Utility Crews A Sign of Progress on Tucker Boulevard

Work continues on rebuilding Tucker Blvd (12th), continuing southward in phases. Now that work on removing the old road built over a railroad tunnel is getting closer to Washington Ave utility crews can be seen more frequently.

As with most construction there have been inconveniences but soon Tucker will play a new role as a major in/out route for downtown from the north.

– Steve Patterson

CVC Plan To Improve Dome Improves Broadway

Last Wednesday the St. Louis Convention & Visitors Commission announced the plan it submitted to the Rams to remake the Edward Jones Dome into a “top tier” facility.  Rather than rush to post about the plan I decided to take my time to revisit Baer Plaza (between the Edward Jones Dome and I-70), read & reread the plan, and offer more than a knee-jerk reaction. I’m not going to rehash the big picture you’ve read elsewhere but I’ll focus on a couple of areas: the point where the Dome and convention center meet and Baer Plaza. Click here to download the 22-page PDF plan.

On page 14 of the CVC’s plan they talk about the boring space shown above:

We are proposing the conversion of the courtyard between the convention center and the Dome into a flexible pre-game fan destination for pre-game concerts, food and beverage sales and exciting fan entertainment offerings. This can facilitate earlier ingress into the Dome and reduce congestion created by new NFL Security requirements for wandings or patdowns. It will also generate additional food and beverage sales and create a ‘friends’ gathering place for pre-game activity. 

The courtyard is certainly not an asset in it’s existing condition. The CVC plan includes an image of how they think this courtyard could be revised.

Presumably this updated courtyard space could be useful throughout the year as other events are hosted in the convention center and Dome. If so, this could be a good investment in updating a drab area. But it’s outside around Broadway and in Baer Plaza that big changes will take place so lets go there.

From up high this looks nice but both sides of Broadway are dreadful.

The exciting part for me is a new 50,000 square foot multilevel building to be built here as part of an expanded club experience for the well-off football fan:

The new club seats will become part of an exciting contemporary club experience, with the addition of a new 50,000 square foot building referred to herein as the Baer Plaza addition. The suite corridors on the club level will be remodeled with lighting upgrades and finishes to flow nicely into newly remodeled club lounges. The club level renovations will add an ADA platform and expand the club floor plate by filling in the open sections to the floor below. All club level guests will be able to enter the facility through a new club entrance in Baer Plaza. This new building will improve the club experience and enhance the facility as a whole. It will provide a premium entrance for the Rams’ highest dollar customers and will be outfitted with club lounge space, a technology area currently dubbed the ‘Geek Suite’ and an open air deck for a rooftop beer garden. The Geek Suite will be outfitted with Wi-Fi connections and an abundance of HD flat screen monitors and is intended to be a location for the club/suite customers who want to stay connected to Fantasy Football with their handheld Smart devices. This space would be similar to a high-end technology store like an Apple store in fit and finish. The development of Baer Plaza will function as a gateway to the stadium, offering the Rams premium seat fans a new front door experience. The bridge connects to the stadium at the suite and club level(s).

I’m not a fan of bridges over roads but the massing of this new structure is worth a pedestrian bridge over Broadway. This new building, with a “street level restaurant”, will enclose Broadway and give it a needed urban feel that’s been missing since buildings on that side were razed for the open Baer Plaza. The building would also include a team store and rooftop space. Building massing is absolutely needed on the east side of Broadway so this has great potential. Ideally the restaurant and team store would be open all year. Hopefully the rooftop space could be used for other events when the Rams are playing.

Retractable bollards would allow Broadway, a major road into downtown, to be closed on game days. The bollards would be attractive whereas the current concrete barriers are not. It would also close off the disabled drop off area on Broadway. I’ll need to ask how the CVC plans to address that.  This new building would serve as a connector between the CBD to the south and the future “Bottle District” to the north of Cole.

Financing is another issue.

Congrats to Kitty Ratcliffe and her team at the CVC, I’m not easily impressed but I think these improvements (plus interior changes) will greatly improve the game day experience for those attending the games, increase revenues for the Rams,  and improve the area the rest of the year. Remember if the Rams accept this solution, and stay in the Dome until 2025, we must think about what happens after then. The new natural lighting, massive video scoreboard and this building could serve other uses in the Dome after a new facility is built for the Rams for after 2025.

– Steve Patterson

Winners of the Laurel Apartment’s Lovin the Lou Contest

Last night winners were finally announced in the Lovin the Lou contest:

The Laurel Apartments is asking St. Louisans to show them why they love St. Louis in a ‘Lovin the Lou Video Contest’ beginning July 8th. The prize for the most love (and a little creativity and video savvy) is Free Rent For A Year at the Laurel Apartments in Downtown’s Mercantile Exchange District!

Contest Details

The Laurel Apartments will run a city-wide ‘Lovin the Lou’ video contest for an incredible opportunity to live rent-free for one year at The Laurel Apartments in Downtown St. Louis. The winner will also be the featured blogger on the’ Lovin the Lou Blog’ which will chronicle their crazy cool adventures and experiences around their new neighborhood in Downtown St. Louis.

