Developer Curran Tosses Egg on Preservation Board’s Face

Developer Michael Curran just reduced the number of units at the Mississippi Bluffs project from 56 to a measly 34. I say measly because the site is a massive 8.2 acres. Part of the site, as you may recall, had the wonderful but tired Doering Mansion (shown at right). This formerly graceful mansion sat on the far north 1.79 acres. Myself and others argued before the Preservation Board the Doering Mansion should be saved which would still leave 6.4 acres for new construction. The Doering Mansion was razed earlier this year.

From the Suburban Journal last week:

Curran had argued before the St. Louis Preservation Board late last year that he had to have the larger amount to make the project feasible.

At the time, Curran was seeking the Preservation Board’s permission to tear down the Doering Mansion on the north side of the property to make room for more townhouses.

He said at the time with a smaller amount of townhouses – 42 – he couldn’t recover the cost of preparing the property for development, including demolishing the old Good Samaritan Home. To recoup the investment on a smaller area, he would have to build a larger condominium development with about 120 units.

That would overwhelm a prime piece of property, Curran said at the time. Rather than do that, Curran said at the time he would sell the property to another developer.

The Preservation Board wound up voting to approve the project and demolish the mansion.

OK, just so we understand. Before the mansion was razed it was argued by the developer that if he could not tear down the historic structure that would reduce his planned 56 units to 42 units and at that rate he could not make any money and would be forced to abandon the project and sell the property. The only way he could recoup his costs if the mansion stayed was to build a bigger structure on the balance of the site containing 120 units. The classic doom and gloom argument.

Now, he says, due to site costs he cannot build 56 units because it would be too expensive!!! Thus, he is placing only 34 units on the 8.2 acre site. He couldn’t make money with 42 units on 6.4 acres plus a mansion but he can somehow make money with 34 and no mansion? Was the Preservation Board taken for a ride when they approved the demolition of the Doering Mansion? I think so.

This is yet another example of a poorly executed project in this city. The Mansion was razed in February and yet no construction has begun. Had they started razing the old Good Samaritan Home first they might have realized the folly of their plan and been able to go back to the drawing board before the loss of the mansion. This developer has an excellent track record with historic rehab projects but is not doing so well with new construction. He probably would have been better off with the old mansion. This fine example of planning shares the same ward as Loughborough Commons, Matt Villa’s 11th Ward.

Envisioning Smart Growth

A California firm known as Urban Advantage Inc. is doing to some great work helping people envision how their environment could be transformed. I thought showing some of their work might illustrate to all of you how small & incremental changes can, in the end, have a big impact. I contacted Urban Advantage principal Steve Price and obtained his permission to use a few of his images:

Price starts with the “existing conditions,” in this case an older shopping street that has seen better days.

He then subtly adds in some “building facelifts, restoration of ground floor retail, infill development.” The changes are few but you can begin to quickly see how a few tweaks here and there can begin to have an impact.

Then we can see how it might look with new sidewalks and a resurfaced street. Minor change but freshens the whole look.

And finally with urban street trees, new street lamps and pedestrians.

See the Urban Advantage website for roughly 10 more examples in a variety of settings — I think you will be impressed by the changes. Well, most of you anyway. Others will stubbornly cling to what they know and refuse the accept that we can actually design public streets for people on foot, bike, scooter, transit or car. It takes good planning and making improvements with each and every capital improvement or construction project.

Price’s images have been published in many places and recently he did some “Community Transformation Images” for the Sierra Club that are amazing. Please check out all six of those, paying close attention to how gas stations and wide streets are handled.

I’m looking into training in such Photoshop work through Mr. Price or some other architectural specialists doing similar work. My thanks again to Mr. Price for allow me the use of his images and for helping people everywhere see how their ordinary spaces can be transformed into walkable streets.

The New QuikTrip at Gravois & Chippewa Should Be An Urban Prototype

The general consensus is the relocation of an existing QT from the Bevo area up the street to the wedge at Gravois & Chippewa is OK. Assuming that to be these case, let’s discuss the design options for the site.

But it is a gas station you say, implying options to do not exist for the site layout. After all, everyone knows you place the building as far back on the site and put all the pump islands out front. What is to debate?

Well, that very assumption!

Yes, I’m calling for QT to build an urban gas station like those required in other cities around the world. Not only are the design options interesting and more urban, it makes better use of the land which can return higher profits. Here is the basic argument: flip the typical site plan around — put the building next to the street and the pumps in back.

First, let’s see just how wasteful QT is with land development.

At we can see from the existing QT to the east on Gravois they have made little attempt to maximize the site. As a result, a very large land area that was originally many smaller parcels is reduced to only serving one function: the QT. This is not an urban model and is well suited to far suburban areas but not in an urbanized city environment.

