I’ve got several big projects going simultaneously on the ranch right now. That complicates life and has me running the parts circuit, picking up oddball hardware at everywhere on the Wasatch Back.  While on the road the other day, I was surprised at the number of orange traffic barrels on the highways. The barrel rental business must be like printing money. There are thousands of them scattered around. They aren’t really in the traffic lanes. More often than not, they are stretched out in the shoulder areas where there doesn’t appear to be anything happening. There’s a stretch of them about a mile long on S.R. 32 between Francis and the Jordanelle Dam. Oddly, that’s the only part of that highway that isn’t under construction. There is nothing happening there at all, a condition so rare around here that UDOT needs to warn us about it. I think they are just warehousing the barrels there.  Instead of improving safety through an active work zone, they create a traffic danger by pushing bicycles into the traffic lanes during the weeks when the contractor doesn’t show up. They are really ugly. Sometimes, somebody hits one and they go bouncing through traffic or the wind blows them around. And they lose their value as a warning sign of something different and potentially dangerous when they are so ubiquitous that there really isn’t anyplace you can go and not see one.  Maybe when the number of traffic barrels is greater than the number of people who live here, it’s a sign that it’s time to shut things down for a while. If barrels were rationed, maybe work would get done with reasonable diligence, actually completing one project before ripping things apart for the next. Just a thought. One barrel obstacle course is on S.R. 248 as you enter Park City. UDOT is replacing the guardrails. They are all rusty.  The ironic thing is that the city and UDOT had an epic battle over the design of 248 in that area years ago. UDOT wanted to build it to four lanes.  Park City would have none of it and insisted that the road be constricted by installing a concrete planter down the middle of the road. And to give it that “resort aesthetic,” the guardrails were Core-Ten steel. That’s the pre-rusted finish that makes it look as if the guardrails had been there forever and blend in with the scenery. It was a big deal.  UDOT has now replaced them with the shiniest metal available. They could be chrome plated. Not a whimper from the city. The Core-Ten steel went the way of the concrete planter. So those battle scars were wasted.  There’s actually a lot of that around here when you look back. The community melted down over the construction of a Pizza Hut 45 years ago. The Pizza Hut people wanted to build their normal franchise building — an ugly-tilt up concrete box with a distinctive bright red roof on it.  Park City was not having it, especially not in a neighborhood as architecturally treasured as Prospector Square in the 1980s. It almost went to litigation over whether the red roof was a “sign” (which would have been too big under the sign ordinance) or part of the building.  In the end, the swords were sheathed and they put cedar shake shingles on the building in a dark and non-reflective red. The building isn’t even there anymore, replaced years ago with the Insta-Care clinic. But it seemed existential at the time. Another great battle was over the film studio, which was bitterly opposed because the planners had decided that there should not be large buildings in the entry corridor along 248. That one also involved a proposed MIDA-sponsored hotel on a patch of federal land along there.  The city and county both fought that to defend the openness of the entrance to town and keep it free of large buildings. Then they built the Health Department, the ski team building, hospital, ice rink, Peace House, more medical facilities. And suddenly the film studio blends right in. But that multi-year battle involved courts, the state Legislature and even Congress on the part of the proposed Air Force hotel. The fundamental principle involved was that Park City must end at the neck in the canyon, and east of there was to remain open and rural. Pace’s cows and Osguthorpe’s hay field.  The result is obvious, with such open space as Park City Heights, the whole medical campus, ski team, Studio Crossing and the string of auto body shops along U.S. 40.  And soon, a new Maverik gas station with another traffic light to gum up the works at Quinn’s Junction. I was involved in some of those fights, especially the Pizza Hut stand-off. I watched others from a distance, noting how the red-line position of “no large buildings in the entry corridor” was repeatedly compromised and surrendered. And where else was there space to build something like the hospital if not there? Times change. But I have to wonder what things would look like now if the Air Force/MIDA hotel had been built on the “totally unacceptable” location on 248 instead of becoming East Village. Maybe we could have had Core-Ten guardrails and a non-traditional Pizza Hut as part of the deal. Tom Clyde practiced law in Park City for many years. He lives on a working ranch in Woodland and has been writing this column since 1986. The post More Dogs on Main: Yesterday’s planning battles appeared first on Park Record. ...read more read less