If you haven’t heard the news (PubDef, Post-Dispatch), yesterday morning “Big John” Triplett, father of 6th Ward Alderman Kacie Triplett, died as a result of a heart attack, he was only 55. Losing a parent is tough, not getting to say goodbye makes it more difficult.
My condolences go out to Kacie, her family and Big John’s friends and co-workers.
Largely ineffective at changing the local scene since arriving in 2001, St. Louis’ planning director Rollin Stanley is heading to greener pastures, literally: suburban D.C. The news was announced on the Mayor’s campaign website Monday.
So, to help out the city I thought I’d write a help wanted ad for Stanley’s replacement. Here is what I’ve got so far:
Requirements:
- Must act busy and give appearance that actual planning takes place in the city.
- Write reports about all the wonderful things that are happening because of the Mayor.
- Manage handful of bureaucrats.
- Accept that planning is not a requirement for subsidies or the threat of eminent domain.
- Report directly to Mayor’s director of development, ask her permission to speak to an alderman about planning.
Benefits:
The major project during Stanley’s tenure was the “Strategic Land Use Plan” that was adopted by the city in January 2005 but basically kept on a shelf since.
This new Strategic Land Use Plan is intended to improve the quality of life for those who live and work in St. Louis by encouraging appropriate types of development and preservation in clearly defined locations. Within this overall intent, this Plan has two main purposes.
• To provide direction for those who wish to make new investments in our City, and;
• To provide stability and opportunities for those who already live, work and build
their businesses here.
This plan has failed to meet both stated purposes. While seemingly providing limited direction, with statements such as, “Mixed use buildings with commercial at grade and a mix of uses on upper floors are an ideal type within these areas.” However, the land use plan has zero teeth, the zoning remains as it has been for decades which means you can talk all you want to about mixed uses and street level retail but nobody is required to do so. Meanwhile, the zoning we have pretty much mandates the opposite unless you purchase a variance from your alderman. Thus, this plan fails to meet the second purpose because it basically continues business as usual, using zoning variances as leverage. Alderman April Ford-Griffin explains:
…at the Board of Aldermen we always have the power to change zoning. So when this happens is…as you see the development boards and you see the different things that have happened, most of those had to have some type of zoning changes, street changes, name changes, just you go down the list of changes. Also, that is the only thing that makes most of the developers come and talk to us. If we did everything that it took for the development they wouldn’t have any reason to come and talk to us. Once we talk about a development, once they have shown us what they do, once they talk about minority participation, once they talk about inclusion, once they talk about jobs, and all the other things that I make sure I am committed to asking them.
When the new plan was adopted I was very encouraged. As a starting point, it was excellent. From the introduction:
Equally important, this Plan identifies areas where new directions are possible and encouraged. These directions will allow portions of the City to offer amenities and lifestyles that are now found only in the suburbs. The Plan also sets the stage for City initiatives to raise development standards throughout the region with new and innovative development approaches.
This Plan, like the City itself, is not a static object. Rather, it is intended to provide a foundation and a roadmap for positive change. It is expected the Plan itself will continue to evolve as historic preservation and new development initiatives evolve. This Plan is the beginning of a more thoughtful and cohesive approach to a bright future for the City of St. Louis.
Oh man, “thoughtful and cohesive approach” to planning in St. Louis! If anyone was going to break through the 28 obstacles in the way of doing so I thought it would be Stanley. But he needed their cooperation, at that of Room 200, to go to the next levels:
Adopted by the City’s Planning Commission on January 5th, 2005, this straightforward Land Use Plan will become the basis for additional planning and development initiatives involving collaboration between elected officials, City departments, neighborhood residents and developers, to overlay more fine-grained visions of the broader framework presented by this Plan. These future initiatives are expected to include public improvement plans, detailed neighborhood level plans, and tailored rezonings.
So here we are just a month shy of two three years later. We are left with an unfinished vision of new planning and Rollin has ducked out the back door. Really, who can blame him. Talented guy wants to bring St. Louis out of the 1940s but our parochial systme didn’t allow it. This mindset has driven out numerous other people, what is one more?
