Join Me at the Royale to Discuss the Upcoming City Primary Election

Monday evening (2/16/09) I’m hosting the first of two City Primary Discussions at The Royale.

From the invite:

In our fair city we have many elections, and a very important election is coming up in early March. It is the primary, the key election for most offices in Saint Louis city. In this election half of all of the wards will be up for election along with the executive branch, our city’s Mayor.

Here at the Royale we discuss the future of our city. For the next two Mondays(16th and 23rd) starting at 8:30 to close we will have an open discussion about all of the city election races. These discussions will be hosted by Steve Patterson of the urbanreviewstl.com blog. All are welcome and encouraged to attend to learn more about the candidates.

The start time is 8:30pm on the 16th & 23rd.  The Royale is located at 3132 S. Kingshighway (map).  So come out, get a beverage from the bar, and sit down with me to discuss the various races throughout the city.

Non-Smokers Speak Up For Change!

My recent post requesting a smoking ban for the region & state generated the most comments for a single post for the entire 4+ years I’ve been writing this blog.  While many found smoking to be as equally disgusting as me, others took a more libertarian viewpoint — let customers, business owners and the market — not the government  — decide.  Fine.

I’m no longer going to patronize establishments that permit smoking anywhere. I encourage others to do the same.

The whole non-smoking section is really a joke anyway.  If smoking is allowed indoors with the same ventilation system then the ill-effects of smoking are throughout.

But avoiding smoking places is not good enough.  We non-smokers need to tell the smoking places why we are no longer going to patronize their establishments.  And we need to make sure the non-smoking places we do visit know we are there, in part, because they are 100% non-smoking.  So how do we do this?

First, if you are heading out to dinner call ahead and ask if the establishment is 100% smoke-free.  If the answer is no say something like, “Oh, too bad.  Thank you, but I won’t be eating at your place as long as smoking is permitted.” I know it sounds harsh and perhaps you can suggest different phrasing but they need to understand that allowing smoking costs business.  When you visit a place and they ask “smoking or non-smoking?”  you can respond with, “Oh, I didn’t realize you still allowed smoking.”  Ideally you’d do a 180 and leave.  I did this recently even though I was ready to eat then.  If you don’t want to find another place to eat go with, “I guess we’ll stay this time, please seat us as far away from the smokers as physically possible.”  Remember, most likely the person seating you didn’t make the choice to allow smoking so you don’t want to direct your anger at them.

I’m convinced many restaurant owners only see and count the smokers.  These owners fail to realize they have more non-smoking customers than smoking customers.  Recent reports indicate that less than 20% of U.S. adults smoke (source).  Owners are afraid to ban smoking because they might lose a minority of the population.  They don’t fear losing the non-smokers.  We need to change that.  Instill some fear.

Most places I visit are 100% smoke-free.  But I will stop going to a few places — Chimichanga and City Diner to name a couple — that are not 100% smoke-free.  Since I started writing this post a week ago I’ve found myself in places with smoking allowed at the bar.  It certainly won’t be easy.  Friends might not so understanding when I insist we go elsewhere.  No everyone is comfortable being perceived as confrontational or difficult.  So to help out I’ve created some card templates that can be left behind when you leave.

For those unpleasant places that still allow smoking:

The above language works for contacting restaurants through there websites.  Just copy & paste:

I enjoy your establishment but the presence of cigarette smoke makes the experience less than ideal for me.  I eat out less due to the economy so when I do I want to enjoy it.  Please remove smoking so I can return.

For those awesome places that are smoke-free:

Click each of the above for a PDF document set up with 10 cards per sheet (Avery 5371).  Just print, cut and carry.  Leave them behind at places so they hopefully get the message. It is a tough economy out there and we non-smokers account for 80% of the population.  We don’t need to be subjected to the disgusting addictive habit of the remaining 20% of the population.  We, the complacent non-smokers, have the purchasing power to rid smoking in places.  We just have to speak up.

Early Poll Results Shows Trend Away From Land Phones

Used a phone booth lately?  Even seen a pay phone in the last decade?  Wireless technology has changed the urban landscape.  No more pay phones.  No more phone booths.

This weeks poll, still active in the upper right corner of the main page, shows the continued transformation away from land-based phone lines to wireless phones.

The question asked is, Do you have a land-based phone line at home?

As of last night, half of the 58 responses indicated no they did not.  Of the half with a land line, 55% of those are considering dropping the line and going cell only.  Combine the people without a land phone with those who are considering dropping the land line and you get 72.4%.

I like having only a single number.  I also like saving money. Having messages in only one location rather than at the office, at home and on my wireless device is also convenient.

In a decade we probably won’t have new places wired for land phones at all.  I think I was a teenager before I could have a phone in my room — not my own line but just a phone on our single line.  Now young kids have their own wireless phones.

Wireless phones enable people to meet up in public places — calling when close to pinpoint their exact location.  Waiting for a call no longer means staying at home.  Hopefully the end result will put more folks outdoors in great public places.  Phones with cameras and email allow people to share where they are.  I’m guessing the Wal-Mart parking lot will not be shared.  Vibrant pedestrian-filled streets, however, will be emailed on posted on sites like Facebook.

The technology of the automobile has physically seperated our society.  Handy wireless devices may be just the item to help reduce our distances.

