Wellston Station TOD: Small Businesses in Liner Buildings on Plymouth Ave
In April I posted about the Wellston MetroLink Station and again yesterday. After attending three days of events with Dan Burden of the Walkable and Livable Communities Institute I’m convinced we can make improvements at low cost that deliver a big impact. I’d like to see the following happen between the MetroLink line and the MET Center some 300 feet to the east:
- Allow on-street parking on at least the north side of Plymouth Ave
- Replace the existing sidewalk with a much wider walkway, perhaps to the current fence line.
- Plant street trees to provide shade
- Remove fence to vacant industrial park
- Remove earth berm on north side of fence
- Construct liner buildings 15-22 feet deep where the fence and berm were located. The length to fill is roughly 240 feet to the industrial drive and another 100+ feet on the other side. These would be one story in height, although higher would be fine. The storefronts would provide retail/restaurant/office incubator space.
- Build new sidewalks to actually connect the sidewalk to the entry to the MET Center so transit riders aren’t subjected to walking through grass and driveways and parking.
Liner Building Description: A building specifically designed to mask and enliven the edge of a parking lot, parking garage, public assembly or large retail facility (big box) along a public frontage.
Placement and Massing: Minimum frontage build-out is 60%. Minimum liner building depth is 16 feet. The façade along the ground floor on a Public Frontage must change visibly at an average of at least forty feet (40’) in height, setback, materials, or colors along the street frontage and with no module exceeding 75 feet in length. An entryway must be provided on the ground floor every 40 feet at a minimum. Courtyards or forecourts shall not exceed 10% of the street frontage. (City of Albuquerque North Fourth Street Rank III Corridor Plan)
There are many examples of liner buildings online but the basic idea is to construct inexpensive buildings (temporary or permanent) to either conceal something and/or to create a pleasing streetscape. Let’s take a quick look at the area.
The vacant industrial park is owned by St. Louis County. My idea would create roughly 7,000-7,500 of new retail space immediately adjacent to the Wellston MetroLink Station. Rather than be one small box this could be 7-10 incubator spaces. The wide sidewalk would be more inviting to pedestrians and could provide space for cafe seating in front of a small restaurant.
Locals that live and work in the area know the needs best. Based on what I heard last week a small grocer would be good. This might be a co-op model like the Old North Grocery Co-Op. A small cafe, possibly part of the grocery co-op would also be nice. Passengers on MetroLink passing by the Wellston Station would do a double-take to see a tree-lined retail street with sidewalk tables and bright umbrellas.
I’d love to see local food production in the industrial park but past contamination means growing food in the soil is unlikely. An industrial building with an indoor hydroponic farm is a possibility though.
Other businesses might include a small bike shop modeled after St. Louis BicycleWorks, a newsstand, coffee shop, etc . I’m sure there are local residents that have a concept for a business, they just need help getting started and a place to operate.
I’m going to conclude with the same words I used yesterday: “I’m sure many of you can list numerous reasons why my list can’t/shouldn’t happen. I’m not interested. I’m interested in thoughts on how the type of connection that should have been built 19 years ago can finally get done.”
— Steve Patterson
I agreed with you yesterday, but today’s vision of sidewalk cafes in Wellston is just ludicrous.
Shade trees between the sidewalk and street (the sun is in the south, so shadows will be north of the trees) would be a good and inexpensive idea though.
They wouldn’t be serving $10 tapas but allow someone to carry their foot outside to sit and enjoy. Nobody will think they’re in Clayton but it can work at a basic level. Eating outside on a nice day is enjoyed by everyone regardless of income.
When I was growing up, “eating out” at restaurants was a rare treat that couldn’t be justified on a regular basis. And we for sure didn’t eat outside during the day, because we were at school/work during that time. For Wellston people who have less money than my family did, if they are at all responsible, they should go to restaurants even less frequently. A grocery store, I can understand. But insisting on putting a Starbucks and Whole Foods in their neighborhood strikes me of arrogant cultural imperialism.