More than likely, his new suburban county gig will prove to be more urban than here in St. Louis. However, he has been an outspoken critic of greenfield projects, including New Urbanist projects such as New Town at St. Charles. Not sure how that will all play out in Montgomery Co Maryland. Actually Montgomery County is not rolling farm fields, it is a wealthy county just outside of DC proper and is served by their red Metro transit line. But, back to St. Louis.
All I can say it good luck to the next planner, you’ve got your work cut out for you. The city needs help to recover from planning disasters from the last half century or so yet the establishment seems continent with their current power structure that prevents that from happening. In pockets, we have some great places. The trick now will be to expand and connect these together in a positive manner.
On the eve of shutting down a portion of I-64, still known locally as Highway 40, one traffic engineer is upset by MoDOT’s plan. It appears that he and others have built us an expensive roadway system that is critically tied to a single highway. Close it and our region will cease to function, he claims! Wow, brilliant planning to be so reliant on a single corridor.
From Joe Passanise’s stophighway40closure.com website:
Imagine ALL the lanes of Highway 40 are completely closed in both directions – for TWO years. You are one of about 160,000 motorists who normally travel Highway 40, but now have to find alternate roads. You are stuck in traffic every day this week going to and from work using alternate roads that are packed with traffic. You inch along with other motorists hoping to move faster – but you realize it is gridlock traffic again. You are getting frustrated and impatient waiting through the endless number of traffic signal cycles. Eventually you get home – drained, tired and angry at whoever is responsible for creating this traffic mess.
You realize that your travel time has increased about three times your normal travel time. This has increased your cost about three times more for gasoline. This means you are spending less time with your family and tripling your cost of traveling to and from work.
Well, Mr. Passanise, you actually need to have a grid to have gridlock! Back in the days before we abandoned how cities were built for centuries, we had a grid. It was a nice grid that took people in all directions. One street backed up, no problem, just go over a block or two and go through that way. Typically blocks would be 300-600ft long. Some streets were more prominent than others but this allowed local traffic to use a lessor street while through traffic used a more major street.
Along comes the traffic engineer and his buddies the urban planner and visionary architect and they dream up a better way, doing away with the grid in new areas. The new streets, with the promise of easy motoring, would go from the local cul-de-sac to the collector road to the arterial and finally to the highway. The only through streets would be the arterials and highways. The old grid was messed up as well, with new highways terminating the existing grid, rendering it only partially effective.
The irony is, of course, that if our suburban areas did have a grid the closing of the interstate wouldn’t be such a big deal. Motorists displaced from the interstate would have numerous alternative East-West routes. Instead, with only a few East-West streets like Manchester Rd, Clayton Rd and Olive, those seeking to traverse the mid-county area of the region are going to be royally screwed very soon. For reasons stated above, it is not going to be gridlock. More like artery blockage.
Suburban advocates have long cited the public choice theory for the rise of suburbia (and the fall of inner cities), that people voted with their feet and moved to where they wanted to live. Well, true enough. But now these same folks, their kids and grandkids, aren’t so pleased with their choice. With public infrastructure spread out over increasing amounts of land per person, they come to the public trough expecting everyone to subsidize their lifestyle choice, one totally dependent upon the car on limited-access highways. We’re not asked to buy the car, just everything else. Oh yeah, and fight off anyone that attempts to limit our supply of cheap oil so that we don’t have gas prices commensurate with the rest of the industrialized world.
Where does Mr. Passanise live? In suburbia, of course. Let’s take a look, shall we:
Mr. & Mrs. Passanise live in Creve Coeur, in a condo purchased in 2005 (lower right, near golf course). As we can see, the Passanise’s have a number of businesses, including a number of car dealerships, not far from their home. While sidewalks exist in some places, they are certainly not complete and you can’t walk door to door as you would in a traditional neighborhood of years past or newer versions such as New Town at St. Charles. Along Olive are several places to buy groceries; Provisions, Trader Joes and a Dierbergs (or is that a Schnucks?). However, I certainly wouldn’t want to walk to these from Passanise’s condo. I can see how someone living in this environment is saddled to car. This brings us back to the public choice theory, they voluntarily moved to an auto-centric part of the region (of course, that is hard not to do).
