Positive Developments in St. Louis

Some out there may get the impression I’m against all development. Well that is just not the case. Still I can be pretty negative at times so here is a list of some of the things I see as positive development in the city – the things that get me excited about the future of Saint Louis:

Continued rehabilitation, adaption and reuse of existing buildings:

All over the city we are seeing everything from existing shotgun cottages to old schools to large warehouse buildings being reconfigured internally to meet today’s lifestyles. This work is being done by individuals and large developers alike. We have the state historic rehab tax credit to thank for aiding in much of this, especially on the larger projects. After decades of writing off so many great old structures it is great to see their qualities be appreciated. By renovating these structures, many once vacant, we are adding density and thus strengthening multiple neighborhoods. We are also showing that building types once thought to be obsolete can again be functional. Creativity is winning out over demolition in many areas.

The East Loop area

Even just five years ago, it would have been easy for many to justify more suburban new construction East of Skinker. People would have pointed to the gas station and Church’s Chicken on the corners and count the area a lost cause to the automobile. Joe Edwards saw a continued pedestrian-friendly environment and he has worked toward that goal. Metro narrowed the street from four lanes to just two — widening the sidewalks in the process.

So many of our streets were widened in the first half of the 20th century when our population was significantly greater — widening sidewalks and narrowing streets is certainly a positive.

Old North St Louis:

Today the neighborhood is vastly different than when I moved there in 1991. The 1970’s mistake, a pedestrian mall, is finally being removed and 14th street is being reopened again. Buildings, some barely still standing, are being renovated — again by individuals and through large development deals. If not for the hard work of many individuals on smaller projects (single buildings) would we see the larger efforts today. The work of one person renovating a single small structure should never be discounted — For more than 30 years now individuals have been bringing back the neighborhood.

Mass Transit:

The continued development of our mass transit choices is exciting to me. Sure Metro has screwed up before and they will do so again but we must keep our sights on the goal of being able to navigate our region both through the use of public transit and the private bicycle. As someone who is only recently disabled, our mass transit system will play an important role in my having mobility.

New urban infill development

Many get excited by proposed new high-rise towers. Me? Not so much. I prefer more modest structures in the 2-8 story range. The building on the NE corner of Sarah & Laclede, known as 6 North, is just such an example (see my review from three years ago). New infill construction along Park in the Lafayette Square neighborhood helps define an urban public street. The modern loft apartments on Forest Park Parkway at Euclid (with the Bread Co) is another good example of new urban infill.

Just having new construction isn’t enough for me — they have new construction out in O’Fallon but that doesn’t mean it creates the environment I want to be surrounded with.

Dogs in the city

I’ve always been a cat person but in the city it is the urban dog that rules. The owner walks the dog to an outdoor cafe where strangers now begin conversations about the dog’s breed and so on. Dog parks have formed that bring people together in new ways. It is hard to walk around many neighborhoods without seeing a person out walking their dog. Each and every one is an encouraging symbol.

Conclusion

So while others get excited about proposals for a particular high-rise, another casino or even a “district” like the 3-block Ballpark Village concept or the Bottleworks proposal, I’m more content with modest examples of urbanity. Slick marketing and hype turns me off. Simple urbanity, on the other hand, gets me stirred up. A good form-based zoning code is totally sexy. Laws that encourage an active street life (making it easier for street performers, street vendors and such) would be so cool.

I will continue to point out design flaws when big ticket projects that, for example, fail to include proper pedestrian pathways get built with or without public subsity. I will continue to point out how our elected leaders repeat mistakes of the past and how they focus on the short term (ground breakings, ribbon cuttings) while not always considering the long-term sustainability of the project. This doesn’t make me anti-development or a naysayer, it’s just me being vocal about my expectations and how they were not met.  We need many more people standing up and articulating what it is they want and expect from their surroundings.

As they come along I will try harder to highlight what I see as positive contributions to our build environment because they are out there.

St Louis Centre; Different Owners, Different Standards

In 2005 the failed downtown mall, St. Louis Centre, was at the center of Mayor Slay’s priorities. At the time the Mayor and others were busy pushing Centre owner Barry Cohen to tear down the sky bridge that crosses over Washington Ave and move forward with redevelopment.

From the Mayor’s blog on Sept 25, 2005:

Stories in the business pages last week confirm the obvious. Barry Cohen, the owner of St. Louis Centre, is stalled. After a summer of fumbling, Mr. Cohen lost the funding proferred by Downtown Now’s Tom Reeves to demolish the skybridge.

Since purchasing the downtown mall more than a year ago, Mr. Cohen has promised, announced, floated, and projected some plans – none of which has come to anything. It is not clear to me whether he is hapless or canny, hoping for a profit on the $5.4 million the Biz Journal says he paid for the property.

Whatever.

As Tom Reeves told us, there’s plenty else to do Downtown. Meanwhile, we’ll keep sending Mr. Cohen those tax bills.

Wow, he had the mall for a whole year and the mayor calls him out. Slay supporter, now former developer John Steffen, was treated differently from day one:

Friday, February 17, 2006

This is a note to every developer hoping to be able to make a deal in the City and to every citizen hoping for redevelopment: John Steffen has announced ambitious plans to turn St. Louis Centre and the One City Centre office building into a mixed-use development.

These plans are possible because a public/private team, including Barb Geisman, Rodney Crim, Rollin Stanley, and Tom Reeves, kept their eyes on the goal line — not the headlines.

Not every real estate transaction can be negotiated in a blog.

I congratulate Barb, Rodney, Rollin, and Tom for their discipline — and I wish John good luck in getting this done.

