The warehouses Salt Lake City
The warehouse quarter just south of downtown Salt Lake City
The Granary District, brick by brick
Old grain and freight warehouses, some among the oldest in the Intermountain West, served by rail and left behind when trucks took the freight in the 1950s. They are still standing because nobody wanted the land enough to clear it, and now the same brick and steel holds breweries, roasters, studios and climbing gyms. An 1884 Salt Lake brewery name is back in business, and the city's biggest downtown redevelopment block, the Fleet Block, is on its way to becoming public open space.
By Scott Buehler, Moving Utah
Updated October 2026
The short answer
The Granary District is the old warehouse quarter just south and west of downtown Salt Lake City, where century-old grain and freight buildings now hold breweries, roasters, studios, climbing gyms and offices behind their original brick and steel. It kept those buildings for an odd reason: trucks took the freight that rail used to carry through the 1950s, which ended the district's whole purpose, and for the rest of the century nobody wanted the land enough to clear it. Two things anchor a first visit. A. Fisher Brewing, an 1884 Salt Lake name reopened in 2017 as an employee-owned brewery, and the Fleet Block, 8.75 acres the city owns and is turning into public open space. Come in daylight, pick two or three stops, and use the 9 Line Trail along 900 South as your spine, because this is a working industrial area as much as a night out.
Buying or selling in Salt Lake City?
Why it is here
Named for what it stored, kept for what nobody cleared
The Granary District sits just south and west of downtown, roughly bounded by 600 South on the north, the interstate on the south and west, and West Temple on the east. The name is literal. Some of the oldest flour mills and grain elevators in the Intermountain West once stood on this ground, served by rail, and the whole quarter existed to store and move what the valley grew.
That model ended with the freight trains. Through the 1950s trucks took over the freight, the warehouses lost the reason they had been built beside the tracks, and for the rest of the century this was the part of the city people drove through on the way to somewhere else. Which is exactly why so much of it is still standing. Nobody wanted the land badly enough to clear it, so the brick and steel stayed.
What is happening now is the reuse of that stock. As of 2019, close to a billion dollars of investment was projected across the district over the following five years, and the visible result is old warehouses carrying breweries, roasters, studios, climbing gyms and offices behind original brick and steel. It is the least polished part of central Salt Lake City, and the most interesting to walk.
The shape of it
The name that came back
An 1884 brewery, reopened by the people who work in it
A. Fisher Brewing Company was first founded in Salt Lake City in 1884 by Albert Fisher, and for decades it was one of the largest brewing operations in the state. Then it was gone, the way most old regional breweries went, and the name sat unused for a very long time while the industry it belonged to was built back from nothing by other people.
In 2017 it came back, in the Granary, at 320 West 800 South, as an employee-owned craft brewery. That ownership is not a slogan, it is how the company is actually put together, and it is unusual enough in the trade to be worth saying plainly. The taproom sits in exactly the sort of building this district is full of, a plain working one with the roof structure left showing.
It is the clearest single example of what has happened here. A name from the rail era, in a building from the rail era, running on a business model from this decade. Most of the district works on some version of that math, and the places that do it well are the reason people now cross the interstate on purpose.
Directions to A. Fisher Brewing
A name from 1884, a building from the rail era, and an ownership structure from this decade.
The block in the middle
Eight and three quarter acres the city is turning into open space
The Fleet Block is 8.75 acres owned by Salt Lake City, bounded by 800 and 900 South and 300 and 400 West. It was the city's vehicle maintenance yard, and when that operation moved out the block became the largest publicly owned redevelopment site anywhere near downtown.
In 2020 artists painted temporary murals across the buildings on social-justice themes. Those murals turned a maintenance yard into a place people came to on purpose, and they made the block's future a public question rather than a quiet procurement. The old fleet buildings were taken down in 2025.
In August 2026 the city published a final design for a 2.4-acre public open space at 900 South and 300 West, after more than a year of public meetings. The plan calls for about 150 new trees and two shade structures, drought-tolerant native planting, an open lawn and a small amphitheater, room for markets and performances, a water feature for cooling, community tables, and a major public artwork on social-justice themes. The money is in hand: 6 million dollars from the city's 2022 parks, trails and open space bond, and a 2 million dollar grant from the Bezos Earth Fund's Greening America's Cities program, part of a larger Bezos award that also adds trees along the 9 Line.
A published design is not a finished park. As of 2026 the buildings were down and the funding committed, but the ground had not been broken, so treat the renderings as renderings until the space is actually built.
The Fleet Block, in short
How to walk it
One trail up the middle, and long blocks on either side
The 9 Line Trail runs east and west through the district along 900 South, and it is the single best way to move through the quarter on foot or by bike. It gives the district something it otherwise lacks, a continuous route that is not a truck street, and it puts the Fleet Block, the taprooms and the studio buildings within a few hundred yards of one spine.
Beyond that spine, treat this as a district you walk on purpose rather than wander. The blocks are the city's full 660 feet, several have no sidewalk on one side, and the through traffic is genuinely industrial in places. Daylight is easier than dusk for a first visit, and picking two or three stops beats hoping to stumble onto something.
What the district does not carry is the polish of the blocks north of it, and that is the point of coming. If you want the retractable roof and the theater lobby, those are four blocks north, covered on the Main Street page. If you want the version of downtown that still has its roof trusses showing, this is it.
