The Avenues
The Avenues neighborhood lies on the “benches” of the Wasatch Mountains. The bottom of the Avenues is South Temple Street and from there the neighborhood is built up onto the lower slopes of the mountains. First surveyed in the 1850s, the Avenues became Salt Lake City’s first neighborhood.
The Avenues lie just northeast of downtown Salt Lake City, and just east over City Creek Canyon from Capitol Hill. The neighborhood to the east of the lower (below 11th) Avenues is known as Federal Heights, and is traditionally thought of as beginning north of South Temple Street and East of Virginia Street. It is sometimes considered a part of the Avenues, though the neighborhood may be considered as generally more affluent than the Avenues. Above Federal Heights is a more recently developed area often called Arlington Hills. Compared to the neighborhoods to the east, the Avenues are in places quite steep as they climb the foothills to the north.
The large Salt Lake City Cemetery occupies a significant portion of the eastern Avenues below 11th Avenue, and abuts Lindsey Gardens (park) and the 11th Avenue Park.
The “lower Avenues” (below 11th or 13th) is a neighborhood of older Victorian-era houses, and at one time was popular with younger homeowners looking for affordable “fixer-uppers”, but in recent years a large renovation boom has swept the area. As fixer-uppers are diminishing, it has become less affordable to the younger crowd. It is also especially popular due to its proximity to downtown, the large and remote Memory Grove/City Creek Canyon recreation area to the West, the University of Utah to the East/Southeast, and the airport, as well as low traffic and minimal commercial development.