What will be built next to my house in Herriman?

The honest answer is that nobody hands you a single document that says what will be built next door. You assemble it from a few public sources, one phone call and one written question, and in Herriman — where open ground is everywhere and most of it will not stay open — it is worth the afternoon it takes.

This is a process post. It does not tell you what is planned beside any particular house, because I cannot know that for a parcel I have not looked up, and neither can a listing description. It tells you how to find out for yourself.

For a worked example of applying this to a named project, see what is being built at Juniper Canyon in Herriman.

The same homework applies to two related questions: what is lot placement and why does it matter and should I buy next to open space in Herriman.

Why this matters more in Herriman

Herriman is still building. Empty ground beside a subdivision may be a park, a school site, a church site, a future phase of the same subdivision, a commercial pad, a road right-of-way, or a private parcel whose owner has plans nobody has heard yet. From the street, all of those look like weeds and a fence.

A live example just over the Riverton line: Riverton’s planning commission took up a commercial subdivision at the edge of Western Springs in 2025, which is exactly the kind of thing the city’s records will tell you and a listing will not.

A buyer who assumes the field stays a field, and finds houses or a retail building there later, did not get cheated. They did not look. The information was public, and this is how to get it.

The general plan and the zoning map

Every Utah city keeps a general plan — the long-range map of what it intends each area to be — and a zoning map, which is the legally binding designation for each parcel today. Herriman publishes both, and the planning office can point you to them.

The zoning tells you what is allowed on the ground next door right now: residential at a certain density, commercial, mixed use, open space, agricultural. The general plan tells you what the city intends it to become over time, which can differ from the current zoning and is the direction a rezone would move.

Look up the parcels that touch the lot you are considering, on every side, and across the street. I am not going to describe what any Herriman zone allows, because the city sets its own rules and revises them; confirm with the planning office.

Planning commission agendas and public notices

If something is already moving on a nearby parcel, it shows up in the planning commission’s agendas and minutes, and in the public notices the city posts for rezones, subdivision approvals and conditional uses. These are public records. Search the city’s recent agendas for the street name or the area, and read what has come before the commission.

Also look at the signs. A parcel with a pending application often has a notice posted on it. Drive the block and read anything on a stake.

Call the planning office

This is the single most useful step, and almost nobody does it. Call Herriman’s planning office, give them the address, and ask:

What is the zoning on the adjacent parcels, and what does that designation allow?

Are there any approved plats, pending applications, or pre-application meetings on record for those parcels?

Is any of the nearby open ground dedicated open space, a park site, a school site, or a road right-of-way?

Is there anything in the general plan or a capital plan for this area that a buyer should know about?

Planners answer these questions all day. They cannot tell you what a private owner might do someday, but they will tell you what has been filed, approved and designated.

Read the plat

A recorded subdivision plat is the map of the subdivision as approved — every lot, every road, every parcel of common area, every easement. The title company can pull it, the county recorder has it, and the HOA usually has a copy.

What you are looking for is a difference that is invisible from the sidewalk:

Dedicated open space. Ground that the plat sets aside as common area, park, trail corridor or detention — owned by the association or the city and restricted from development. That is the open ground that stays open.

Undeveloped ground. A future phase of the same subdivision, an outparcel, or a neighboring property that simply has not been built yet. That is open ground that is open because nobody has gotten to it.

A listing that says “backs to open space” can mean either. The plat says which. If the house is in a subdivision that is still building, buying new construction in Herriman covers what to ask the builder about future phases.

The HOA master plan

In a master-planned community, the association or the master developer often has a plan showing intended future phases and commercial areas. Ask for it with the HOA documents. It is not binding the way zoning is, and it can change, but it tells you what the developer intends for the ground you are looking at.

The school district, the county and the corridor

Not everything that gets built is housing.

School sites. Jordan School District plans schools ahead of growth and holds sites for them. A future school beside a house means a building, parking, lights and traffic at the same hours every day. Ask the district whether any site near the address is designated.

County and utility facilities. Salt Lake County and the utility districts have their own facility plans — parks, substations, detention basins. The planning office usually knows what is designated nearby, and the county’s plans are public.

The Mountain View Corridor. The corridor runs along Herriman’s north and west, and it was built in phases with more phases planned. If the house is anywhere near it, understand where the future alignment and interchanges are planned, because a road that is a quiet frontage today may be a freeway later. What living near the Mountain View Corridor means for a buyer covers it.

Ask the seller, in writing

Utah sellers disclose what they know, and a seller who has lived beside a parcel may know things that are not in any public file — a neighbor’s plans, a notice that came in the mail, a survey crew last spring. Ask the listing agent, in writing, whether the seller has any knowledge of planned development on adjacent parcels. Put it in an email so the answer is in writing too.

An honest “we do not know” is a legitimate answer. What you are avoiding is the version where the seller knew and you never asked.

Do it inside due diligence

All of this fits inside the due diligence period in a Utah purchase contract, and that is where it belongs, because it is the window in which you can walk away if what you learn changes your mind. After the deadline passes, the field next door is your problem. What due diligence means in a Utah contract explains the deadline and what it protects. If the timeline is tight, do the planning office call and the plat first.

What you cannot find out

Nobody can promise you that the ground next door will never change. Zoning can be amended and general plans get updated. Dedicated open space stays open; nearly everything else is a matter of who owns it and what they decide. What the process above gives you is the difference between an informed guess and a hope. If the answer is legally important to you — an easement, a restriction, a right-of-way — ask a Utah real estate attorney to read the documents.

What I actually see happen

I am Kelsey Earl, a Realtor with Keller Williams South Valley, and the buyers who get surprised in Herriman almost always bought a view rather than a lot.

They stood in the back yard, looked at open ground with the mountain behind it, and priced the house as though the view were part of it. Then the next phase went in, or the school, or the road, and they felt misled. In most of those cases the plan was on file the whole time.

The buyers who are happiest either found out that the ground was dedicated open space and paid for it knowingly, or found out that it was a future phase and priced their offer for a house with neighbors. Both are fine. Not knowing is the only bad outcome.

What to do next

Before you write on a Herriman house beside open ground, pull the zoning on the adjacent parcels, call the planning office and read the plat. Ask the seller in writing. Do it during due diligence.

For the citywide version rather than the parcel version, what is being built at Herriman Towne Center collects what the city has confirmed, including the projects it says are not happening.

Send me the address and I will pull the zoning, check the recent planning agendas and read the plat with you, so the question of what goes next door is answered before your deadlines, not after.