What if the Utah Jazz moved the Delta Center a few blocks to the northeast and played five games in two days?

Picture that, and you will have some idea of what downtown Salt Lake City could be like this weekend when The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints holds its 170th Annual General Conference.

Conference parking graphicRequires Adobe Acrobat.

The event will be the first held in the church's new 21,000-seat Conference Center. But attendees are also expected to fill the 6,000-seat Tabernacle, home to previous conferences, and the 1,200-seat Assembly Hall for simulcasts of the conference. And, weather permitting, another 2,000 people could sit on the lawns of Temple Square and listen to the live broadcasts.

That's up to 30,200 people attending each of five sessions — Saturday, 10 a.m.-noon, 2-4 p.m. and 6-8 p.m., and Sunday, 10 a.m.-noon and 2-4 p.m. That's 151,000 people, nearly doubling the population of Salt Lake City for the weekend.

Jazz games attract about 20,000 people. But as Salt Lake City Police Capt. Scott Atkinson points out, those basketball fans arrive at the same time and leave at the same time.

In the two hours between General Conference sessions, about 60,000 people will be either coming or going — driving, riding, carpooling, walking, parking, standing or just milling about.

"It's going to be new for us," Atkinson said. "It will probably help us prepare for the Olympics as well."

Fourteen additional city police officers will be posted downtown Saturday and Sunday, primarily to direct traffic.

"I think the traffic downtown will be a mess," Atkinson added. "Come early."

But not too early. Church officials have asked attendees to begin arriving no more than 90 minutes prior to each session so that people from the concluding session can leave.

"Obviously, we want this to be a good experience for everyone attending the conference and not be a frustrating thing," said church spokeswoman Kim Farah. "People just need to plan ahead."

The church plans to pay the Utah Transit Authority up to $20,000 to operate its TRAX light-rail system Sunday. TRAX normally operates six days a week.

During a test run of the Conference Center on Tuesday, TRAX cars were packed heading into the city for the 7 p.m. event.

The church is required only to pay UTA the difference between operating expenses and fares paid. If a large number of people purchase TRAX tickets ($1 one-way, $2 all-day pass) Sunday, the church may not have to pay — or pay very little — to operate the system Sunday.

Anyone, not just conferencegoers, will be able to ride TRAX on Sunday. TRAX will make its regular stops and depart every 15 minutes beginning at 7:45 a.m. Sunday. Trains will depart every 30 minutes between 5:30 p.m. and 10:30 p.m.

Saturday, TRAX will run on its regular schedule from about 5:30 a.m. to midnight.

"We encourage car pooling and also car pooling to the TRAX stations because the buses are not going to be running" on Sunday, Farah said.

A minimum of 5,400 parking stalls will be available in nine downtown parking lots. Frequent shuttle buses will take people from the lots to the Conference Center.

Another 700 downtown parking spaces will be available beneath Main Street when the Conference Center is officially dedicated in October.