Last week I was driving home on 7th when a bright store at Olive caught my eye.On Monday I was back in the area and snapped the above picture. It wasn’t until last night I figured out this new corner store downtown is a Fred’s Cheapo Depot. Locals will recognize Fred as the guy that has been selling “dirt cheap” alcohol & smokes for years. I’m an avid non-smoker but I may stop in to check out their spirits. This store is certainly better than a vacant storefront.
I’m seeing what appears to be more and more small corner stores throughout the city. What they lack in selection and parking the make up for in convenience.
ABOVE: broken planter on Washington Ave sidewalk between 15th & 16th.
Not quite sure what to say about this broken planter I spotted last week. Mostly I’m curious about who would do this and why. My first thought was someone out partying after they’d had too much to drink. It was definitely discouraging to see.
ABOVE: Mother & daughter walking on Locust at 16th
The other day I stepped out the front door of my building to check out the sidewalk, friends was going to come pick me up and I wanted to make sure I could walk to their vehicle. Our condo association pays a crew to come out and create a pathway. Â At the moment I stepped out I saw a mom & child walking down the street, a reminder we do have pedestrians even in bad weather.
Pedestrians generally walk in a straight line, stepping over curbs as necessary to keep going in the same direction.
People pushing strollers, or using wheelchairs, have to go not in a straight line, but where the curb ramp is placed. Ideally ramps would be located where we could also continue in a straight line.
But most St. Louis intersections place curb ramps, not in the natural line of travel, but at the apex of the corner. On a standard intersection of two streets at a 90° angle the corner ramp does save money by requiring fewer ramps – four rather than eight. The problem however, is the corner ramp has become the local default, even when it makes no sense to do so.
ABOVE: curb ramps at a downtown hotel drive direct you into the snow rather than a straight line
The example above is one where placing the curb ramps at the corners makes no sense at all. There is no opportunity to cross Washington Ave from either curb, the only direction to travel is straight ahead. Most of the year it is just annoying that I’m forced nearly into the nearby vehicle lane. When there is snow in the way I’m forced to go off the edge of the ramp and through some of the snow.
At other intersections I neatly got stuck because my line of travel was beyond the worn path of able bodied pedestrians. The corner ramp is marginally acceptable when you have two crosswalks meeting at a single point. The above ramps should have been constructed to permit a straight line of travel. The cost would have been the same, maybe even less because a ramp is less complex in a straight curb as opposed to on a corner.
Looking at the intersection of 8th & Walnut St it is easy to see why the sidewalks are so empty. Blanks walls, no street trees. Dead zone extraordinaire. Eventually the former Bowling Hall of Fame (far side) will be razed once Ballpark Village is completed. That could be 5-10 years away at the current rate. Will the replacement be any better? The garage destroys the corner anyway.
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