This was well over two years ago and today the mall is totally vacant and the bridge still hovers over the street. Pyramid is out as developer with their equity partner Spinnaker taking over the now very stalled project. In fact, as reported here a week ago, Steffen and his company are out of the development business completely. Does this mean that Geisman and company dropped the ball? Were they all too cozy with Steffen?

Oh wait they did manage to give Steffen a sweetheart deal — a TIF backed by the city’s general revenues. That was also in 2006.

In the year and a half since then we’ve seen only slick marketing — drawing a line around a few blocks and calling it a district, The Mercantile Exchange or MX for short. That is almost as clever as the cards calling Ballpark Village a six block area (Broadway/5th to 8th and Clark to Walnut is 3 blocks no matter how many times they say otherwise).

So my question is this —does the city-backed TIF deal run with the property regardless of who takes over? If so, how long does Spinnaker have to complete the project? A year? Five years? A decade?

I think Steffen wanted this project so the city put up roadblocks for Cohen so he’d be forced to sell to Steffen.

Finally on Wednesday KMOX reported Pyramid’s story with greater detail and certainty than I had last Friday:

The developer of major St. Louis projects…St. Louis Centre and the former Dillard’s building, in the Mercantile exchange project…is getting out of the development business. Pyramid Construction’s John Steffen made the announcement through Steffen’s attorney Attorney Steven Goldstein… Problems in the real estate lending market are the main reason. Goldstein says Pyramid is currently working with other developers, investors, lenders and the city to make a transition for its development projects…but will continue to operate it’s property management division…which oversees a thousand apartment units in the city and surrounding area.

For someone with $609 million in development on his plate, Steffen has gone on a crash diet. Two years ago Steffen had this to say;

“We literally have more people offering to finance us than we have projects to finance,” Steffen said. “I need more projects because I have banks wanting to do business with me.”

Our city’s leaders bought Steffen’s hype. Or did Steffen buy off their better judgment with generous campaign contributions and illusions of success? Regardless our leadership has once again failed us. They claim Steffen was a victim of the current crisis but the roots of this go way back (see my post from June 2006) .
Perhaps we would have been better off giving Cohen a chance to prove himself? Of course then many of us wouldn’t have been able to enjoy the fancy parties thrown by Steffen for each project he announced. We sold out for some sushi.

I do hope all their projects are assumed by others and that they perform well. I also hope the next time we’ve got a developer bragging about his ability to get financing that we recognize the red flags.

I Have Missed This View, on KDHX Monday

Just days prior to my stroke I took a series of pictures from my balcony and from the shared rooftop space:

Above is the view from my balcony looking North. I’ve been away for nearly three months now but I know the view is unchanged. CPI Corp. hasn’t built a new building on their surface parking lot (that would be nice).

A guy was found murdered in the parking garage of the Ventana (right above).

The view is still in place for my return to St Louis and back to my own place.

Tune in Monday evening at 7pm on 88.1 or online at kdhx.org and I will talk about my rehabilitation, the date I return to St. Louis (soon) and share details on a welcome back party in my honor. I’ll also talk about being disabled and what life is like in a wheelchair.  Of course host DJ Wilson and I will talk about current development issues in St Louis.

The Video Store, Now in the Parking Lot

In the years that we’ve had video we’ve had video stores. Traditionally these have been brick & mortar stores. As I pointed out in November, local video stores are closing. With rentals from places like Netflix and iTunes who needs to drive to a store.

Companies like Redbox are bringing small video distribution machines to local stores like Shop-N-Save and McDonalds. In other parts of the country these have been placed outdoors.

Above is probably the only video rental place in the small town of Mt. Vernon, MO. The sad part is that it isn’t a place at all.

These are also located in Oklahoma City and likely in every city that doesn’t ban outdoor vending machines.

Above: Redbox rental outside a new McDonalds in suburban Oklahoma City. As this is an entirely new facility they could have found room indoors —the decision to place it outdoors was on purpose. On the plus side this offers the consumer access at times other than when the McDonalds is open.

My fear is that we replaced our main streets at first with suburban strip centers and drive-thrus. Now we are seeing the strip mall fail with walk-up kiosks in parking lots replacing full stores.

Above is the new main street of suburbia.

While the Redbox kiosk is convenient, it fails to help create any sort of meaningful space on the par with a good walkable commercial district. Our cars help isolate us from these dreary spaces — who’d want to walk here?

So the question is should municipalities ban exterior vending machines like soda machines or video rental machines? Should they only be allowed when built-in like a walk-up bank ATM? Should their number be limited based on some sort of formula. Are these visual clutter or just a fact of modern life? I personally think they are clutter and I don’t like seeing a Coke machine outside a store. Still I am reluctant to advocate a total ban except as part of a new urban form-based zoning code. However, allowing this to continue is only going to further denigrate our public & private spaces.

Pyramid sold former Sears site last year

For much of 2006 Pyramid was trying to swap the former S, Grand Sears site with McDonalds, but strong opposition from those that would be directly impacted by having a drive-thru closer to their homes raised a fuss — I helped too.    In the end the McDonalds closed.

The senior housing center Pyramid wanted to build on the site of the old McDonalds at Grand and Chippewa was then planned for the old Sears site across the street that they already owned. Owned as in past tense.

Property records indicate Pyramid sold that property (3708 S. Grand) and others on Oct 12th last year for $361,869. The properties are now titled with Pyramid’s name as well as “c/o Grand Future Realty LLC.” Grand Future Realty LLC is the owner of the adjacent building at 3722 S, Grand, which it purchased on 6/28/06 for $275,000. The registered agent and both organizers are from St Charles.
With Pyramid’s shut down last Friday it raises questions about the future of this project and others.  The property transfer raises questions about who all is involved in the project and who we might look to for its completion.