Hadley Township Redevelopmemt, A Planning & Policy Failure
In the 1940s-60s many neighborhoods were razed for grand urban renewal schemes. These were often the oldest parts of cities and they often showed signs of decay because of deferred maintenance & lack up updates during the Great Depression and WWII. Commonly called “slum clearance” the practice was also known as “Negro removal.” The replacements for these neighborhoods were all failures. Planning practices failed
millions of people and cost taxpayers billions. In the City of St. Louis nearly all of these areas have now been wiped clean of the failed urban renewal projects and started over.
But in inner ring suburbs of St Louis County we are seeing these past mistakes repeated. Starting in 1991 Kirkwood annexed and later wiped out half of the Meacham Park neighborhood, an area first platted in 1892. This area was and is a troubled area. To read redevelopment documents you’d think it was the street layout and 25-foot wide lots that sold drugs on the streets. Half the neighborhood was razed for a Target/Wal-Mart/Lowe’s big box center adjacent to I-44 at Kirkwood Rd (aka Lindbergh).
Brentwood must have liked what Kirkwood did because they wiped out another lower middle class black neighborhood for their own Target at Eager & I-170/I-40. Or did Brentwood come first and Kirkwood follow their example?
Maplewood got into the game by razing a neighborhood along Hanley for a horrible strip center anchored by Wal-Mart, Sam’s & Lowe’s.
Richmond Heights has their own long established predominantly black neighborhood, Hadley Township, in the SE corner of Hanley and I-64 (hwy 40). Unlike the other areas mentioned, Hadley Township was a respectable middle class area. Homes were mostly owner-occupied and well maintained. But then their municipal government decided to take the path these others did — designated an entire area adjacent to a highway for redevelopment. Of course they have other neighborhoods adjacent to the highway at major roads but those have wealthier white residents who might be able to stop a redevelopment plan.
In January 2006 — nearly three years ago, I attended a Richmond Heights meeting where prospective developers presented their ideas to the city and public. The place was packed. Most were concerned about how much they’d receive for their homes — long before realizing they were in the wrong place and were going to be forcibly removed through eminent domain. Few cared what was going to be built in place of their homes because they’d no longer be there to care.
The Richmond Heights City Council picked what I thought was the least desirable of the proposals. The good thing was they made a decision. That meant residents could finally move forward with their lives — get bought out & relocate. No more waiting. Or so they thought.
This past week they and the rest of the public learned the developer doesn’t have the money to move forward. Like the project that couldn’t in Sunset Hills (I-44 and Lindbergh) an entire neighborhood is caught in a weird situation. Some folks have already moved and now have two mortgages. Some were bought out and those properties are boarded. It is uncertain if the project will ever get done even if the city grants the developer the 1-year extension they have requested.
In too deep.
When this all started you had a stable middle class neighborhood. That has now been destroyed — not by bulldozers but by a failed planning process and a political system that is willing to toss aside good people and a stable area to chase regional sales tax dollars.
Those who still remain are no longer in the same neighborhood they loved. This is what too often happens when we start thinking of wholesale replacement of an area. What should happen is to determine what is best for the community and guide growth in that direction over time through the use of zoning. This would guide the area to gradually change and transform slowly – in line with the natural market.
The planners & officials responsible for this debacle all need to resign in shame.
Prior posts:
- 1/12/2006 – announcement of public meeting
- 1/13/2006 – review of proposals
- 2/9/2006 – City Council makes selection
Further Reading:
- 8/29/2008 – Biz Journal article on prior short term extension
- Richmond Heights official Hadley Township Redevelopment web page.
- Developer’s website for this project, Hadley Heights & Hadley Center.
One, given that the financial markets are in the toilet, it’s no surprise that the developer can’t get financing for a speculative retail development. Two, saying that urban renewal was “all failures” is too broad a statement for me – success or failure can be measured many different ways, and while many projects were not very “successful”, especially over the long haul, their failure can also be blamed on location and changing demographics, among many other things, in much the same way we can only speculate on whether the blighted areas of the ’60’s and ’70’s would have come back on their own, or not – we need look no further than the northern half of our fair city to find failures of both public effort and public policy as well of failures tied to the free market essentially abandoning the area.