This contest is an effort to identify what makes St. Louis unique and remarkable and to find the next ambassador for St. Louis. The Laurel Apartments is asking St. Louisans to submit a 2-minute video that captures how they are Lovin the Lou!

“We want to showcase the people and character that make St. Louis, especially downtown, a great place to live and work,” said Melissa DeCicco, Marketing Director for Mills Properties, “We know it’s fabulous, but it is time for us to show and tell!”

I served as one of the judges in the contest, along with Jeff Vines (STL_Style), Bill Streeter (Brick by Chance and Fortune) and developer Amos Harris.  I can tell you it was not easy to pick the final winners, but we did come to agreement:

Grand Prize Winner –  Finding You in the Lou, Ria & husband

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PSki_EZgzmY

Second Place Winner –  Love in the Lou, Mike & Tabitha

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7iYowBe_Hnk

Best Use of Music – A Day in the Lou, Dana Kay Goddard

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=khtPX8ZYODI

Best Guest Appearance –  Becky Shows us St. Louis, Becky

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OwE47VCAUhU

Best Use of Food – Get a Taste of Lee’s Cookies, Lee

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSpS5c3DlZ8

Best STL Style –  St. Louis Social Scene, Jessie & Red October in the Lou, The Ropers

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KobwYGOx0jQ

Fan Favorite – Our Kinda Town, Jenna & Todd

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G8U7F1VXbrM

Honarable mentions: The Real Lou, Shaun

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tgP-daCfIdo

& Andy Rocks St. Louis, Andy

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2w8mdquAKLY

The above awards were presented at a bonfire in the center courtyard of the Laurel Apartments last night.

Congrats to all the winners.

– Steve Patterson

Park Over Highway Useful For Boulevard Concept (Updated)

Last week the public was updated on the CityArchRiver project. Much of the presentation (pdf) focused on getting to the Arch from downtown.

From the press release:

In December, the US Department of Transportation announced a $20 million TIGER grant for work on the I-70 corridor connected to the CityArchRiver 2015 plan. With matches and other resources, $57.2 million has been secured for work on I-70 connections surrounding the Arch Grounds making it possible for a critical piece of the project—the park over the depressed lanes of I-70 between the Old Courthouse and the Arch grounds—to move forward.

“Visitors will now have a tree-lined green space to traverse between the Old Courthouse and the Arch without a stair step in their way,” said Ed Hassinger, St. Louis area district engineer for the Missouri Department of Transportation (MoDOT). “Not a single stoplight or dangerous intersection will hinder visitors between Fourth Street in front of the Old Courthouse and the Arch Grounds.”

In his remarks to community members, Gullivar Shepard, associate principal for the lead design firm Michael Van Valkenburgh and Associates, identified the crucial role the park over I-70 has in achieving the project’s full potential.

“A park over the highway is probably the most important piece of the whole puzzle,” said Shepard. “It is a great big move, which humanizes and strengthens the link between the city and the new Museum entry, and a central tenet of what the original Arch designers, Eero Saarinen and Dan Kiley, wanted to achieve. Following on this move, projects on the Arch Grounds, especially the reflecting ponds and north gateway landscapes, will also enhance the experience of the Arch grounds for everyone.”

Work on the park over the highway is already taking place. MoDOT has solicited engineering proposals and expects construction to be completed in connection with the new Mississippi River Bridge well in advance of October 2015.

Despite this park over the existing highway I’m not giving up on the idea of replacing a mile stretch of highway with an at-grade boulevard. But the lid will be in the way of this vision? Shouldn’t we stop the lid and push for the boulevard? I’m not so sure. Here’s why.

The boulevard that replaces the highway can simply dip under the park just as Chippewa & Gravois go under railroad lines and how Forest Park Ave goes under Grand Ave. I still picture the elevated highway over Washington Ave/Eads Bridge removed.

To me the intersection at Washington is far more critical than at Market or Chestnut. The view entering downtown on the Eads Bridge without the elevated highway will be excellent, enough so I’m personally ok with the park space to connect to the proposed new Arch museum entrance.

UPDATE 1/30/2012 @ 11:45am CST:

My friends at CitytoRiver sent me a link to when they discussed this issue in late 2010 — click here to read it.

– Steve Patterson

Stop By The Court of Honor Saturday During Iraq War Parade

Come downtown tomorrow morning for a parade to honor Iraq War veterans:

The parade will step off at noon Saturday from Kiener Plaza and travel west on Market Street to Union Station. Inside Union Station, organizers plan to offer a “resource village” from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. where veterans can connect with service providers such as the Red Cross or Department of Veterans Affairs. Entertainment is planned from 3 to 8:30 p.m. (STLtoday.com)

While you are downtown along Market Street be sure to visit the Court of Honor (between 13th & 14th streets).   The Court of Honor was the subject of my posts on Monday & Tuesday. Officials at the Soldiers’ Memorial say the space sees few visitors. The design of the space is remarkable from all sides, it opened Memorial Day 1948.

-Steve Patterson