City of Clayton Threatens to Tow 49cc Scooter/Moped

The note wasn’t very friendly. Here I was attending a luncheon (Society of Professional Journalists) and my wee little moped parked at the tail end of a parking space seems to have offended the City of Clayton’s sense of order. You will recall a month ago I had a similar issue in Clayton while attending a different luncheon, see post. In that case, I was parked on a really wide sidewalk, out of the pedestrian path, and the parking enforcement person came up as I was leaving. At that time I was told I must park in a full metered space.

So yesterday I am heading to Clayton for this event and I just can’t bring myself to take up an entire full space. Plenty of spaces were available and I could certainly afford the pocket change to feed the meter. The issue is two-fold: use of space and personal safety. In short, a “vehicle” that is only a few feet long and weighs less than 200lbs only needs so much room. It certainly does not need the amount of space a 3-ton SUV requires. And it is that 3-ton SUV that has men concerned — will it see my scooter before rushing into a parking space?

Looking around the area I found this sweet little left over spot along a parking zone on Forsyth. This last parking space is considerably longer than those immediately in front of it. In this little left over section I was out of the way of all pedestrians, including those at the adjacent bus stop, and cars had plenty of room to come and go from the main space. My only alternative would have been to ask the restaurant management if I could have parked somewhere on their private property but looking at the situation that would have likely involved compromising one of their pedestrian entrances. So, I went with the little bit of left over street.

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St. Louis Grocery Market: Density Trumps Income

Over on Steve Wilke-Shapiro’s 15thWardSTL blog he is offering the following:

…a $10 Trader Joe’s gift certificate to the first person who can demonstrate that there is more money within three miles of the Brentwood Promenade than there is within three miles of Southtown Center.

This is in a post of his in response to a debate over demographics — the false notion that retailers locate in suburban areas due to higher purchasing power. Steve’s $10 is safe because, as he was betting, density trumps income. I was unable to find good public data within a 3 mile radius of Brentwood Promenada. Excellent data, however, is available for every address in the City of St. Louis. Click here to view the city’s excellent GIS (graphical information system) database where you can search by address and review census data.

I knew I probably could not prove Wilke-Shapiro wrong and collect the $10 gift certificate but I thought I could at least help out and prove him right. But, I was lacking good data from St. Louis County on a radius basis. I wanted to compare from the same source.

I found the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee Employment and Training Institute website. Here they have a database which looks at purchasing power and other data from the 2000 US Census.

Their stated purpose is to “assess the advantages of urban density for underserved city neighborhoods.” So I looked at 63116, where Southtown Centre is located as well as 63144 where the Brentwood Promenade situated in St. Louis County. Upon seeing the results I thought I’d look at a few more just for comparison sake. Density wins over higher incomes each and every time. The more people per square mile, regardless of income, the more raw purchasing power per square mile. Wilke-Shapiro was correct and the naysayers that blame demographics for the lack of big chain stores in the city are incorrect. To be fair, it may well be the racial makeup of our demographic or the average incomes that keep retailers out.

This density issue is, I believe, why in low-density sprawling suburbs developers talk of creating regional shopping centers. They certainly need more purchasing power than a 3-mile or 5-mile radius would support in the ‘burbs. They must draw in shoppers from greater and greater distances to support say a mega grocery store. Despite lower incomes within the City of St. Louis the sheer number of people gives us substantial purchasing power within a given geographical area — a square mile.

The ETI site looks at a total of 16 categories of consumer expenditure. I looked at two of these: “Food at Home” and “Food away from Home” and included the total from all categories. Others were items such as “Furniture”, “Apparel and related services”, and “Computer hardware and software.” The numbers are annual expenditures within a square mile from that population. It does not, however, indicate where they spent the money. This is strictly a combination of how much they have to spend.

Go down the chart and the higher the density the higher amount of money spent on food at home (aka groceries). In fact, if you compare each of the 16 categories from 63116 in South City to 63144 in Brentwood you’ll see the city zip code trumps Brentwood on each and every one. We pack in a lot per square mile. In North St. Louis from 63113 (The Ville/MLK area) their total purchasing power is just shy of Brentwood’s on a total basis.