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And three, these developments have much less to do with “improving” a neighborhood or a community and a whole lot more to do with chasing retail sales taxes. Since there are, what, 80+ cities in St. Louis County, there’s a lot of (too much?) incentive to build something new to try and capture a bigger part of the finite amount of sales taxes out there. In this case, Richmond Heights simply wants a bigger slice of the pie that Maplewood is currently “stealing”, directly across the street, at the Maplewood Commons. Consolidation/merger would solve much of this “problem”, but it’s probably politically untenable. A “compromise” position would be centralized county sales tax collection and a per capita formula for distributing the revenues. If you live in Ladue or Belle Rive and spend your money in Richmond Heights or Maplewood, you’re taking money away from “your” city and giving it to residents of the city where you buy your clothes or your ipod. The current “system” is simply biased toward maximizing retail sales. Redevelopment, emminent domain and tax-increment financing are just the tools that (greedy?) cities use to build more and newer and “better” retail, to attract (steal?) more customers and to feed the revenue requirements that every government has.
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Until the fundamental tax structure is changed to minimize the current attraction of the retail sales tax, any other argument, even design-based ones, will be essentially futile. Zoning can be a guide, but it can also be changed. None of these developments was zoned for the retail that was built – the cities simply changed the “old” zoning to something that would fit their new sales-tax-driven paradigm! Sales taxes are “attractive” because, hey, you’re mostly taxing non-residents, and they generate more in revenues than they consume in services. The same can rarely be said about property taxes. Solve the revenue side of the equation, and you’ll have a much easier time solving the design and quality of life sides of the equation . . . .
No doubt that the rabbit being chased is retail tax revenues. However, this plan to annex Hadley began 10 years ago when the City put the neighborhood in play. The recent turmoil in the financial markets is a convenient excuse for delaying this project but ignores the truth. There have been many delays and only those supporting the abuse of ED power are still spinning positive themes.
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One of the originally stated goals was to increase residents in a City that has experienced a population decline of 35% in the last 20 years. Eventually one of the extensions included revised plan designs which would lead to less homes and less people than the community had to begin with in order to create larger and more intrusive parking lots. Even though cars don’t spend money, the elected leaders cater to this group as most potential spenders are outside city limits and are overly car dependent. And just imagine a Metro train station is in a short walking distance.
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In addition, more problems have been placed on the quality of life for residents as the City planned along with the County and MoDOT to make the area friendlier to cars, not people and especially not for pedestrians. But the design was flawed from the beginning and the proof is in the disastrous results. As stated and predicted in Feb ’06, a grand opportunity became a grand illusion.
The city and developer have strung along residents for years. At least up until a year ago, they were still telling residents “don’t worry, we’ll get the financing.” The residents were the only ones who read the writing on the wall. The city continues to give the developer “one more chance” and approving emergency extensions for the developer. Those residents were abandoned by their city. That so many of those residents, many whom are elderly, had to get lawyers, spend hours upon hours in council and planning meetings and have had their lives disrupted for the last few years is downright shameful. And for what? Another empty shopping center? Another hotel? Unbelievable and unexcusable.
I’d love to know more about the razed neighborhoods in the city–I’ve been going through some genealogy (to keep from going crazy tracking the elections) and every St. Louis ancestor lived in areas that were razed, turned into other things, and are now mostly boarded up housing projects or fallow fields. Don’t know where I’d look–any hints?
The shame is the people being displaced are usually in desirable parts of town and are never adequately compensated for their relocation to a less desirable location, school dist, etc. We will be living with the Kelo decision for a long time. ED needs to be seriously limited for commercial purposes.
Victimization. Vultures circling. A Council more than just confused as homeowners were led to believe a decision was to be made at the Council meeting. Instead more delays and misinformation was presented along with a poorly designed homeowner’s survey.
