SLU’s New Law School Breathed New Life Into An Old Building, Downtown

The building at 100 North Tucker was built by a developer in 1964, opening for office tenants in 1965. Typical for that era, the 11-story structure had low ceilings and small windows. It was plain, a dog. It’s been “functionally obsolete” for decades now.  Occupancy dwindled to the point the last owner donated it to his alma mater, Saint Louis University.

Last week I got to tour the Saint Louis University School of Law, the new occupant of the building. The tour was organized by the St. Louis Chapter of the American Institute of Architects, our guides were architects from The Lawrence Group who worked on the project.

I’ve not been happy with the direction former SLU President Larry Biondi took the main campus (fenced fortress) but his last project looks to be a winner.  I’ve not tried The Docket restaurant on the ground floor yet, but at lunch on the day of the tour I saw a SLU law student at Empire Deli on Washington. An ugly building was given new life while adding many more people downtown.

Congrats and thank you to everyone that made this happen!

— Steve Patterson

Tucker Offramp Now Open, Adjacent Land More Valuable

Yesterday MoDOT and city officials cut a ribbon to open traffic from I-70 onto the new Tucker.

With the new offramp, and the opening of the Stan Musial Veterans Memorial Bridge in 2014, the adjacent land is suddenly prime real estate. Will it be developed like most highway offramp areas or will it be more urban/dense/walkable? I don’t have any illusions the city will make any such demands so my only hope is Paul McKee comes through with a plan the surprises his many critics.

— Steve Patterson

Cordish & Cardinals Failed To Plan for Pedestrians at Ballpark Village

Last month Alderman Scott Ogilvie called Ballpark Village a “total failure”:

“Taxpayers have earned a better project than they have delivered,” Ogilvie tells us. “The city of St. Louis has been a great home for the Cardinals…and this is a place downtown where we could use a great project…. It’s just maddening to see what I would call the total failure of this project. It is completely unacceptable that the citizens of St. Louis have been asked to subsidize two themed bars [and a parking lot].” (Riverfront Times)

It’s too soon to call it a total failure, large undeveloped areas used for parking is par for the course with a multi-phase development. They should’ve planned the site as a phased project from the start, they’d be further along by now. But it is what it is, we must wait to see about the success of the total project.

In the meantime, I can already say the pedestrian access & circulation is a failure. I got a sense of this back in February when the Phase 1 site plan was released:

No internal pedestrian was shown on the drawing, but I knew the final might be more detailed. Might, but it quickly became clear the released site plan was pretty accurate.  In fact, what’s built so far isn’t even as good.  Let me show you what I mean:

Looking at the above images it may not be obvious to you, but to the various city staff that I emailed in July they quickly knew Cordish would need to redo this corner of BPV. Upon site inspection, one city staffer said; “Everything they’ve done so far is questionable. Many areas are extremely tight. ”

Expect to see these mistakes busted out and corrected. If only Cordish & the Cardinals had taken pedestrian access seriously…

— Steve Patterson

Downtown Trolley Ignored By Metro, CVC, & Downtown Community Improvement District

In July 2010 the #99 downtown circulator became the #99 downtown trolley, a bus wrapped in a cartoonish look.

“We are pleased to introduce this new trolley service, which will not only benefit downtown residents and workers, but also the millions of visitors St. Louis welcomes annually,” said Kitty Ratcliffe, president of the St. Louis Convention and Visitors Commission (CVC). “Just in time for the Fourth of July holiday weekend, this new service will enable tourists to experience more of the world-class attractions, sports venues, culture, retail and dining that St. Louis offers.” (Partnership)

Many laughed three years ago, but based on observations during my use, I’d say it has been a resounding success. I regularly see other downtown residents, workers, & tourists on the trolley bus. It does the job Metro, The Downtown Community Improvement District, and the Convention & Visitors Commission intended.

Unfortunately, it is all too often ignored by these three entities. I’ve got two examples:

First, I overheard a Metro employee helping tourists who wanted to go from the Crowne Plaza hotel to Sweetie Pies’ Upper Crust the next day.  The Crowne Plaza is located downtown at 200 N 4th St (@ Pine St) and Sweetie Pies’ Upper Crust at 3643 Delmar in Midtown/Grand Center.

The Metro employee suggested walking to the Convention Center MetroLink station to catch the train to Civic Center MetroLink station to catch the #97 (Delmar) MetroBus to Sweetie Pies. Really?

