Board of Adjustment To Render Decision Regardless of New Design
On April 19, 2006 the Board of Adjustment tabled a decision on the citizen appeal of a drive-thru variance for a proposed McDonald’s on South Grand. At that hearing Ald. Jennifer Florida stated “they” would be revising the McDonald’s plan to reflect the Toronto standards that I first suggested on March 20, 2006. Funny, but it almost sounded like Florida considered herself part of the development team rather than the people’s representative. But, I digress…
A May 4, 2006 , letter from the Board of Adjustment states:
“If plans are not received within 2 weeks of the date of this letter, the Board will deliberate upon this matter with evidence already received. If revised plans are timely received, this appeal will be rescheduled for a later date.”
So is the wonder team of Pyramid, McDonald’s, Core States Engineering and spokeswoman Jennifer Florida working on a revised site plan? Probably, because it did not seem like the Board of Adjustment was impressed with the standard menu of small building, tons of parking and excessive curb cuts.
I just called the city’s zoning department to inquire if any new plans have been submitted, I am awaiting a return phone call. Meanwhile the deadline is a week from today.
I have re-read Toronto’s “Urban Design Guidelines for Site with Drive-Through Facilities” and I must say it is quite complete (4.9mb PDF file). The document covers the history of drive-thrus, problems associated with them and reasons for seeking to control where and how they are built. The document should be adopted by every other city in North America, including St. Louis.
Any facility with a drive-thru that is being touted as applying these guidelines needs to front on all public streets. So, a business such that is not on a corner should have its building up to the single street it faces. Those located on corners, however, should have their structures up to the public sidewalk on both streets. Anything less is simply lip service.
The original site plan of the proposed McDonald’s had three curb cuts, two on Grand and one on Winnebego. Way too many for a single business. Anything they submit needs to have no more than two curb cuts. Lighting should also be carefully designed to minimize glare on neighboring properties. But as I’ve said before, this really shouldn’t matter. The McDonald’s could & should just rebuild on their current site and Pyramid should build a mixed use project on the old Sears site.
– Steve
Steve,
Good post. I think that the last point you make is the best however. Why move the building? What pyramid promised has not been lived up to. Putting a McDonalds there is a waste of prime real estate in a growing, but still struggling market. I don’t think residents of this neighborhood should settle on anything less than a building with combined residential and retail, with parking in the rear, and a building that is up to the sidewalk along Grand. It’s the only way to go if this part of South Grand ever expects to be considered a good place to live for city residents. Otherwise, folks in the Melba and Southside National Bank will have a tough time keeping the types of residents they are seeking with their projects. Urban minded people will realize they aren’t moving to an urban neighborhood, and simply go downtown or to the CWE.
“Urban minded people will realize they aren’t moving to an urban neighborhood, and simply go downtown or to the CWE.”
Getting St. Louisans to think “urban” in any neighborhood outside of downtown and the CWE will be a struggle for a long time.
It will take more than young progressives for this to happen.
The city’s democratic machine must buy into the vision, including the cops, firefighters and labor unions.
I’m not sure I can completely agree with downtown and the CWE being called the city’s only “urban” areas. First, it sounds like by “urban” we mean the area has a mix of residential and light commercial. When I counsel clients (as a REALTOR) that are looking for such a mix, I frequently recommend looking at not only downtown and the CWE, but also Soulard, Towergrove south and Towergrove east, even parts of Fox Park and other neighborhoods in the corridor between Soulard and TGE/TGS have this nice mix of residential and commercial. This mix after all is why many people choose to live in the city, and can be found in most neighborhoods of the city. So, I challenge us all to find this wonderful mix or urban St. Louis in all our neighborhoods. I promiss you its there.