Downtown Now! Absorbed By The Partnership?
From MayorSlay.com:
In certain quadrants of the blogosphere, this will be Big News: Downtown Now! has updated its website.
You have to give the mayor’s PR team recognition, they do have a sense of humor. They are referring to my posts about the organization such as this one from October 15, 2005,
Downtown Now! Looking a Bit Dated:
Prominent on their main page is a logo for Celebrate 2004 along with the text “What’s Happening in 2004?” Uh, last time I check it is October of 2005 and rapidly approaching 2006. Clicking on the link just gives me an access denied message. That isn’t going to do a good job revitalizing downtown.
So I eagerly clicked the link to see this new website from Downtown Now! I find a sub-page of the Downtown Partnership’s new site that I posted about on March 27, 2006.
And what is the content of the new Downtown Now! page? A really cool picture of Washington Avenue, a simple paragraph explaining who they are, and:
We now refer you to the Downtown St. Louis Partnership website (www.downtownstl.org) where you can learn more about the exciting happenings in the new downtown St. Louis! We thank you for all of your interest and support!
Just shut it down altogether. Keep the domain name around and direct it to the Partnership’s main page, nobody will know the difference. Since it was all the same people involved people often got the two confused.
The Downtown Now! organization was set up to be temporary so this is a natural closing process. But much work remains to be done. Washington Avenue is doing well but is being damaged by aggressive valet companies as they illegally “reserve” spaces all up and down the street. Gaslight Square was a happening place at one time and it imploded due to its own popularity. The Partnership and the Department of Streets seems unwilling to rectify the valet problems.
The balance of downtown and indeed the entire city is in need of serious planning work. Our zoning dates to 1947 when planners & architects hated cities and wanted everything to be suburbanized into separate use pods. Our zoning does things like encouraging more parking spaces rather than fewer and does not require buildings to abut the sidewalk. Our entire zoning code needs to be scrapped and replaced. Where is the leadership for this mountainous task?
It is nice the Mayor’s campaign staff has the leisure to give out nods to bloggers like myself but this city has some serious planning groundwork to be done and I just don’t see anyone making it happen.
– Steve
Patterson for Mayor, 2008!
Man, do something! I’m tired of leaders who decide to get into office for… what reason? Well they certainly don’t get into because they have good, progressive ideas about how to enhance the quality of life in their city. Too many people are there just because they can be, and it seems their attitudes are… “Oh boy, we can’t do that… we’d have to work!” I feel like a lot of people are elected because they promise to keep things the same.
“Oh you won’t have to worry about progress if you vote for me! I’ll help make sure that 40% of all the buildings/homes remain empty and that you have to rely on your car to get everywhere! Don’t worry, I won’t bring any of that noisy new transit to your neighborhood. And I’ll make absolutely sure your neighborhood remains in poverty so we can eventually tear it down and replace it with empty lots of uncut grass, a surface parking lot, or maybe even a K-Mart or something that will stay open for a year or two before going out of business, but not before sucking the life out of any local business that you have!”
In just one term, man, St. Louis would be a different place. Patterson for Mayor.
[REPLY – Thank you, I am flattered. For the record, the next mayoral election is in the Spring of 2009, not 2008.
I am in the process of reading The Wealth of Cities by former Milwaukee Mayor John Norquist. Many of his examples parallel those of St. Louis. When do we ever discuss the St. Louis budget and how to make government more fiscally efficient? It is the 21st Century but I feel like we are operating in a 1950s sort of mode.
I won’t rule out a run for Mayor in 2009. Maybe it is time to set up an exploratory committee to begin fundraising? – SLP]
Way to feed Patterson’s ego…
So now it’s confirmed: the devil inside is OFFICIALLY the devil inside. Whatever. They’ve all been screwing each other’s cousins, politically speaking, for too long.
Which is why our urban development and planning looks so funny, with the eyes (and the parking lots) a little too close together.
Come on outta the holler, fellas, and let some new blood in the gene pool, before the whole town dies of hip dysplasia.
And the beat goes on.
PS Steve, good for you to not let any mayoral PR ho-dogs stroke your ego. It’s pathetic to watch how easily other people are bought off around here.
Man, I agree. Those zoning codes have got to go! I really want to see some very strict urban zoning codes in this city that make it impossible to build things like Loghborough Commons or the dreadful monstrosity of an uder-utilized strip-mall on Manchester just south of Dogtown.
That strip mall could literally be an entire neighborhood! As could many of these un-urban developments.
It’s just incredibly frustrating that history has proven time and time again the the traditional neighborhood and pedestrian friendly urban design (as opposed to auto-friendly design) is the most effective means of creating and maintaining a sense of community and quality of life, yet our elected officials continue to allow these 50’s era zoning codes to run the show.
The zoning codes in St. Louis are definitely too loose and in some cases directly in violation of good urban design.
I’ve also recently been reading Norquist’s book and I really like a lot of what he has to say about these types of issues. And in regards to the first commentor, good to hear you’re not ruling out a possible ’09. We need some aggressive reform and focus on transit and the built environment which I believe, in many ways, is directly tied to a lot of the social issues.
It may “feed his ego”, haha, but seriously… anyone who takes a look at the first page of this blog can tell that Steve Patterson has a much more acute interest in the current and future state of this city than any of our current elected officials. And not only does he have an interest, which by itself is not enough, but he has taken the time to think through theories and plans about how to accomplish this…something I doubt most people in office have devoted any time to. He attends more meetings than anyone who’s paid to attend meetings, and has an extensive knowledge of our cities codes and policies. Furthermore, his politics are pretty transparent, if anyone wants to know what Steve thinks about issues they can just read all of the posts on this blog or type their question in the “search” column… and that way people know he’s not just making things up to get elected. Unlike Mayor Magoo who constantly posts these short ambiguous statements on his site, often in blatant or thinly veiled promotion of unurban projects by people who have money.
I really don’t mean to elaborate on this… but if Patterson ever runs for Mayor he’ll get my vote as well as the vote of everyone I know.
[REPLY – Thank you again for the “vote” of confidence. It is too early to talk about a run for anything in 2009. While I will not be a candidate in 2007 I have every intention of having an inpact on the outcome of those elections. – SLP]