A better, more-economically-viable, greener solution might be renovating this vacant structure, on the north side of Plymouth, opposite the west end of the park-and-ride lot: http://goo.gl/maps/6mWI Heck, the adjacent, vacant school could even be converted into some cool artists’ lofts . . . .
I agree those existing structures should be renovated and occupied but I disagree they’re more “economically-viable” options. Where I’m talking has high visibility to train and bus riders and existing foot traffic between transit and the job training center. Plus people at the center that arrived ny car are potential customers. Additionally by replacing the earth berm with a liner building St. Louis Co might actually generate interest in the industrial park.
Wellston is an underserved market. The people that live and work in the area have needs too.
I love how a grocery co-op with perhaps an attached cafe/coffee shop becomes “Starbucks and Whole Foods” in Wellston.
It’s going to take market demand before any of this moves beyond the conceptual / dream stage, so I won’t beat that dead horse, but I would be interested in successful examples of liner buildings actually working in real-world situations, especially outside of CBD’s (like here). I’m not aware of any in the St. Louis region, and the ones I’m familiar with in Denver seem to have struggled to maintain occupancy, especially those focused on retail uses (not residential).
A second concern is why only do the north side? Maintaining the existing bottom-feeding “industrial” uses across the street, on the south side, you’ve only addressed half the problem and increased the chances for failure of anything “better” on the north side.
Finally, which entity will be tasked with all this replacing, removing, constructing and building? Are you assuming local taxpayer subsidies? Regional? Federal? Form-based zoning? A private developer? More than one? The current landowner(s)? Metro / Bi-State Development? Like you, I can envision and I can dream, but I certainly can’t write the checks with lots of zeroes and I really don’t want to see my taxes directed to questionable “development” projects.
The current station is poorly located, hard to reach from major streets, so the bulk of any customers will have to come from transit users and the immediate neighborhood. Like you, I want to see TOD succeed, which is why I question doing it here, instead of in more viable locations. Both the Rock Road and the Delmar station areas offer better opportunities. But if you really want / need to do one in this area, I’d look at relocating both the station and the project north to Page Avenue.
The demand exists, but not in large enough quantities for the free market to care about. A local resident with s dream to open their own small business in their community has nowhere to do so.
The land around this station is controlled by Metro or St. Louis County. Tax payers have invested millions in cleaning up industrial waste but the industrial park hasn’t taken off. This would be a good use of a wasted land while providing an improved connection to the MET Center. Existing buildings aren’t always suited for indoor agriculture. Transit is important so workers can get to their job although I’d like to see jobs go to local workers.
The major road argument makes sense for Walgreen’s but not for someone operating a small retail space in the community.
The market cares about demand in any quantity. However the demand here is low, and it is outweighed by the costs of land, building, labor, bureaucracy, muggings, and so on.
Not attempting to be difficult here…..but…..who do you think will “shop” at these proposed storefront businesses? How many dry-cleaners, fast-food restaurants/small cafes, shoe repair shops, small grocers do you think can be supported in an area like this one? This place looks to be located across the street from a “junkyard”, in the middle of a war zone. What is going to generate the traffic (both on foot and by vehicle) in the area? Do the math. By the time you develop this “liner” buiding, don’t you think that SF lease costs will be so high that even Macy’s couldn’t justify the investment? JZ71 refers to this as a “questionable” development project. I’d say his projections are optimistic, and I’d say any lending institution with any desire to see 2013 would look the other way.
Market realities elude Mr. Patterson once again. He assumes there is limitless pot of risk-free money available for these pipe dreams.
The market reality is the free market ignores low income communities like Wellston, forcing them to leave their community to shop.