We have considerable purchasing power throughout the city north and south yet we (myself included) tend to give it away to the county. We have the greatest asset of cities: density. We must collectively learn to capitalize on our density as a draw for more people, more purchasing power, and more retail options. We need our purchasing power to stay in the city — to earn tax revenue and to multiple as it makes through out community rather than being gone as soon as we spend it St. Louis County. This is how we will improve our schools and provide better services to the citizens.

The counter argument, if you do the math, is in the suburban areas they are spending more per person per mile. That is, they are buying more expensive items that are likely higher margin for the retailers. So, if you believe this argument then kindly ask Steve Wilke-Shapiro to send me the $10 gift certificate to Trader Joe’s.

Trying To Get to South County Via MetroBus; My Scooter Awaits

I figure I preach enough about walking and using mass transit I should make such a person attempt myself. You see, my beloved scooter got a flat tire from a nail on Monday evening as I was heading to dinner downtown. I ended up pushing it the last 6 blocks to meet my friend, late. I left it in another friend’s parking garage downtown until the dealer could come and pick it up. I’d been meaning to take it in for routine service anyway so the timing was actually OK. Now it is ready this fine Saturday morning and I need to pick it up and ride back home. It is located at Mungenast Motorsports behind Dave Mungenast’s St. Louis Honda on South Lindbergh.

This obviously excludes me driving my car down there as I’d have to go back somehow later and get my car. My first thought was to get a friend to drop me off but then I wondered if I could just take the bus to get there. Why inconvenience a friend and use more gas when the bus is likely going that way anyway. Plus, I can’t let Joe Frank be the only blogging about taking the bus.

So I pull up Metro’s recent “TripFinder” website where you can put in your starting point and destination and it gives you options for bus and light rail — a Mapquest for mass transit. But I was getting these weird results all wanting to take me downtown and then up North with results in excess of two hours. I discovered that although I entered the destination address of 5939 South Lindbergh Blvd the software dropped the “South” part and wanted to take me to Florissant in North County. Zip codes are not allowed or at least I haven’t found any combination of commas or whatever that permits them. Some mapping software will ask do you mean “South” or “North” 5939 Lindbergh just to make sure. This, however, gave me no such option. From past observation I knew I had two bus routes near my house that both ended up at South County Mall which is not far from my destination but probably further than I’d be willing to walk both due to distance and environment (suburban hell). I pulled up Metro’s system map and confirmed that #40 and #93 both make it to the mall.

The TripFinder offers another way to find the address, I can use a map or find a street and look for stops on that street. So, I pull up Lindbergh and they have a very long list of stops on Lindbergh — 5 pages of stops. Makes sense, the street is very long cutting across a wide swath of the region. And Lindbergh is listed as “Lindbergh”, “Lindbergh US-61”, “Lindbergh Blvd” and so on with the cross streets coming after that. I looked up the area on Google and saw that Mueller Rd was probably a likely stop. I picked page 3 of the list and found the Mueller stop relatively easy. Plug it in and I’ve got my logical route to South County Mall via the #93 with a transfer to the #49 along Lindbergh. Total travel time, just a few over an hour. Total time figuring this out, about 10-15 minutes. For a frame of reference, Google says the drive is 8.2 miles and should take 13 minutes.

So I am debating. The fare is $2.25 (bus w/transfer) which is not a big deal but I had to check my wallet to make sure I had some singles as they don’t make change. Looking at the schedule I see that half the hour travel time is spent waiting at the JC Penny at South County Mall, not exactly my idea of a good way to spend a nice Saturday. I do have class reading to do but I’d have to carry a backpack and my motorcycle helmet on the bus and while I am waiting. The bus leaving near my house on the #93 is on an hourly headway so I have to work on that schedule as well.

I just called my friend, he is picking me up in an hour.