But this post is not about what they did wrong at this site and what it could look like if rebuilt. I’m showing the example at right to demonstrate wasteful site planning practices common among such entities as large gas stations.

At left is my crude diagram of the [proposed] site [at Gravois & Chippewa]. The teal color represents the canopy over the gas pumps with the red rectangle representing QT’s standard building design. The blue triangle represents an urban opportunity. Here is what I picture: a 2-3 story building with street-level retail and small living spaces above. These might be rental, perhaps condo? The building might be designed to create some live/work spaces. The building might end up being more than a single building.

What does all this change accomplish? Several things. First, an urban building at the corner reduces the visual impact of the gas station while still providing that service. The urban corner building also begins to place some “community” in the area where, according to Ald. Kirner, none exists. This would be an incremental step toward rebuilding what was once two highly pedestrian friendly urban corridors.

I am not calling for QT to design a special building to house their function —- I’m tolerant of the standard formula. They actually do a decent job of connecting their buildings to public sidewalks which could be easily accomplish in the site plan mockup I’m showing. And the urban building?

I’m guessing folks are going to say two things. One being there is no demand for either retail or living spaces in the area and second that QT is not in the business of building such buildings. True, demand may not exist at the moment or even five years. But if QT builds their facility in the manner I’m suggesting and plants some evergreen trees behind the building it certainly wouldn’t look any worse than coming down Gravois looking at nothing but gas pumps. As demand increases and say MetroLink ends up on Gravois or the tracks nearby then we are ready to do some urban in-fill without having to relocate or rebuild the QT — we’d be that much ahead. And I wouldn’t expect QT to build the building — I’d expect them to sell or lease the land. A non-profit housing group could lease the land from QT on a long term lease so that QT got a good tax write off and then build some smaller living spaces without any off-street parking. This would be great for those who either can’t drive or don’t want to drive. On-street parking could serve the retail spaces.

Think of this as land banking — we are saving this corner that might normally be wasted through typical sprawl planning and holding it until we are ready for something a bit more urban. To move the process along I’d favor some sort of tax incentives to QT so they could offer this land on the cheap to a developer that completed a structure that met some basic urban criteria. This could be a win for the city and QT.

– Steve

Edwardsville’s Pedestrian Tunnel for High School Students

Why did the student not cross the road? Because they were chicken? No, because they have a new $480,000 pedestrian tunnel in place of the former shuttle buses. And it is against school policy for them to walk across the two lane street in front of the high school. Seriously, I’m not making this up!

Last June I did a brief post on the planned tunnel after reading an article in the Belleville News-Democrat. This past Saturday morning I visited the now finished tunnel on a tour of Edwardville, Illinois (map).

So, there it is on the right: the long walk under Center Grove Rd with the massive high school campus in the background. Remember the days when you could walk or bike to school? Those times seem long gone. Now students drive their own cars to school and in Edwardsville some students, roughly 200, have to park across the street and walk under the street to get to the campus.

Don’t look for any steps or walkway to get you from the south side of Center Grove Rd down to the tunnel, it is assumed that nobody walks in this part of town. Probably true enough, it is nothing but tacky buildings set in individual seas of parking.

I should also point out the tunnel was planned from day one. It wasn’t built until this summer because they just received the funding to construct it. So when planning a new high school campus the concept of say placing it closer to walkable areas seems to have been ruled out. I’m actually told the school district is much larger than the City of Edwardsville and that the schools is pretty centered within the district. The solution then becomes two smaller high schools rather than one large high school. You can point to additional costs to do that but that can be countered with the additional costs of sprawl and, in this case, a pedestrian tunnel.

This is Center Grove Rd looking west from the parking lot entrance. That is not a sidewalk you see to the left of the road, it is the shoulder of the roadbed. You can see some of the recently built sprawl in the background. What a horrible environment they are subjecting their impressionable youth.

Sadly, they are in effect teaching kids pedestrians and streets don’t mix.

– Steve

Ald. Kirner: “Very Little Community” at Gravois & Chippewa

Ald. Dorothy Kirner, D-25th Ward, was recently quoted in the Suburban Journal about the plan for the QuikTrip to move from near Gravois and Delor (14th Ward) to the former used car lot of McMahon Ford:

“There is very little community in there. It’s all businesses,” Kirner said. “I don’t see any problem with the residents.”

The message is basically we’ve long since wiped out any residents of the area and therefore nobody is around to object to yet another over-scaled gas station on a prominent city corner. In cities where urbanity is valued, not derided, such a site would become a mixed-use project with street-level retail and housing — helping to create community where it may not currently exist. Such limited view thinking will continue to prevent St. Louis from reaching its full potential as a vibrant urban center.

– Steve