The free market “ignores” low income communities because of two words, low and income. By definition, low income equals little disposable income, which implies less / little chance of making a profit UNLESS all you’re selling are the “essentials” that people need to buy to survive. The vast majority of retailers aren’t stupid or so idealistic that they will choose a low-profit-potential location over a higher-profit-potential one. So, I guess, in theory, residents of higher-income communities could choose, or be forced, to drive to low-income communities to shop, passing multiple stores along the way, but I seriously doubt that that will happen. Does it suck to be poor, “forcing them to leave their community to shop”? Absolutely! But the best way to solve that problem is to improve the income / demand side of the equation, and the supply side will follow. Just artificially increasing supply, absent any increase in demand (disposable income) only means the existing retail pie will be further diluted, hurting both existing and new retailers!
No shame in selling essentials, that’s what the Old North Grocery Co-op sells. That store had to be opened by the neighborhood to give local residents a place to buy fresh food without driving more than a mile away. I get it, conventional mass market retailers have zero interest in meeting the needs of residents and workers in Wellston. Just because they aren’t interested in meeting the demand doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.
I agree, there is some demand. The question is how much? A coop remains a viable option IF enough local residents choose to make it a reality. But much like cohousing, it requires a major change in mindset, doing more than just walking in, paying, then walking out.
There’s a reason why small, specialized, neighborhood food stores have mostly gone the way of the buggy whip – in both poor and wealthy neighborhoods – people like choices! If you’re looking for bananas, tomatoes or cumquats, you a) want some assurance that they’ll be in stock and b) you want more than one or three examples to pick from!
There are multiple examples of buildings across the region that used to be local, walkable grocery and specialty food (butcher, baker, etc.) stores. They’re now Dewey’s Pizza’s and record stores, offices and churches, coffee shops and ethnic groceries. Did the government force the original stores to close? No, their customers simply chose to shop at newer, larger stores. Their profits, and thus their reason for being open, went away.
Mt sister-in-law owns and runs a small grocery in a small Illinois town that’s been in the family for decades. They’ve been forced to evolve and change as their competition has changed. The local demographics haven’t changed all that much, either, it’s just that they’re no longer viewed as the primary source for groceries – local residents would rather drive further for a bigger, better selection and the perception, if not the reality, of lower prices.
I get it, you choose not to drive, you want everyone else to be like you. Unfortunately, the freedom the automobile offers is more attractive to most people. I spend my money where I can get the best product for the best price with the best service, and that is rarely the closest option. All vegetables are not the same, all beer is not the same, all restaurants are not the same, all clothing is not the same. I like being able to support local businesses, but, like you, in many ways, it still IS all about me.
The challenge in Wellston isn’t that there are no retail vacancies, the challenge is that people find it hard to make a profit. Building more space doesn’t solve the profit issue, it just increases the amount of vacant space available. And the challenge with trying / expecting to attract customers from outside the neighborhood is that it invalidates your whole walkability argument – most people will drive, with or without transit being available, and it takes dollars out of their neighborhoods that would / could be supporting their “local” businesses!
Who’d shop here? The existing residents and workers in the immediate area that currently have no such local retail options.
While the idea would have merit in another community, Wellston is not that community. According to Wiki, 68.1% of the population is below the poverty line. That means most of us make more money in a few months than the residents of Wellston make over the whole year. People struggling to scrape together LRT fair are hardly going to shop and dine on the way to/from the platform….and if they did, basic amenities are all they could afford.
If only the LRT hadn’t been routed on the path of least resistance….
…then there wouldn’t be LRT at all.
I like it better this way.
And right now nobody is offering even basic amenities.
Businesses that could work here . . . I actually like the idea of hydroponic farming. I also like the idea indoor aquaculture (raising fish and alligators for food). The challenge is that it would be cheaper and quicker to move into one of the many, many existing vacant structures in the region, instead of building new, plus access to transit isn’t very important. (And the way to jumpstart this segment would be to legalize marijuana, creating a whole new market!)
Unfortunately, when it comes to retail, something like a 7-Eleven would be more likely to succeed here than a cafe, coffee shop or bike coop. The major flaw with your idea for 800-1,000 square foot incubator retail spaces along the street here is simply a lack of visibility, foot traffic, drive-by traffic and a major anchor to draw shoppers from outside the immediate neighborhood. A better solution for most budding entrepreneurs would be to start with a cart at an enclosed mall, a cart or a food truck on a city street or even a booth in a flea market or an antique mall than to roll the dice on a larger space in an isolated location, even if it has great transit access.
http://franchise.7-eleven.com/
A cafe could be a place that makes sandwiches and has three indoor tables. Cafe doesn’t have to mean high end.