I’d have suggested catching the #99 trolley across Pine St, taking it to the City Museum stop on 16th between Delmar & Washington Ave, walking half a block to 16th & Washington Ave to catch the #97 to Sweetie Pies. Google Maps agrees, though it would make the transfer at 14th & Washington.

The order of suggested routes does vary based on departure or arrival times. The MetroLink option it suggests is to go to Grand and take the #70 bus north to Delmar. This may have been what the Metro employee told them to do, but I’m pretty sure I heard her suggest the Civic Center. The point is people get needlessly directed to MetroLink, having them walk more or go way out of their way.  I’d never want a tourist to try to find the #97 bus after leaving the train, it is confusing to me and I know the area well.

The other example is one of omission.

Yes, the pedestrian directories to help tourists navigate downtown doesn’t the trolley route & stops. It’s as if the trolley doesn’t exist at all.

Trolley info doesn’t appear on the downtown directories! Such a huge omission, but not surprising given the anti-bus attitude of so many. The trolley route could easily be shown on the directories.

The directory listings are just printed, easily updated. I’ll be notifying all three entities (Metro, Downtown CID, CVC) about the omission. We’ll see how long it takes to get them updated.

— Steve Patterson

An Infuriatingly Avoidable Accessibility Issue

The former headquarters of the Missouri Pacific Railroad reopened on May 12, 2011 as luxury apartments called Park Pacific. The Lawrence Group was the architect as well as owner/developer, they an impressive job.

But I’ve had a few issues, such as rolling dumpsters left blocking the Pine Street sidewalk.

In the 2+ years since the building reopened a number of businesses moved in. KMOX radio moved into some commercial office space, for example. At the street-level there are a number of options: frozen yogurt, fine dinning, smoothies, and most recently, Art Saint Louis + Mississippi Mud coffeehouse.

Earlier this week I had a meeting with someone, she suggested we meet at Art Saint Louis + Mississippi Mud. When Art Saint Louis announced their plans to relocate from 555 Washington Ave to the Park Pacific I was interested, the sidewalk entrance from their Washington Ave location wasn’t wheelchair accessible, but at least they also had a 2nd entrance via the lobby.

I just assumed with the $109 million dollar building renovation the accessible entrance to their new space must be through the main lobby as well. I thought nobody would build a tenant space with a brand new non-ADA exterior-only entrance. Turns out I was wrong, The Lawrence Group designed, built, & leased a storefront with one public entrance without required wheelchair access as required by the Americans with Disabilities Act.  The architect can’t say the owner made changes without their knowledge — the owner & architect are the same entity!

The sidewalk should’ve been raised up when poured, but it wasn’t. They had two years to fix it while the space was vacant and for lease, but they didn’t. No, it wasn’t until I arrive that it became an issue to fix. The executive director of Art Saint Louis and owner of Mississippi Mud were both apologetic, they genuinely felt bad.  Two staff from the Park Pacific got involved, guiding me through the lobby to a back service corridor, to a back door to the Art Saint Louis space.

But it was worth the journey, the new space is very nice. Much better than their previous space, which had become very dated.

One person said they could grind off the step, though it would be steeper than the ADA allows. On Tuesday post some were shocked when I said I was ok with the city using asphalt to deal with a problem where a sidewalk sank, causing a bit of a lip less than this one. It was suggested I have a double standard.

Well, yes and no.

The sidewalk situation I posted about Tuesday has several parties involved, hard to determine who’s at fault for the sidewalk sinking next to a water vault lid that didn’t sink.  Here we know clearly who’s responsible — and they received tax incentives to do the project. The mayor and other elected officials were present at the ribbon cutting.  So yes, I hold this project to a higher standard, but I wouldn’t call it a double standard.

At this point I want the entrance fixed precisely conforming with the ADA — not a fraction of an inch out of compliance. I have a digital level I’ll bring to test the solution. The Lawrence Group should know better, they cannot claim ignorance. They created the problem for themselves during the renovation, they didn’t address it for the 2 years the space was vacant.

Unfortunately the very nice people at Art Saint Louis + Mississippi Mud will be inconvenienced while this is busted out and redone in compliance with the ADA. If you plan to lease space for a business please make sure it is ADA-compliant. You can’t assume just because the owner of the building is an architecture firm that they got it right, bring along an independent 3rd party to verify before you sign the lease.

I emailed Lawrence Group partner Steve Smith that same day, saying I was “angry & disappointed.” Infuriating!!

— Steve Patterson