Reflecting Salt Lake City’s commitment to sustainability and energy self-sufficiency by 2032, project stakeholders mandated a venue that would support great performances onstage while performing at an optimal energy efficiency level as well. The new performing arts venue would reinvigorate the entire arts community by drawing big shows and new audiences to the renewed cultural hub. Previously, theater enthusiasts would wait years to see Broadways’ most popular hits come to Salt Lake City. Project stakeholders established ambitious objectives that would extend beyond the performing arts venue as a new landmark of the Downtown Arts District and a cultural destination for the region: the project was envisioned as an economic catalyst for Utah’s capital city, designed to enrich and infuse the cultural context by attracting first-run touring Broadway shows. This set the stage to breathe new life and potential into Main Street’s historic district. In 2008, the decades’ long dream became reality when the Salt Lake City Redevelopment Agency acquired the theater site, which extended over several parcels and included abandoned buildings.
Since the 1960s, the Salt Lake Chamber and the city’s community leaders had envisioned a Broadway-style performing arts center with the goal to revitalize downtown, increase the quality of performing arts, and boost the image of Salt Lake City. According to the Eccles Theater Annual Report, in 2017 the venue used just 30 percent of its budgeted utilities costs and exceeded the predicted energy cost savings while welcoming more than 350,000 visitors to 533 performances.
and Dolores Dore Eccles Theater and the entire Salt Lake City Arts District are buzzing with electricity - but not the kind coming from the power grid.ĭuring its first two seasons and one full operational year, the Eccles Theater has spurred economic development of an entire city block and more than doubled the targeted season ticket subscriptions and revenue projections, raking in more than $2.6 million.