"Gateway Mall: Aside from food and experiences, what do you go there for?"

-a shallow look at face value-

Dateline, Salt Lake City...

What opened at the cusp of the Olympic games at the dawn of this century, has found itself worse for wear. Not Detroit-beat-down, but certainly not keeping in with what a quarter-century building should be degrading at, considering our climate.

Surrounding

A large portion of locals steer clear of The Gateway because of the multitude of homeless shelters in the immediate vicinity, which invite roving pack of aimless cogs to maraud through.

Access off the I-15 is decent during off peak hours.

Eatings

The restaurant scene lacks depth, character, variety, and destination restaurants. With a few national names and some local startups, the offerings don't scream out for being craveable. Nothing noteworthy or special, the same veggies, meats, and American staples.

Shops

A ghost town. What did you expect? We all save money by shopping online now... We are all equally guilty in the death of local retail.

Mall Infrastructure

Various escalators are usually always off, and the wind and dust kicking through the North-South thoroughfare mall orientation doesn't offer any respite from freezing winter winds or any matter of inclement weather. The huge Biohazard floor level fountain still works, but it doesn't bode well that the last time I was there, it was being used as target practice for peeing children, which is better than a few times before that, when an adult male was using it as a bidet, I suppose.

Parking

AVOID ON WEEKENDS

It's an absolute mess on the weekends, taking 45 minutes to find parking at 7 pm on a Friday. When exiting, doing so after movies let out, or heaven forbid, a Delta Center Event... can be brutal! With the number of spaces this mall accommodates, and the few number of entry and exits to parking, the mall management automatically created a bottleneck at all entry and exit points, costing their patrons hundreds, if not thousands of hours collectively each weekend.

Still being Salt Lake City, car break-ins are common, so leave valuables at home, or better yet, don't have any valuables... less for others to covet and steal, in a nasty repetition of the poor stealing from the poor.

Benefits of Gateway

-Only Dave and Buster's in Utah -not busy on weekdays -main traffic from weekdays is office workers -outside freedom when shopping

It used to be, malls were an automatic destination. Now, it's a struggle coming up with reasons to visit The Gateway.

Final Results

Combine trips. If you aren't jumping on and off the lightrail, you'll need 3 or more good reasons to go through the hassle of going to The Gateway.