Interestingly, the City of Creve Coeur is not pleased with their suburban environs that lack a true downtown. The grid-less and congested streets, the increasingly larger parking lots, the dangerous sidewalks, and so on created by traffic engineers and others doesn’t really work. Today, a new set of planners are carving out a true downtown for Creve Ceour, just north of Old Ballas Rd. How are they doing this? They plan to construct a street grid of short blocks!
But let’s move on to Passanise’s main claim, the additional costs to motorists during the shutdown;
Ignoring the collateral cost of depression and stress to the personal lives of each of the 80,000 motorists, the collective cost for additional fuel and time for Highway 40 users for two years is estimated to be $592,400,000 [fuel]+ $6,979,200 [time] = $599,379,200 or approximately $600 million. Please note that this is more than the $552 million construction cost budgeted by MODOT.
How does his calculations compare to say keeping a lane or two open in each direction during the project? We don’t really know because he is only comparing from a base of doing nothing, not the suggested alternate of keeping traffic moving through the construction zone. Not only would keeping a lane or two open increase the direct costs by MoDOT but is not like motorists would be able to get through in the same amount of time they are today. Instead of two years of construction this might take three or more years to complete. People who are dependent upon the highway are going to have delays and unless they’ve got a Toyota Prius that shuts off when stopped, they will waste gas idling. If he is going to claim the delays will cost another $600 million we need to see the estimates for keeping a portion of the highway open. From a worker safety standpoint, keeping a portion of the highway open will increase the risk of injuries or death for those doing the work.
Granted, Mr. Passanise is right, people’s lives will be significantly impacted by the closure. We’ve become used to being able to get pretty much anywhere in the region, either side of the river, in under a half hour. That will soon change, one of the realities of sprawling to the degree that we have. We’ve had it easy up until now, time to pay the piper.
MoDOT is saying they need to shut down the interstate to stay on schedule and on budget. Given the flack over Metro on the extension of our light rail, it is hard to blame them for keeping the budget and time table in mind. But earlier tonight, at Passanise’s meeting, the speakers were all upset with MoDot for putting their budget as the top priority. Yeah, what are they thinking, not wasting our tax money?
Passanise, being the good traffic engineer, wants to keep cars moving 24/7. Based on his estimates, Mr. Passanise seems to think everyone will continue to drive their own personal single occupancy cars for the next two years. However, car pools will form, transit ridership will increase and yes jobs will shift around the region. It will be rough going at first but people will find ways to adapt.
However, it is true that not everyone can adapt. For example, those living in subdivisions just off say Clayton Road, near the epicenter at I-170, will have little choice but to use Clayton Road if they plan to ever leave their homes. Sidewalks and crossings are already poor in many of these areas and increased traffic will make it worse. Bicyclists, I’m told, are already getting told by police to get off the road and onto the sidewalk.
The irony here, of course, is that if more people walked or biked the problem wouldn’t be as bad. Still, we very much have a one person, one car mentality. There is a reason your sedan has four doors and extra seat belts! If we actually had a street grid in many parts of the county, residents could access nearby stores without adding to the congestion on main arterials.
Tonight’s meeting was poorly attended, maybe 15-20 non-news people. The speakers were an interesting group, besides engineer Passanise we had Missouri State Rep from Frontenac, T. Scott Muschany (R-87) and former school board member and a former candidate for every office, Bill Haas. Muschany has filed a bill to make it illegal to shut down a highway for more than 60 days at a time. Haas intends to file a lawsuit to attempt to block the shutdown.
Me? I say shut it down. Not just for a couple of years, but permanently. Make a nice boulevard out of it with 4-6 total through lanes and slip roads on each side with on-street parking in front of urban buildings lining the corridor. This through section in the middle would have limited intersections but many more streets would be able to cross the roadway, so that you would not end up with homes on one side of the highway able to see stores across the way but have it be a long drive around to get there.
Yeah, I know, it ain’t gunna happen, just had to put it out there again. I also registered shutdown40.com which links back to my Highway 40 category here at UrbanReviewSTL.com. A gimmick? You bet, I can register domains with the best of them.
We are going to get a big ugly rebuilt highway that will be great until it fills up with traffic in short order. More cars & truck, more infrastructure, more pollution, more maintenance, more sprawl, more dependency, and more foreign oil. Frankly, I’m glad MoDOT is shutting down the highway. Maybe folks will get the message that living in a physical environment that forces people to drive everywhere isn’t very bright.
