Union Station 25 & 116 Years Ago
St. Louis’ Union Station opened to a massive crowd on September 1, 1894 – 116 years ago today. Twenty-five years ago Sunday, August 29, 1985, Union Station reopened as a “festival marketplace” after being closed since the last train pulled out seven years prior on October 31, 1978.
St. Louis had gotten so bad the 1981 film Escape From New York was filmed here, able to pass for 1997 New York – as a maximum security prison. A big fight scene took place in the Grand Hall of Union Station prior to the restoration you see above.
In 1985 I entered architecture school, Union Station’s reopening was widely studied. In the days when 100,000 passengers a day would pass through Union Station there was no shortage of activity. For the last 25 years the busiest spot has been the Fudgery:
When new Union Station was considered to be too far west of the central business district — the location is 8 blocks west of the station built under present-day Tucker in 1875. When I arrived in St. Louis 20 years ago there were many well-known stores in Union Station as well as St. Louis Centre, also downtown. In a few years a small mall just outside the city limits would expand and become the St. Louis Galleria — the shops quickly relocated.
– Steve Patterson
Like many 25-year-old malls, it's seen better days. My prediction is that if / when Ballpark Village gets going, it'll be Union Station's death knell (as a shopping mall / tourist destination) with the Hard Rack Cafe leading the exodous.
Best reuse after that? Enclose the train shed with a glass curtainwall system and make Union Station into one of the coolest, architecturally-significant / unique convention centers in the country. Between existing Metrolink access and adjacent freeways, it would be a logical transition.
That sounds abominable. What is with this “convention center” fetish that people seem to have? No creativity? None at all?
Steve, the notion that St. Louis City's chain retailers “relocated” to the Galleria just doesn't ring true to me. Many remained open downtown concurrent with the opening of additional Galleria locations: The Body Shop, Brookstone, The Limited, Eddie Bauer, etc…
There's been structural realignment in the retail industry, no doubt, but there are also serious problems with the health of our regional and local (city) economies. To suggest that what we're experiencing is merely the relocation of existing business from one community to another is to discount a much larger concern–a lack of leadership and vision to move our community forward.
I want to believe in the City's revival as much as the next person, but I can't accept much of the current dogma. Our diminishing stature relative to other places as a community in which to do business is anything but a natural consequence of the economic cycle or the product of changing tastes and preferences.
I have a theory that you can gauge and judge the health of a region's economy by looking at its malls: Too many of ours are dead (Jamestown, Northwest Plaza, Union Station, St. Louis Centre, Crestwood Plaza) and not all of the ones still around are operating at potential (Galleria, West County, Chesterfield).
Agreed. “It's the economy, stupid.” Losing as many jobs as we have, especially well-paying, industrial ones, reduces disposable income and negatively impacts retail at all levels. Have to disagree with you on West Couny, though – last I heard, they're 99%+ leased. Unfortunately, the St. Louis region seems to be following the typical rust-belt model, with the core and the inner-ring suburbs, at best, holding their own, or, in too many cases, declining, while retail moves further to the periphery, in places like Wentzville, Edwardsville, Fenton and Arnold.
Many retailers did close their Union Station or St. Louis Centre locations as soon as their Galleria location opened – they couldn't support two stores so close in the same market. Jim you weren't here and Tom is too young to know.
“Couldn't support” or better demographics? The distance from West County Mall to the Galleria (8.3 miles) is roughly equal to the distance between the Galleria and downtown (9.6 miles), and population density is pretty consistent, as well. Using your logic, there should be an Apple store downtown, since there are locations in both the Galleria and West County.
I'm talking about the early 90s. For this post I read articles about retailers at Union Station losing money — before the Galleria opened. In 1989 they were tweaking the retail mix. Management was certainly losing money because rents were based on sales. 'Sales need to be 15 percent to 20 percent higher so we can start shaking out some percentage rents.''
Malls are constantly tweaking their retail mixes. And you're right, I wasn't here in the early '90's, but my best guess as to what doomed retail in both St. Louis Centre and Union Station, once the Galleria opened, wasn't so much proximity as the fact that the Galleria had/has free parking, while you had/have to pay to park to shop at the other two. A 10 minute (or less) drive to save a buck or five just has a certain attraction for a lot of shoppers!
I think the terms are interchangeable. If you get 80% of your sales from the 20% demographics of _____ and then all the sudden a new mall opens up next to the 20% demographics…. well now you cant support your current location due to 80% sales disappearing.
Agree, partly. Most malls have a natural life of 20-30 years, unless they are in the minority that succeed in constantly reinventing themselves. Many shoppers gravitate to the new and shiny, when, deep down, the merchandise really is the same . . .
Ironically I just visited Union Station for the first time in 3 years. (First time I visited Union station was the very first day I visited St. Louis) Besides some stores on the inside… what else does one do at Union Station? I couldn't find any type of history museum or interesting displays that a visitor could do. Unless I somehow missed it…
So what does one actually do there? It seems so out of place. You have to pay for parking. The inside of the mall looks very depressing because it is so dead and the type of stores in the mall doesnt help either.(Random mish mosh stores) They even have parking underneath the roof next to Hardrock Cafe which makes that area look horrible.
