as trolley cottages. The nearest UTA Trax station is named "Trolley station".

Major businesses

* Alice Lane Home Collection * Ballet West Academy * Cabin Fever * Coffee Connection * CorePower Yoga * Cosset Bath and Body * Desert Edge Pub and Brewery * Alliance Theater * Flight Boutique * Google Fiber Space * Himalayan Artswear * Jensen Technical Services * Lanny Barnard Gallery * Millennium Dance Company * Orangetheory Fitness * Payne Anthony Creative Jewelers * Pottery Barn *

Pottery Barn Kids Pottery Barn is an American upscale home furnishing store chain and e-commerce company, with retail stores in the United States, Canada, Mexico and Australia. Pottery Barn is a wholly owned subsidiary of Williams-Sonoma, Inc. The company is head ...

* Precious Eyebrow Designers * Rodizio Grill * Styld' Blow Dry Bar * SPARK *

Tabula Rasa ''Tabula rasa'' (; Latin for "blank slate") is the idea of individuals being born empty of any built-in mental content, so that all knowledge comes from later perceptions or sensory experiences. Proponents typically form the extreme "nurture" ...

* The Machine Age * The Old Spaghetti Factory * The Spectacle * Trolley Square Barbers * We Olive - The Olive Oil Experience & Wine Bar * Weller Book Works *

Wells Fargo Wells Fargo & Company is an American multinational financial services company with a significant global presence. The company operates in 35 countries and serves over 70 million customers worldwide. It is a systemically important fi ...

Whole Foods Market Whole Foods Market, Inc. (colloquially referred to as simply Whole Foods) is an American multinational supermarket chain store, chain headquartered in Austin, Texas, which sells products free from Hydrogenated fat, hydrogenated fats and artificia ...

Sale and development

Trolley Square is owned by SK Hart Management, who purchased it in May 2013.

References

External links

*
The history of Trolley Square from the Salt Lake Tribune

* [https://web.archive.org/web/20070930122208/http://www.scanlankemperbard.com/news/press_release.php?id=20&PHPSESSID=b6f8c0c4b2f34afc29ee5b00b653d9c2 ScanlanKemperBard's Trolley Square purchase press release] {{Shopping malls in Utah 1972 establishments in Utah Buildings and structures in Salt Lake City Shopping malls established in 1972 Shopping malls in Utah Tourist attractions in Salt Lake City