Abandoned Construction Elevator Platform Blocks Midtown Sidewalk

In November of 2004 the ball started rolling to renovate the  Metropolitan building located at Grand & Olive in Midtown St. Louis:

At least six developers are interested in two Grand Center sites up for redevelopment.

A joint pre-bid conference on the properties, which include a vacant site owned by Saint Louis University on the northeast corner of Grand and Lindell and the Metropolitan Building on the northeast corner of Grand and Olive owned by Grand Center Inc., drew several developers or teams of developers. (source)

Pyramid Construction was one of those developers and they succeeded in getting the Metropolitan building by 2006.  Today, however, the building remains vacant and the wooden base from the long-removed construction elevator blocks the sidewalk.

Last April I broke the story that Pyramid had collapsed and was in the process of shutting down.  By June of 2008 most of their vast real estate holdings were either sold to others or taken back by creditors.  Such was the case with the Metropolitan:

Centrue Bank, the first mortgage holder on a loan to Pyramid Cos. for a planned redevelopment of the building, has assumed ownership of the building at 500 N. Grand. Pyramid bought the vacant, seven-story building for $2 million in 2006. The company planned to open a Hyatt Place hotel on the upper floors with retail on the ground floor. The total development cost was estimated at $30 million.  (source)

The owner of the construction elevator at the site removed the elevator following Pyramid’s collapse in April.  Since then the platform has continued to block the sidewalk and several on-street parking spaces.  The city is losing revenue by not having these spaces open for vehicles.  Pedestrians walking back and forth from various businesses & restaurants in the area must go into the street or walk over the platform.

Centrue unfortunately got stuck having to foreclose on the property.  Based on tax records, they remain the owner. I’m sure all they want is to be the former owner.

I will be sending the bank, 19th Ward Alderwoman Marlene Davis, and the City’s Director of Streets  an email asking for this to be removed so the sidewalk is once again open for use.

Hopefully we will once again see construction activity at this location but in the meantime the sidewalk needs to remain free of obstructions.  With newly renovated buildings and several new restaurants in the immediate area the last thing we need is an abandoned platform reminding us of Pyramid’s failure.

New $13 Million Villa Lighting HQ Lacks ADA Access Route

Walkability and accessibility do not happen overnight.  With strong leadership and a commitment to these goals, as new buildings are built we can incrementally improve both.  However, without the right leadership and tools in place to ensure improvements in walkability and accessibility, we will continue to invest in projects geared toward a single mode — the private auto.

I thought I had hammered this message home to Ald. Matt Villa over the poor accessibility of Loughborough Commons, a suburban style highway-centric big box/strip center in his ward (11th).  While that project has improved greatly in the last few years it is clear that was as a reaction to pressure from me.  To date, the Burger King & Lowes still lack an ADA access route.

I’ve had numerous conversations with Matt Vila over accessibility and walkability.  You’d think he would have learned something and ensured the new $13 million headquarters of his family business would have been accessible. With a reported 80 employees it would be reasonable to assume that some might arrive to work on foot — either walking directly from home or taking public transit.

This project is located in my ward, the 6th, where  Ald. Kacie Triplett has been on the job for just shy of two years.  Of course I don’t think walkability or accessibility should be left up to each of the 28 Aldermen. They clearly don’t know about these things.  We are a small city — only 61.9 square miles of land area.  This is less than two square miles larger than Columbia MO (60.1 sq. miles of land) and smaller than Springfield Missouri (73.2).  My hometown of Oklahoma City is a whopping 607.0 square miles of land area.  So we are small in terms of land area but we are fairly dense despite having lost a half million in population since our 1950 peak of 856,000.

But while Springfield Missouri only has 2,000 persons per square mile we have over 5,700.  San Francisco has over 17,000 persons in each of its  46.7 square miles of land area.  Manhattan, the prominent NYC Borough, has over 70,000 residents per square mile (22.96 square miles of land area).  At our 1950 peak, our density was slightly higher than Chicago’s density in 2000.

The point is the greater the density the greater the likelihood of having a population that walks and uses transit.  Regions such as NYC and San Francisco have dense walkable centers with less dense, less walkable fringes.  Here we continue to weaken our core.  Lowering the standard down to that might be acceptable 20 miles outside of the core.  I know of no growing region where the core being reduced to suburban fringe levels of density and non-walkability.

Which brings us back to Villa Lighting’s new facility.  It is great they stayed in the city.  It is unfortunate the building was made to be arrived at by private car only — not by foot or bicycle (no bike rack out front).  On the edge of the region it is more reasonable to do single mode development but not in the core.  This facility is a short walk from the #70 Grand bus route and the Grand Metrolink light rail station.

For those who physically can, climbing the hill is the most direct route to the front door.  Remember this is all new construction so they created the grades.

There is sufficient room for a stair & ramp to the entrance so the new building can be brought into compliance.

For anyone in a wheelchair this is a fortress.

So once again the pedestrian is relegated to the drive designed for autos.  So I’m thinking the architect, Clayco’s Forum Studio, must be out of touch on the ADA.  But then I switched from the East to West side of the building.

Here the new sidewalk continues on the side street.  They even included a street tree.  No curb though.

Hallelujah, an accessible route for tenant spaces on the West side of the building.  So this has me even more confused.  They are obviously aware of the requirement as they complied here.  My only guess is they didn’t do it on the East side claiming it wasn’t feasible due to the grades —- grades they created.  We should do better.