Changes to Urban Review – St. Louis

Categories

This weekend tech guru Brian Marston updated my blog to show the categories I’ve been using for entries. This will hopefully make it easier to review archives. Please note that some entries are in multiple categories.

If you have suggestions on new categories for me to use please let me know in the comments below.

Local Sponsorship

We are talking with some locally owned businesses about sponsoring my site and others in the St. Louis Syndicate. The exact form the ads will take on (banner, side display ad, etc…) has yet to be determined. We are still working on pricing as well. Part of the answer is in the level of interest from local business owners. If you have interested please send me an email. In the meantime click on a Google ad in the right column to help out.

News Aggregators

This isn’t a change so much as a technological note. With the substantial amount of information available on the internet it is increasingly difficult to check all the various web sites for interesting information. With RSS & Atom feeds you don’t need to go to the news – the news will come to you. Including Urban Review – St. Louis!

You don’t need to worry about the types of feeds and how it all works. All you need to know are some choices of applications. For recommended news aggregators click here. This list includes recommendations for Mac, Windows and other operating systems.

If you are lucky enough to use a Macintosh computer from Apple you may want to consider upgrading your operating system to the new OSX 10.4 “Tiger” which was released on Friday. It has integrated RSS support in the Safari browser. I haven’t upgraded yet but I plan to do so in the next few weeks.

Notifications

If you are not ready to make the jump to RSS feeds but want to know when I’ve added a new entry to Urban Review – St. Louis you can sign-up to receive “notifications” via email. Each time I make a new entry you will receive a brief email with a link to the new entry. Your privacy is protected – the list is never used for any other purpose. To begin receiving notifications send an email to this address.

Not Getting Enough of My Views?

Ever wonder about my thoughts on issues such as music, TV, advertising and other pop culture issues? Oh, you haven’t huh? Well, fine. Oh wait, I see a couple of hands in the back of the room. For the few of you that are curious I’ve got a new blog devoted to all those subjects not covered here on Urban Review – St. Louis. The new blog is called, Steve’s Thoughts. Check it out. And yes, RSS feeds are available for the new site as well.

And don’t forget, I have a site on St. Louis’ 25th Aldermanic Ward. The look has just been updated and I will be posting new information this week on local meetings, happenings and neighborhood issues. Not for everyone but if you live in or around the area you may find it interesting. RSS feeds and notifications are also available for this site.

Podcasts

I am working on the next installment of my podcasting. It takes quite a bit of time to put together just a short podcast. I’ve started recording short segments as they come to me so as I get enough I will be putting them together for broadcast.

Links and More LInks

I have some great links in the right hand column so be sure to check those out. I am also working on adding a substantial number of links. These will be in clearly marked categories to make it easy to find what you are looking for.

Thanks for reading Urban Review – St. Louis!

– Steve

Free Valet Bike Parking at Earth Day in Forest Park

From Renee Duenow of the St. Louis Regional Bike Federation:

The St. Louis Regional Bicycle Federation will be offering our annual free
valet bike parking at the Earth Day festivities in Forest Park this Sunday, May 1st (10:30am-6pm).
We will be located in front of the Muny, on the circle drive. Ride your bike
to the festival, save some gas, avoid the traffic jams, and leave your
wheels with us while you take in the fun.

There is also an organized ride starting at the Missouri History Museum on
Sunday, “Pedal into History”, at 1:30pm. Sponsored by Trailnet and the
Missouri Historical Society, the ride will go through forest park and is
free of charge.

Check out the Earth Day website for more details on the Valet Parking, rides and other events.

Hope to see you there!

New Target Store Not As Urban As It Could Be

No doubt about it, the new Target store currently under construction is far more urban than the store it is replacing. With the bulk of the parking under the new building and a front facade closer to Hampton Avenue this is the most urban big box we will have in the City of St. Louis.

The problem is I’ve seen a far more urban target in a less urban context. A few years ago, on a visit to Seattle, I visited their newest Target store. We were in North Seattle – pretty suburban and no different than most suburban areas. Seattle’s NorthGate mall was across the street. Both the mall and Target are visible from the always congested I-5 highway.

(Note: photo by Target – my helicopter is in the shop)

I asked a friend, Seattle Architect Richard Kenney, to take pictures of the Target for me.

The NorthGate Target store is on the top two levels of the four story structure. You can enter/exit the Target from either floor and it contains internal escalators like you would expect in any department store. A Best Buy and other national chains are part of the building. Yes, this is not the most attractive structure in the world. But, compared to the typical mall across the street it is a major improvement.

Basically the building is divided into two sections – the Western section is the retail portion while the Eastern section is a parking garage. A plaza is in the middle.

Looking into the plaza you can see the retail section on the left and the garage on the right. Smaller retail spaces front the main street and the plaza space.

The Quizno’s at right makes the corner of the parking garage more friendly (and toasty…).

A closer look in the plaza you can see how plantings have been incorporated into the design to soften the concrete and steel. On my one visit to the building we parked on the top level of the parking garage. Some surface parking is also located behind the building.

As you can see, nobody is going to mistake this for a great street. Still, as big box developments go I will take this over sprawling parking lots and horizontal buildings any day.

Another view looking into the plaza area.

Looking from the plaza out toward the main street, with the typical suburban mall across the street.
When land is scarce and valued, developers and retailers will build more urban out of necessity. I’m not foolish enough to think that urbanity is their motivation. No, they are motivated by the all mighty dollar. In this case the result was far better than the sprawl surrounding it.

Better big box projects are possible. We just have to find ways to more sure they work for the developers and retailers as well as the general public.

– Steve

The Easing of the St. Louis Police Residency Requirement

In the nearly 15 years I’ve lived in St. Louis I have supported residency requirements for city employees and the St. Louis Police. I’ve met some great cops that enjoyed living in the city. Unfortunately, I’ve also met my share of officers that had a chip on their shoulder about the city. Granted, in their line of work they don’t exactly encounter the best the city has to offer. Here is the info on the new rule:

“Under the rule passed Friday, officers who leave the city will have to live within an hour from the patrol station where they work. That requirement was amended from an earlier proposal that said officers must live either in the city or St. Louis County. The goal presumably is to ensure that police are available quickly in an emergency. The commissioners did not specify how they would measure whether an officer’s residence is within 60 minutes of work.” Reported Jake Wagman of the Post-Dispatch;

“The Police Board voted 3-2 to allow officers with seven years of service to live outside the city limit, effective immediately. About three-fourths of 1,360 current officers are immediately eligible to move. New officers will have to complete training and a probationary period before their experience will count toward the seven years.”

It is because of the sometimes bad attitude that I am not so upset about this change. Let them move. Maybe they will approach the public with better attitudes? That when those of us that like the city complain about something they won’t give us lip about thats what we should expect in the city. If they move it certainly can’t make their attitudes any worse. Again, not all cops have bad attitudes. Just enough to leave a bad taste in my mouth.

I choose to live in the city because I love city living. I hope once these cops are not longer forced to live in the city they will open their eyes and choose to stay.

– Steve

Saturday May 21st Will Be A Busy Day In St. Louis

From Joan Esserman, League of Women Voters of St. Louis:

From Lynn Josse, UMSL 2004 Public Policy Research Center Community Fellow:

Both events on the 21st of May look great so it will be a tough decision. As a side note, it was May 21, 1966 that the last street car operated in St. Louis.

– Steve