I wonder how much profit can be made from 3 or 4 indoor tables? I’ve never been in the restaurant business, but there’s got to be a good reason why tables are shoved as closely as possible together in restaurants. And with just 3 or 4 tables, can you pay the monthly mortgage, the heating/cooling/lighting costs, rental on the restaurant equipment, daily upkeep, your own salary, food and beverage purchases, plus put away a few bucks for a slow day, or a rainy day?
Do they raise alligators for food in Colorado?
Yes, in Mosca,near Alamosa, east of Peublo: http://www.trails.com/tcatalog_trail.aspx?trailid=XFA023-SW11
I tried alligator on a stick once at the VP Fair but it tasted like old fish, not very tasty. I wonder if it tastes better with a better preparation?
I see that people want answers to questions that have not been asked in decades. I find that, as Steve suggested, have income and have to spend there resources somewhere else. Why not both ask the surrounding area as well as the Metro rides, what they might support. It could be a dry cleaners, it could be a small deli with groceries (Macklind Deli comes to mind). But if we could work to increase ridership to midtown and downtown from parts west, there are businesses that could certainly work.
Look, where I come from the local gas station carries milk, bread, fresh produce, bait, a few necessities for car maintenance/repair and a few necessaries for the home. It also has a deli counter that sells lunch meat and cheese but will also make you a sandwich, a pizza, and a few other small easy-to-make items. They even have one of them there fancy Lean Mean Grilling Machines, which means you get a hot pressed sandwich just like you’uns can get in the big city! I would consider a place like that as a “small grocery and cafe.” It serves the needs of the locals – most of whom are “low income” – and the occasional passer-by. It generates a job or two and a living for a local family. And it creates a social space that is safe and comfortable, climate-controlled and even has a public toilet for customers.
They serve coffee for a dollar in a styrofoam cup, and the old men can sit at one of the three little tables inside all morning and make comments about everyone walking by on the street. It ain’t no Starbucks, but we don’t hold with no five dollar coffees anyhow.
Sorry to resort to hickspeech, here, but I have to make the point that while Steve’s dreams of multiple retail spaces might be difficult to fulfill, the general idea is sound and the grocery store/cafe concept is great, and could really work in a neighborhood that doesn’t have a lot to offer. It works in rural regions which are even less densely populated and in some cases more desperately impoverished than Wellston.
I’ve been trying to say the same thing, only to be really successful it would probably end up being more like a QuikTrip than a liner building.
They’d be a huge failure. The type of hole in the wall exists throughout the city and inner burbs but not near this transit station because no storefronts exist. Someone has to build them first.
There are multiple storefronts and retail outlets along Olive, southwest of the station, and a nice, newer Sav-a-Lot grocery store (and what appears to be a very-well-done, new, mixed-use structure, under construction, on the southwest corner of Page & Ferguson, in Pagedale) northwest of the station, both easily accessible to Wellston residents. There are also several commercial structures along Ferguson, between Page and Olive, that were likely corner bodegas in their original incarnations, that are walkable to a lot more people / potential customers.
The fundamental problem with your concept is that any TOD here would have to be supported by new residential construction, since there are few residential units within 1/4 mile of the station/your proposed site. (You know the realities, a 1/4 mile walk is acceptable to most people, and a 1/2 mile walk is usually considered to be a practical maximum.) Instead of advocating for liner buildings, why not advocate for true, high-density TOD? With 5-6 story mixed-use structures? On both sides of the tracks? Using all of the available property? There’s plenty of vacant and underutilized land surrounding the station, so why just “put lipstick on the pig”? Creating hundreds of units of new housing, even in Wellston, would be more likely to succeed than building 7,000 square feet of spec retail space in a vacuum. And, alternately, if there’s a need for a snack bar in the Met Center, just do one there!