I gotta agree with JZ71. Standing under the structure, it is amazing to look at. And if they could transfer it into something else, it would be great. But its' current life as a mall is dead.
I met some of the current managers at city hall a couple of years ago, they were offended when I called Union Station a mall. They are a “destination” they say. I've been there in the last year and it was pretty busy. In my mind you eat there. They have train history near the side 18th Street entry.
I've suggested building a neighborhood abound Union Station, including an East-West street just past the shed. They've got drawings for new buildings in the current parking.
Turn it into a convention center–seriously, what better use could such its huge enclosed space be used for???
By begging the question so incredulously you reveal your creative limitations. Large enclosed spaces have an unlimited number of uses. Do we need to get out some sort of encyclopedia for you?
Of course a huge open space such as the train shed has a myriad of uses, but many of those uses could be used in smaller spaces–like a shopping mall. A function, ie convention center, would use the space to its fullest potential, even if other uses could be found. I suppose it could be used as an airplane hangar and they could build a runway out in Mill Creek too.
I always think of Union Station as a place for tourists, where you can buy baseball caps, tshirts, and other souvenirs. Maybe I should go back and see what other stores are there.
I have been trying to make most of my purchases in the city of St. Louis so that my tax dollars go to the city, not the county. I have been taking the Metro to downtown Macy’s for clothing and I have found everything I was looking for.
I’ll drop by Union Station and see what stores they have. Since I take Metro, parking is not an issue for me. The Galleria is not particularly convenient for me, because I don’t like walking over from the Richmond Heights station, crossing Brentwood through all the traffic, and then having to walk across that big parking lot. Downtown Macy’s is very pleasant to walk to from the Metro station.
I believe Union Station is transitioning to a better mix, that is a hotel/meeting space/lunch crowd that is more in lined with Scottrade Center/Kiel rebirth and surrounding offices. While I don't know that latest between the Marriot and their contractor's dispute or rift, which is not uncommon when hotel redo spaces. I'm hoping it is a bump in the road. To me the future is getting 22nd street interchange rebuilt and opening developable land to the west of Union Station. I think its use will be much more appreciated and better served as a neighborhood anchor that serves business as well as an event crowd.
The Union Station Mall is more proof that cities need to play to their creative strengths instead of attempting to superimpose the popular weaknesses of the suburbs. It was a desperate attempt to attract their inane denizens; it failed. It's boring, it's ugly, and it ruins the beautiful and historic outer-shell is pales in comparison to.
Are you sure about the date October 1978 ? When I was in grad school at SLU in the fall of '77 we were taken on a secret tour of Union Station through padlocked doors. It was abandoned at that time. It was weird to see the cafeteria/diner with plate on the table and sugar containers on the counter like it had been lost in time. We got to go all through the abandoned hotel and even into the underground pulley system for the trains.
We are both right. The main building was shuttered while trains still operated under the shed, until 1978.
I'd love to see Union Station tweaked into a niche shopping destination. My choice would be vintage clothing boutiques, which could work with the many small storefronts and the out-of-town crowd. I'd love it on Washington, with the Garment District history, but I doubt many vintage shops can afford the rents in a gentrifying area. (Eve's Apple is the only one I can think of on Washington.) And Union Station would offer a venue for special events that draw in the vintage and retro subcultures from the Midwest and beyond. I'd love to see it grow into something as big as the Vintage at Goodwood festival. The setting would be awesome!
I could be wrong (and usually am) but I'm pretty sure that while Union Station played host to some scenes in the film, St. Louis City did not play backdrop for the rest of NYC. If so, it would make a stunning similarity eh?
A better use might be…perhaps…as a train station? But then that would require a collective act of foresight that the denizens of the urban area seem incapable of. No matter that they have just fought two devastating wars for oil, and have a half-dozen wars or proxy wars either under way or waiting in the wings. No matter that they now import 60% of their oil, and face crushing dislocation should any one of the states upon which they depend succumb to popular revolution. No matter that they, through redlining, discarded one of the most beautiful cities in North America outside of New Orleans, Boston, and a few others, and exchanged it for a shoddy, sprawling mess of strip malls and parking lots.
One can only wonder, how could a citizenry become so comprehensively stupid?
I agree with you on many of your observations, but especially the thought that St. Louis Union Station should host actual train arrivals again! It’d be brilliant! In Chicago, Amtrak arrives in a beautiful beaux-arts temple of a building, a different Union Station. St. Louisans could have an equally admirable central train station. Hopefully people in the Midwest will realize how useful trains are before fuel prices make car travel too expensive.
The convention center idea is terrible!
I agree with you on many of your observations, but especially the thought that St. Louis Union Station should host actual train arrivals again! It’d be brilliant! In Chicago, Amtrak arrives in a beautiful beaux-arts temple of a building, a different Union Station. St. Louisans could have an equally admirable central train station. Hopefully people in the Midwest will realize how useful trains are before fuel prices make car travel too expensive.
The convention center idea is terrible!