There will be no December 2007 meeting of the St. Louis Preservation Board. Well, technically they will meet by teleconference this week to set up a date for a second meeting in January 2008. Normally their meetings are held on the 4th Monday of each month, which happens to be Christmas Eve this year. In these cases, the meeting is often moved up a week.
Tonight (12/17/07), at 6:30pm, a public meeting will be held by traffic engineer Joseph Passanise regarding his opposition to the full shut down of portions of highway 40 through 2009. This meeting will be at 6:30pm at Maggie O’Brien’s located at 20th and Market (map).  For more information see stophighway40closure.com. I think I’ll walk the half mile to the meeting rather than take highway 40 to get there.
Last week I was pretty harsh on the city for “buying” a second so-called World Leadership Award (see post). Well, I did a records request (per Missouri’s Sunshine Law) and have for your weekend reading the “Vacancy to Vibrancy” entry as well as the invoice for £3,000 (a tad over $6,000) to be included on the short list.
Here are a few selections from the entry:
Housing is the key to a sustainable urban environment.
Historic preservation has proven to be the catalyst for the resurgence in the inner city housing market.
Recycling aging buildings is key to a healthy urban environment.
I believe the City of St. Louis strategy “Sustainable Housing Through Preservation†can encourage Mayor’s in the world’s industrialized cities to meet the growing demand for housing by recycling our existing built heritage.
Wow, the mayor seems like he cares about developing sustainable housing and preserving existing structures. In the report, they talk about the energy it takes to build a new building and construct a very good argument for retaining old buildings. Too bad they do things like raze the historic Century Building for a parking garage rather than more housing as proposed by other developers with less influence. Or allowed SLU to raze a historic building for a surface parking lot. The list is long, too long.
The region experienced a 25% increase in the urbanized area, yet population growth was only 6 %. The region ranks 18th in population in the country, but second in land consumption. Land consumption occurred four times faster than our population growth.
Again, quite true. In fact, the report is excellent. Now if only they actually talked publicly about sustainability and acted upon these beliefs rather than on what those with money and influence seek. It should not take me doing an open records request to obtain this information. The full submission is a large PDF file (4.5mb), Vacancy to Vibrancy: Sustainable Housing Through Preservation.
The letter from the World Leadership Awards indicated the city was on the shortlist is dated September 4, 2007. It acknowledge being shortlisted in the “Law & Order” category but our entry was clearly marked for the housing category — I assume this to be a clerical error in the letter.
The letter references some details as well as payment for the “presentation fee”:
Because of difficulties which occurred with several cities last year we have, with great regret, been forced to adopt a stricter policy regarding late payment. If we have not received payment by 14th September, then we may not be able to include your city in the shortlist, which will be published on 20th September 2007.
So unlike competitions where everyone pays an equal registration fee, here they make sure you pay up if you want to be on the shortlist. No money, no shortlist. With 38 entries on this year’s shortlist that is over $228,000. Cities still have to make flight, hotel and transportation arrangements to get their team there to present in person. I’m not sure where in the budget this is funded. Do we have a PR budget? Click here to see the letter and invoice.
Speaking of PR, we had less incorrect BS being spread this year but there was still some misleading facts out there. For example, the Mayor’s announcement about the win included this item:
In his presentation, Slay focused on rebuilding the City through the creation of new housing units and renovating historic buildings. Since 2000, more than 20,000 units have been rehabbed and 4,221 new units have been built in historic buildings, resulting in almost 14,000 new residents of the City.
Really? “Almost 14,000 new residents of the City?” I covered these types of lies back in April when they were twisting original & challenged census numbers around.
Here are the official Census figures:
By my math the difference is 5,648. Most likely Slay’s PR folks are playing with numbers again hoping the media will pick it up and not question the source. As in the past, they use the pre-challenge census numbers from years past to compare with a newly revised post-challenge census figure to artificially inflate population.
I personally am quite happy that we’ve stopped losing people, it does not benefit anyone to twist the facts around to make it look like we’ve gained nearly three times as many people as we actually have.