A handful of tiny storefronts serving the thousands of people who currently use the Wellston station wouldn’t need to be supported by additional housing. There is room for housing east and west of the station and I’d like to see Metro’s vacant parking lot become a mixed-use development someday. Maybe senior housing like’s being built at a station in East St. Louis.
You are correct, there’s a daily average of 1,569* boardings here on Metrolink, for an average of about 100 per hour. What remains unstated is the split between transferring riders and origin / destination riders (who start or end their trips here). Most transferring riders aren’t interesting in lingering and/or shopping, they just want to get to their ultimate destination as quickly as possible, so they need to be viewed as a minor market base. Riders that actually live or work in Wellston would actually provide a more-viable customer base for your concept.
While “thousands” sounds like a lot, the boardings here pale compared to busier stations, where the daily numbers are in the 5,000 to 6,000+* range, and they haven’t created much demand for new retail TOD, either. The real problem is a combination of commuters being concentrated at rush hours (with little traffic or business at other hours) and the reality that Metro prohibits food or beverages on their vehicles, making trying to sell snacks to transferring passengers problematic, at best. Add in the fact that the two nearest stations, Delmar and Rock Road, both see significantly more boardings (2,721 and 2,408, respectively) and are served by multiple bus routes (four and six, respectively, compared to this station’s single Route 94) and you end up with a less-than favorable business model.
*http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_St._Louis_MetroLink_stations
Chicken vs egg, rather hard to have huge demand for retail when no retail currently exists. You expecting people to get off the train and bus, stand next to a vacant parking lot or vacant industrial park and hold up signs of what they’d buy if stores existed? Rock Rd has many bus routes, Wellston has one. Delmar has actual things to do.
So, go ahead and “build it and they will come”? Do you have a developer? Financing? Tenants? A business plan? A TIF commitment from Wellston? CDBG? If this is such a great idea, why has there been absolutely no interest and no movement over two decades?! No one else sees the brilliance in this concept? Plus, you’re restating my points in your last sentence – nearby stations are better positioned to succeed, from both transit and non-transit users.
You know the old cliche in real estate – location, location, location – and this location, to put it bluntly, for 21st century retail, sucks. Plymouth Avenue has very little vehicular traffic and is not directly accessible from Page Avenue. In stark contrast, both the Delmar and the Rock Road stations do have direct access to major roads. In comparison, it’s taken, what, eight years to see ANY retail announced at Ballpark Village, a site with many times the potential customers than around here
This may sound harsh, but the best “solution” for this station, from an operational standpoint for transit, would be to either concede defeat, close it and shift all transfers to the Delmar and/or Rock Road stations or go “all in” and do a full-blown TOD project, with several hundred, multi-story, high-density, residential units supporting the retail you seem to think is needed here. A few liner buildings might be a good start, to jump-start a better location, but a few here, absent any other development, have little chance for any long-term success.
As I’ve said before 1) St. Louis County & Metro have a lock on the land around the station 2) the small scale isn’t of interest to typical developers. That said, I hope to interest a non-profit developer that builds incubators in undeserved areas like Wellston and get Justine Petersen on board to work with entrepreneurs on their business models and financing. You need to grasp the reality that what works for most developers just doesn’t work here, no point trying to put a square peg in a round hole.
Maybe a better first step would be getting one or more food trucks to set up here, on a regular basis, and see how well they do . . . .
http://www.nashvillemobilemarket.org/
http://theveggiemobile.blogspot.com/
That’d also be a huge failure. The local food trucks are used to a guaranteed audience and selling out in 90 minutes, targeting high concentration areas like BJC and Wells Fargo. You really don’t get what it takes to get businesses started in low income areas!
We obviously will never agree on “what it takes to get a business started”, especially in a low-income community, nor on how to keep one going without massive subsidies.