This district changes faster than anything written about it. Businesses here turn over at the speed of a construction cycle, and a lot of what gets written about the Granary is out of date within a year. Places open, move a block and close, and a building can go from studio space to a fence to a hole in one summer. Confirm a specific place is still open before you build an evening around it.
Keep reading
More of Salt Lake City on The Local
Things to do
The top 12, ranked
Twelve picks, ranked, with what each costs and the day it actually works on.
Read the guideThe founding block
Temple Square
Forty years to build, closed for a deep renovation, and still the most visited block in Utah.
Read the guideThe high ground
The Avenues and the east bench
A grid that breaks the city's grid, a 250 acre cemetery, and a canyon on odd days.
Read the guideThe spine
City Creek and Main Street
A creek daylighted through a mall, a roof that opens, and an 1864 shop front.
Read the guideThe south side
Liberty Park and Sugar House
Eighty acres around an 1852 mill, and a park where the state prison used to stand.
Read the guideThe garden
Red Butte and the foothills
A state arboretum, a concert lawn, and a canyon behind it nobody may walk into.
Read the guideThe New SLC
The airport
The first new hub airport this century, four miles out, and that walk to A West.
Read the guideAfter dark
Nightlife and the liquor rules
What the state sells, what the shop sells, and the pour limit written into code.
Read the guideMoving here
Living with the inversion
What the bench buys you in January, and what it costs you in the driveway.
Read the guideThe companion
Salt Lake City, in full
The founding block, the bench, the spine, the warehouses and the season, in one place.
Read the pageQuick answers
The Granary, answered
It sits just south and west of downtown, roughly bounded by 600 South on the north, the interstate on the south and west, and West Temple on the east. The name is literal: some of the oldest flour mills and grain elevators in the Intermountain West once stood on this ground, served by rail. It is a different place from the Warehouse District, a smaller cluster of historic buildings up around 200 South.
Because the reason to build there disappeared before the reason to tear the buildings down ever arrived. The quarter was built as rail-served warehousing, and through the 1950s road freight replaced rail, which took away its whole purpose. For the rest of the century nobody wanted the land enough to clear it, so the brick and steel survived, and that is exactly the stock being reused now.
A Salt Lake City brewery first founded in 1884 by Albert Fisher, and for decades one of the largest in the state before it closed in the last century. The name came back in 2017 as an employee-owned craft brewery at 320 West 800 South, in the Granary District. The employee ownership is the company's real structure, not a slogan, which is unusual enough in the trade to be worth saying plainly.
An 8.75-acre block the city owns, bounded by 800 and 900 South and 300 and 400 West. It was the city's vehicle maintenance yard, and it is the largest publicly owned redevelopment site near downtown. In 2020 artists painted temporary murals across the buildings on social-justice themes, which made the block a place people visited on purpose. The old buildings were taken down in 2025.
In August 2026 the city published a final design for a 2.4-acre public open space at 900 South and 300 West. It calls for about 150 new trees and two shade structures, drought-tolerant native planting, an open lawn and a small amphitheater, room for markets and performances, a water feature, and a major public artwork on social-justice themes. As of 2026 the design was on paper and funded, but the park had not yet been built.
Two main sources: 6 million dollars from the city's 2022 parks, trails and open space bond, and a 2 million dollar grant from the Bezos Earth Fund through its Greening America's Cities program. That grant is part of a larger Bezos Earth Fund award to Salt Lake City that also pays for more trees along the nearby 9 Line Trail.
Partly, and it rewards a plan more than a wander. The 9 Line Trail runs east and west along 900 South and is the one continuous route through the quarter that is not a truck street. Off that spine the blocks are the city's full 660 feet, several have no sidewalk on one side, and some of the traffic is genuinely industrial. Daylight is easier than dusk for a first visit, and picking two or three stops beats hoping to stumble onto something.
No, and the two get mixed up constantly. The Warehouse District is a small National Register historic district listed in 1982, a cluster of buildings around 200 South between 300 West and 400 West. The Granary District is the much larger area to the south, and it is a neighborhood and a redevelopment area rather than a Register listing.
A lot, and quickly. As of 2019 close to a billion dollars of investment was projected across the district over the following five years, and the visible result is old warehouses carrying breweries, roasters, studios, climbing gyms and offices behind original brick and steel. The one caution worth repeating is that this district changes faster than anything written about it, so confirm a specific business is still open before you build an evening around it.
The most interesting blocks are usually the least finished ones
The Granary is where central Salt Lake City is visibly changing, which makes it both the best quarter to walk and the hardest one to price. What a building here is worth depends on what is announced, what is funded, and what is actually built, and those are three different lists. Tell me what you are weighing, and I will connect you with a Salt Lake County partner agent who tracks the difference.
Or call Scott: (435) 357-4345or send Scott a message
Keep going
Continue your Salt Lake City research
Eight more doors into Salt Lake City, chosen for what this page covers.
Questions about Salt Lake City?
Call Scott, send a message, or find out what your Salt Lake City home is worth. No pressure, no obligation.
Referral Disclosure: For moves outside Southern Utah, I can connect you with trusted local agents. If you choose to work with one, their brokerage pays my brokerage (Real Broker, LLC) a referral fee from their commission. This costs you nothing extra, and you are never obligated to use my referral.