Mascoutah Illinois’ Mainstreet is A Good Example of Small Town Urbanism

On my second Podcast I mentioned how Main Street in Mascoutah IL is narrow but interesting. A number of people asked for pictures. As it happens, I had to go through Mascoutah today on the way to a Bicycle Fun Club ride in nearby St. Libory IL.

The street is narrow with on-street parking only on the North side of the street. Over the years many parking lots have been built which takes away from the line of buildings. A number of storefronts have been converted to residential uses. As this street is returning to commerce I expect these will eventually return to use as storefronts.

As you will see, what works in a small town may not work in the city.

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How Can a Virtual Store be Urban?

Online shopping can be quite convenient but nothing beats walking down a city street and walking into a storefront. For example, I love shopping at UMA in downtown St. Louis shown at right. Besides the great selection of products and friendly service from owner Mike Finan, the building is a knock out. Just look at that storefront.

Graphic designer Jen Halski managed to retain this feel for UMA’s new website and online store. In fact, the image to the right came from Jen. When you see UMA’s new site you’ll see how this was used and how you feel like you are shopping downtown from your computer.

Click Here to view the site in a new window.

I personally love the new site and how it gives that street feel. Let me know what you think!

– Steve

Streets Need to Bloom With Flowers

April showers bring May Flowers is the old saying. But sidewalks with pedestrians bring out the flower vendors. This cart in Philadelphia is overflowing and adding substantial interest to the sidewalk.

Florists are also using the sidewalk as additional selling space while adding color and interest to the street life. St. Louis area florists are just now starting to do this.

This market in Philly’s Rittenhouse Square neighborhood is very ordinary except for the interest from its signage and flower display.

Window boxes with overflowing plantings look great on urban residential streets. This example hails from Philly but the city of Cincinnati is using flower boxes as a means of kick starting urban revitalization. But please, no plastic plants.

Come on folks, lets add some more color to the city!

– Steve

Rising Fuel Prices Make Mass Transit More Cost Effective

Not surprising is the fact that as fuel prices increase we see an increase in riders on St. Louis’ light rail – MetroLink. From the St. Louis Post-Dispatch:

Increased ridership, of course, is great news. More ridership will mean greater support for mass transit. But a downside does exist as well.

First, the cost to the system will increase even though the MetroLink cars are electric. Increased fuel costs will result in higher costs on nearly every good and service in the country. More directly, the cost of the electricity to run MetroLink will increase as well as diesel fuel for the buses. This increase in costs will put additional pressure on the agency to maintain service. It is estimated increased revenues from more riders will not offset higher operating expenses. Some will call for ending public subsidy of mass transit.

For decades the public has been subsidizing transit in a much different form – sprawl. From efforts to keep fuel costs down to paying for highways society has been footing the bill for the privilege of driving a private car. Nothing is more subsidized than the private automobile on a public street or highway.

With a monthly ridership of over a million passengers just think if we didn’t have MetroLink. That is over 35,000 riders per day on average. Without MetroLink we’d have many more cars on our roads for those that could afford a car. The costs of additional wear and tear on roads must be taken into account. The environmental impact of additional cars adding to our region’s smog would also add to the costs. Plus where would all the cars go? Would we tear down more of our historic architecture for yet more parking garages? The price of not having good mass transit would just be too high. We must support and use our mass transit systems.

For me MetroLink just isn’t between my normal A-B routes. I would love to see a street car come down South Broadway to connect downtown to Carondelet. It would be great to walk the few blocks from my home to Broadway to catch a street car. Maybe someday?

In the meantime, I’m going to look at bus routes to get me downtown for the occasional lunch at Curry In A Hurry, public meeting or First Friday gallery walk. It is not going to hurt me to take the bus on occasion. Getting on my bike for trips offers even greater benefits.

Citizens for Modern Transit
Metro – bus & light rail service
St. Louis Regional Bike Federation

– Steve

Biking to Brunch on Cherokee

Two miles is a short bike ride for most people and that is how far away the new Shangri-La Diner (2201 Cherokee, 772-8308) is from my house. A rode my bright orange Kronan bicycle and met a friend who rode from her loft downtown. As we were locking up our bikes to a street lamp post a couple from Tower Grove South rode up on their bikes – they locked to the handicap ramp railing.

Four bikes on one street corner on a Sunday morning. For the hour and a half we were there I saw a number of cyclists riding in both directions on Cherokee. St. Louis is becoming a cycling town. We are becoming, once again, an urbane city. The signs of urbanity are everywhere.

St. Louis needs a major program to install bike racks in commercial areas. I’m not talking about a few racks here and there but hundreds each and every year. This is not a build it they will come idea, the need is current.

– Steve