On a somewhat related note: Dave Mungenast Sr. recently pass away from cancer. I had the fortune to meet and talk with him earlier this year while visiting his Classic Motorcycle Museum on Gravois in South City. I, of course, bent his ear about opening a new shop in the city for his Honda scooter sales. I had hoped to talk to him more in the future as he had great knowledge about what the city was like in the 1950s. The motorcycle museum location on Gravois was one of his early auto dealerships before he and nearly every other business fled to the once greener pastures of the suburbs. My condolences go out to the Mungenast family for their loss.

Clayton: No Scooters on the Sidewalk

Today I was having lunch at the posh Dominic’s Trattoria at the corner of Bonhomme and Brentwood. Upon arrival in my scooter, a bit on the wet side, I parked as I often do within the public right-of-way. Remember, the ROW is everything from one private property to another — sidewalk and street. In this case I was parked out of the line of the pathway of the main sidewalk.

Ideally, I’d not park in such a random place but in this part of the country parking for anything other than a car is hard to find. Don’t scroll down and tell me not to park on the sidewalk just yet — at least hear me out.

I was in Clayton attending this month’s luncheon for the Society of Professional Journalists, the group that I was on panel for last month. The topic this month was Freedom of Information requests! Upon leaving the restaurant I walked across the street to snap a few pictures and noticed a parking enforcement cart pull up behind cars parked on the street near my scooter. The enforcement officer was either there for my scooter or the cars — it quickly became apparent he was there because of my scooter.

As I approached I asked if there was problem. He said he was about to give me a ticket and that I could not part on the sidewalk. I said I was completely out of the path of the sidewalk. I asked where I should park. “In a metered space,” he replied. My scooter, technically a moped due to engine size, is tiny and would surely get run over in such a small space.

Aside from getting hit, it simply doesn’t make any sense to take up a 20ft long parking space for my scooter. How can that possibly be good public policy? I asked where, if I had bicycled instead, I could have parked my bike. His response? At a bike rack. Duh, right? Well, I looked up and down the street and no bike rack was in sight. In fact, I can’t think of a single bike rack in central Clayton. If one exists anywhere, it is well hidden.

Attempts to break our reliance on the single user car are often met with more obstacles rather than solutions. Clayton, like the City of St. Louis, needs to come to grips with bicycles, electric bicycles, mopeds and registered scooters. They will continue to increase in numbers so it would be wise for them to be pro-active.

The fun part of this story was the timing. As I am discussing this issue with the parking enforcement officer out comes one of the panelists from this month, KSKD reporter Mike Owens. Mike asked, “Are you getting a ticket?” When I turned back to the enforcement officer and asked if he knew Mike Owens, his look was priceless. It only took a minute for him to be in his cart and be on his way. Priceless.

Electric-assist bicycles have been around for many years but these are increasing in the marketplace. Really small mopeds, some with pedals and some without, are also becoming a good urban option. And finally, we are seeing electric scooters and hybrid scooters within the realm of affordable. With all these variations on small two-wheel motorized transportation where is the line drawn? If it has any motor at all it cannot be secured on a sidewalk? Would Clayton expect me to park an electric-assist bicycle in a full metered parking space simply because it has a motor and battery?

I have an idea but it will take an old scooter that can potentially be sacrificed. I’d take the scooter to Clayton and park in a metered space at noon, pay the meter and then hide in an adjacent location and film people’s reactions. I think you’ll see more than one person get upset of a small vehicle taking up such a large space. Look out Clayton, you may soon be on camera.

Ok, now you are free to tell me not to park my scooter on the sidewalk.

Gateway Cup Day 4: The Delmar Loop

Another great day for bicycling in the St. Louis area. Today’s race in University City with a loop that included part of Delmar was exciting. In the pro men’s category a few riders broke away from the peleton and led to an exciting finish.

This video is from the final mens race of the event as well as the recognizing the top 3 riders for the Gateway Cup (all four days of racing):

So another year’s racing is done. But, come next Spring look for more racing in the St. Louis region. For information on the local bicycle racing scene go to stlbiking.com.

– Steve