Second Empire Rehab in Gravois Park

Passers by this “home” on Compton near Cherokee can see the sky — literally!

But this is a good thing. This home, which has seen better days, is getting a new interior as well as a roof. The old rotten (and burned?) wood was hauled away as part of the rehab process.

I have no brilliant commentary to make about the project, I’m just glad to see it happening. Gravois Park has very few vacant lots and I hope that remains the case. Affordable rehab projects as well as habitable homes can be found in the neighborhood.

Compton is a regular north-south route for me when I am riding my scooter so I’ve been enjoying watching the progress on this well-proportioned home.

Ald. Kennedy Finally Opens Westbound Olive to Traffic

In April of 2006 I first mentioned the barrels that completely blocked through traffic on Olive at Walton in the Central West End.  The next Month, in May of 2006 I looked into the issue a bit closer and realized that Olive was the dividing line between two wards.  Below is an image from that post.

At the time I wrote:

Olive, a once great road, is politically divided. One side of the street from Boyle Westward is in the 18th Ward (Terry Kennedy) and the other is in the 28th Ward (Lyda Krewson). Both sides of the street, however, are fully within the Central West End neighborhood. From an urban perspective the issues relating to the rebirth of this street do not fall into line with ward boundaries.

In June 2006 I was happy to report that Ald. Lyda Krewson of the 28th Ward had made the decision to remove the old barrels and open the eastbound portion of Olive to traffic once again.  However, the westbound barrels remained in place.

Recently, Ald. Kennedy finally relented and had the remaining barrels removed allowing a free flow of traffic on Olive — a first in many decades.

Much investment and development is happening in the areas formerly on the wrong side of street closings so hopefully we will see a nice blending of the areas.  It is just too hard to justify developing on the bad side of closed streets.  The Central West End folks that pushed for the reopening of Olive deserve lots of credit.  Viva la street grid!

“Small Architectural Interventions in Troubled Neighborhoods”

I got word of a potentially interesting presentation this evening at Wash U:

On Monday, April 30, at 7 p.m., John Kleinschmidt will present a talk on small architectural interventions in troubled neighborhoods in Kemp Auditorium (Room 116) in Givens Hall at Washington U.

John is a third year student in the College of Architecture and worked on this study as an independent project. He concentrated on Old North St. Louis’s 14th Street Mall, on a proposed infill project on North Union and on a WU/AIA proposal for a farmer’s market in the Ville neighborhood.

Givens Hall is the main architecture school building at Wash U. I don’t know the visitor parking situation but they do have some usually full bike racks near the building entrance. The new Skinker MetroLink stop is a short distance away if you wish to take light rail. Bus is also an option but I don’t know the route numbers.

At one time in architecture, engineering, and planning schools the thought was you needed major projects to completely remake “troubled neighborhoods.” I think this mindset is still rattling around at city hall. Many, these days, are focusing on smaller solutions. Can we come in and seek out problems and come up with a series of smaller, easier to implement solutions, that can help communities without disrupting what works? I think if we are going to succeed in helping some areas the answer needs to be “yes.” The one size fits all new subdivision or strip center solutions are simply not realistic or even necessary everywhere.

UPDATE 5/1/07 @ 9:45am:

I attended the interesting event last night.  It was not exactly as I had expected.  The speaker did not offer any new ideas but was sharing thoughts from an architectural writing class about efforts in three areas, Union @ Labadie, The Ville and 14th street. The course is being taught by former Post-Dispatch critic Bob Duffy.

Jane Jacobs: A Year Ago Today

It was a year ago today that the world lost one of the greatest urbanists, Jane Jacobs.  She died just before her 90th birthday (May 4th).  Jacobs was not a professional planner, most likely a good thing in my view.  She authored the classic 1961 book, Death & Life of Great American Cities, as well as a number of other books on urban economics and planning.  Again, not a planner by training but by instinct and observation.  For much of her life she worked against the urban experiments being tested by the professional planners and traffic engineers.