TOD is not a solution. St. Louis County is responsible, not Wellston. Like St. Louis City the county waits on the fairy dust of TOD. Actually there is some TOD at this site. The building on Plymouth, across from the station (I think the address is 6439 Plymouth) was built well after the station was in place.
The building that was built is a typical suburban solution that could be placed anywhere and in no way reflects the location.
St. Louis County has the tools a developer does not. Zoning, the power of eminent domain, the ability to offer tax incentives and just as important the ability to create density at this location.
The surround area, Pagedale, U, City as well as Wellston have had literally hundreds of units of new construction built as affordable housing. The county could have laid a foundation for density by directing a percentage of this activity to this site.
Comprehensive planning is needed at this site to maximize the public investment in light rail. If this was in Helsinki, Finland, a city I am somewhat familiar with, there would be an architectural competition or they would hire multiple architectural, urban design firms to offer solutions (I mean 5 firms, not 2). Nor is Helsinki shy about combining preferred ideas from different solutions offered, (It is also a transparent, public process, unlike the backroom deals in St. Louis)
While a single developer could come up with a comprehensive plan, that single solution may not serve the public interest and optimize the use of the site.
The point is a city like Helsinki would consider the multi million dollar investment in light rail and transportation important enough to invest in urban solutions to enhance that investment. Those solutions are designed to attract developer interest and they do.
The real failure is on part of the county and city government to be proactive in ensuring success of the these stations. Depending on free markets clearly is a faulty approach, and as in the single building already built as “TOD” it is also clear the piecemeal approach does not assure a solution in the public interest.
TOD is a concept more suitable for redevelopment along streetcar or bus lines, not for major or secondary rail stations.
Many of the suggestions that have been made could work, the problem is creating the framework for success.
As a resident of this area I would like to suggest that low-income does not mean no income. The residents of Wellston and the people who frequent the MET Center for programs, meetings etc. are potential users of the services or products that can be offered in Mr. Pattersons strategy. About two blocks from the location being discussed is a small convenience store (on Page Ave) that does a ton of business all day. So much so that at times there are traffic jams for people trying to park in the few available spaces. This store might be willing to expand, but if not, there is already considerable consumer traffic in area. Those who frequent the MET Center, including instructors and other staff are not exactly part of the ‘low-income’ population who live in this community. Better Family Life, Ranken and other entities administering programs in the building might be more inclined to conduct more of their business at this location if there were suitable amenities.
There was a time when the ‘Central West End’ was primarily a ‘low-income’ area – until someone had the courage and strategic insight to begin investing in its transfromation.
Important link: http://www.stlouitod.com This is the official study (funded by East West Gateway) that will identify 5 existing stations for detailed Station Area Plans that will hopefully guide and kick-start TOD in the St. Louis region. If people think that Wellston is or should be a priority, then convince the rest of the region: http://engage.stlouistod.com
Interesting links, I especially enjoyed the site analysis of each station. But the site analysis is part of the problem. Architects (and designers) find solutions. The websites should be offering solutions as well and this crosses onto the other link you reference where they are looking for “ideas”. Yet they don’t outline their own ideas. It should be a conversation, not a one way dialogue, could it be possible they have no ideas? As I have said elsewhere it would probably be good to hold architectural competitions or hire say 5 design firms for competing ideas both for the individual stations and the system as a whole.
Give people something to talk about.
An overall conception of how the “system” might operate is essential and missing. Each station has a certain character, tie the system together. How do you design just 5 sites without referencing the rest? How can successive sites enhance the experience for transit users?
Many ideas should be presented for discussion. There are many possible solutions, but if the connectivity is not considered the system will be weaker by definition.
The blog at the other link seems to demand your ideas, it is odd they don’t offer their own. I couldn’t find a current TOD Framework Master Plan for instance. Have transit authorities been winging it all these years?
In my view the first question to answer is what is the meaning of the entire transit system? Just what is the system going to look like in 2 or 3 decades?
I agree, I think that pathways should be made to help those who are disabled to easily go to their destination. I also think that they should also think of adding lights in the pathway so it would be more visible even in the night time.