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The buyout offers raised the assessed values of the homes and thus higher property taxes are being collected. The school district superintendent explained that district revenues will be hurt if another extension is granted. Mills suggested that a new round of RFPs should be considered. Michelson wants another year added (to the many already) to the contract in hopes that credit can be obtained and anchor stores can be persuaded to sign leases. The residents want some earnest money and a resolution so they can plan for tomorrow.
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As stated in Jan ’06 and remains true, past performance portends a less than satisfactory result. The contract deadline for the Council to act is October 29. Welcome to the St Louis region where poor results, confusion, frustration, anger, higher taxes, lower property values, etc., are all fostered and supported by a region divided by design.
I don’t disagree that way too many urban renewal projects have over-promised and under-delivered – too many government programs do. And, as you point out, urban renewal was superseded by a series of equally unsuccessful programs. I do take exception with the concept that any one program is or can be the sole reason an area thrives or declines, or that any one program is a total failure or a total success. Both government and urban planning are complex juggling acts – the law of unintended consequences interacts with economic realities and “factors beyond our control”. People in government generally have good intentions. Sometimes, however, they’re cursed with believing that doing something, anything, especially something “big”, is more important than maintaining the status quo and encouraging incremental growth. Locally, the Loop, the CWE and the downtowns in Maplewood, Webster Groves and Kirkwood are all good examples of what many of us consider to be good urban areas, they’re also areas that support strong retail markets. The question then becomes, which came first? I’m no fan of eminent domain, but like urban renewal, it can be an effective tool, when used appropriately and sparingly.
This is happening way too often in STL City and County. There is currently another debacle ready to break in Affton, where an out-state developer wants to wipe out thousands of excellent middle class brick homes along Mackenzie and Gravois for ……wait for it…………….another big box development/strip mall! Just what we need (NOT!) Again, no concrete financing plans have ever been relayed to the public and since this started about 3 years ago before our massive economic problems (and behind the scenes with Campisi in full support) who knows what will happen, maybe it won’t happen now, but did we not learn anything from the Sunset Hills chaos??
John, you must have been at the meeting last night. It must be hard being a resident there as not even the city council had any idea what was going on or if they were actually voting on anything. I found Mayor Beck’s dismissive behavior embarassing.
And even if they do manage to build the thing, who is to say anyone would move to their business there? Lots of vacant storefronts everywhere.
This is good news for Hanley Township in one basic way: the neighborhood won’t be wiped out. The city should find money to repair and market the homes already bought out — or force the developer to do so. That is a solid neighborhood with good houses of modest size — perfect antidote to the bloated homes and projects that have wrecked our economy. While the crash is tough, I am not sad at all that it is destroying projects of dubious need. The brakes were needed awhile ago.
The Council has agreed to extend the contract another 60 days which would move the deadline on the other side of Christmas. The project is divided into three zones. The Council was not forthright in revealing what may happen next as some of the best positioned property belongs to the City. The numerous delays have made the timing worse as the economy is heading south. The City has a serious conflict of interest in these decisions, a common problem in the region that few here seem to appreciate.
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Sorry but if you know the details there is no way the residents can see a silver lining as the situation continues to deteriorate. They were promised to be bought out years ago, many neighbors have gutted their homes, taken on second mortgages and businesses are failing as office space can’t be rented with the erratic and closed door decisions being made by Council.
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No doubt that the plan was greatly flawed but it offered a chance for the residents to move on after years of being told that the City was on their side. At one point there were even plans to install an aquarium on the City’s property to be designed and managed by Jean-Michael Cousteau. That too failed.
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But the sharks were let free and have destroyed a neighborhood. Let’s hope the best for the few residents that remain in the eye of the storm. But the worst is yet to come. The neighborhood is in play and residents are now more dependent on the City than ever before. Residents/owner’s ability to make decisions about their property and lives has been impaired.
sounds like the Blairmont path sans plan,meetings,clear objective from Mckee/Slay
. . . . and thirty-forty years later, you get to do it all over again: http://blog.retailtrafficmag.com/retail_traffic_court/2008/10/20/struggling-malls-can-mean-struggling-communities/