Jacobs had her fair share of critics over the years, but I am not one of them.  I’ve got all over her books neatly stacked on my desk as a reminder to reach each of the in order this summer.  To me she is a hero, the lay person turned international urbanist.  Click here to read my post from last year.

Dangerous Situation at Southside Intersection (UPDATED 3X!)

For a few years now the Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District (aka MSD) has been working on a major sewer project under Bates Street in South St. Louis. They seem to be nearing completion and while the area should have better drainage than before not everything is left better than it was.

Above you can see a metal grate over a sewer inlet, with one being tilted creating a potential trip hazard.

Metal grates, in general, can present potential hazards. Women’s shoes can get caught in the openings, possibly causing them to fall. Someone using a cane can have the tip get caught as well. In wet weather, the smoth metal surface can be slippery. It is considered a good idea to keep metal grates (be they for sewer or even urban tree grates) out of the normal pedestrian path of travel.

From the US Access Board’s Public Rights-of-Way Design Guide:

3.2.4.1 Gratings

Other surface features that affect accessibility include gratings and similar fittings that have horizontal openings or gaps that exceed 1/2 inch (13 mm) in the direction of travel. Such gaps can capture the small front wheel of a wheelchair or the end of a crutch, suddenly stopping forward progress and possibly leading to a tip or fall. Additionally, the frame angles in which access covers and gratings are set often result in significant gaps when installed in a sidewalk.

Metal gratings are of particular concern to pedestrians who use walking aids. When wet, the grids can be extremely slippery, and the elongated openings can become a sliding track for the tip of a crutch or cane. Slip-resistant finishes or nonmetallic materials are available at additional cost for installations where the location or extent of exposed gratings may pose a problem for pedestrians, such as on pedestrian bridges and overpasses. Where possible, gratings and similar sidewalk fittings should be located off the travel path. Note, however, that tree gratings–unless part of the pedestrian circulation route— need not meet surfacing provisions.

Slots in grates, if used, should never be in the direction of travel.

Before someone attempts to tell me nobody walks in this area let me just say it gets a good bit of pedestrian traffic. It is true that three out of the four corners of this intersection have been encroached upon by anti-pedestrian development but this is a dense urban area where people do walk. Take a look at the Google map to see for yourself, if you don’t believe me.

Throughout the city and our suburban areas I could find numerous examples of poorly designed and built area that are likely far more dangerous than this one, but that is not the point. When areas receive millions of dollars of new infrastructure work I expect public agencies to do a better job with respect to the people that will use the facilities once completed. This is poor engineering/construction and is unacceptable in my view.

UPDATE 4/26/2007 @ 8:15am:

After making the above post I contacted MSD via email with a link to this post. This morning I received the following email message from their customer serivice department:

An MSD crew was out yesterday to inspect the grate that is tilted up. The crew found the angle iron holding up one of the grates has broken away causing the grate to tilt. Mr. Steve Welnick has been informed of this. Mr. Welnick is in charge of the Grand/Bates project.

I was also given Mr. Welnick’s cell number and I spoke to him this morning, we had a very good conversation. He is working on getting a crew to weld a new angle iron so the grate will be properly supported. Mr. Welnick also indicated he reviewed the drawings (he has only been on this project since January) and it was indeed built as engineered. I asked that he have a conversation with their engineers about ADA requirements and the use of grates.

UPDATE 4/26/2007 @ 8:45am:

Mr. Welnick called me back indicating the inlet grates were existing — they were shown on their drawings only because they were already there. He is looking to see if that was an earlier MSD project or possibly from the city’s Board of Public Service.

UPDATE 4/26/2007 @ 4:30pm:

OK, now MSD is telling me that Jack is to blame?  You know, the one with the big white ball head.  Apparently the Jack in the Box on the corner was responsible for the grate construction.  MSD is talking with the Dept of Streets as well as Jack in the Box.  In the meantime, I believe MSD got the grate level so the tilt would not contribute to someone falling.