Blank Renard Paper Warehouse Now Less-Blank Urban Chestnut Brewing Company

Renard Paper was building their massive blank walled warehouse on Manchester Ave in 1990, right when I moved to St. Louis. It was awful, but many saw it as progress. It was an investment, they weren’t leaving the city.

Fast forward to May 2011, the ribbon cutting for the new Manchester Ave streetscape in the section known as The Grove. Renaud Paper’s boss, Dave Renard was among the speakers talking about the vibrant area even though his own warehouse, built 21 years earlier, was a huge drag on the vibrancy at the west end of The Grove.

That was May 19th, less than four months later came this news:

HP Products Corporation of Indianapolis, IN has announced that they have completed the acquisition of Renard Paper Company of St. Louis, Missouri.

A done deal not even four months after talking about the future…

It wasn’t long before Renard Paper, now a division of HP Products, was located out in Earth City. Their large building with a long blank wall fronting Manchester Ave was now for sale. One argument is they were in the city paying earnings taxes for 21+ years longer than had they sold out in 1990. True enough. What we can’t possibly know is where would that end of The Grove be had Renard Paper not razed buildings to build their warehouse? Who knows, that section might be the most vibrant part. The street might have come back to life years, decades, earlier? Or the area might’ve declined further and be worse than ever to this day?

Again, it’s impossible to know.

After sitting vacant for nearly two years a new buyer was found that could use the warehouse space, but they also wanted to correct the main design problem: the long blank wall.

 Urban Chestnut’s renovation of the Renard Paper warehouse will include a bottling line, staff offices, retail space, a kitchen and bar area, and seating for about 150 people. Windows will look out on to Manchester Avenue, and the bar will face the brewhouse. (Post-Dispatch)

The silver lining is by leaving such a warehouse Urban Chestnut was able to greatly expand their capacity. They also knew design facing Manchester Ave was important, the building’s exterior had to be altered. I couldn’t find my before pictures but you can see some Google Streetview screen captures here.  I suppose Urban Chestnut did the best they could.

The lesson here is most newer buildings cost so much to construct the reality is it’s unlikely they’ll be razed to may way for something better in 20 years, so if you get it wrong now you’re mostly stuck with it long after the company sells out and leaves town. Short-term gain can be a long-term net negative. Urban Chestnut has basically neutralized this 1990 warehouse.

Every new building must be designed with enough long-term vision to think beyond 20 years, when the owners retire and cash out.

— Steve Patterson

November 4th 2014 Ballot

The 2014 midterm election is just two weeks away. Depending upon where you live, the ballot varies. Everyone has US Representatives and State Representatives. Missouri voters, of course, have constitutional amendments. Most have the retention of judges.

For this post I looked at the sample ballot for all raves in St. Louis:

• State Auditor — three candidates, the incumbent will likely win.
• U.S. District Rep 1 —  three candidates. I like that the Republican challenger to Lacy Clay supports ending the War on Drugs and favors marriage equality, he also advocates eliminating the federal income tax, replacing it with a national sales tax — reason enough to not support his candidacy.
• State Senate Dist 4 — two candidates, the incumbent will likely win.
• State Rep, twelve districts: 66, 76, 77, 78, 79, 80, 81, 82, 83, 84, 91, 93
  • Three are uncontested: 76, 77, 84
  • No way would I vote to add to the Republican majority in Jefferson City!
• St. Louis Collector of Revenue — one candidate
• St. Louis License Collector — two candidates
• St. Louis Recorder of Deeds  — three candidates
  • The most interesting local race!
  • The Democrat, Sharon Quigley Carpenter,  resigned amid nepotism charges in July, but won the Democratic primary in August
  • Young Republican Erik Shelquist is seeking to become the first Republican elected to citywide office in decades.
  • And Independent Jennifer Florida, the former 15th ward Alderman, appointed when Carpenter resigned.
  • The real race is between Carpenter & Florida. Will voters go with the Democratic nominee even though she’d been in office for decades and  resigned in disgrace?
• Retain two Missouri Supreme Court judges
• Retain two Missouri Court of Appeals judges (Eastern District)
• Retain seven Circuit Court judges (22nd)
• Missouri Constitutional Amendment 3 — teacher evaluation
  • From the ballot language “Significant potential costs may be incurred by the state and/or the districts if new/additional evaluation instruments must be developed to satisfy the proposal’s performance evaluation requirements.”
  • This isn’t about improving the quality of education, it’s a union busting measure. The Kirkwood School Board voted to oppose this amendment, please vote no.
• Missouri Constitutional Amendment 6 — early voting… sorta
  • I fully support early voting, but not this way.The ACLU of Missouri called it a “sham early voting amendment”, please vote no.
• Missouri Constitutional Amendment 10 — budget power
  • The GOP Missouri Legislature doesn’t like the checks & balances from the Governor’s office, when it’s a Democrat in office.
  • “We believe this amendment could reduce the flexibility to make changes to balance the budget and make the process more difficult. We believe this amendment could potentially weaken the state’s strong governmental framework to make midyear budget adjustments, which in our view, could potentially lower the rating to a level in line with our indicative rating under our state scoring methodology.” — Standard & Poor’s
  • “Vote no on Amendment 10. It’s not conservative. It is short-sighted. It’s bad for business. It’s bad for Missouri.” — Post-Dispatch editorial
• St. Louis Charter Amendment — Veterans’ Preference, would give honorable discharged veterans hiring preference for civil service jobs

See the Post-Dispatch Voter’s Guide for races where you live.

— Steve Patterson

Chouteau Park Just Getting Started

Chouteau Park is the newest city park, created by ordinance in 2008, as compensation for the future loss of Hudlin Park to BJC. The fate of Hudlin Park was a hot issue in the Spring of 2006. This new 2.8 acre park is intended to replace the 12 acre Hudlin Park.

Chouteau Park is just largely a graded empty lot right now, awaiting funds to become a fully realized park space. The design was done by H3 studios in 2009.

Revised renderings from the H3 2009 design include a shaded promenade, adventure playground, spray fountain and park cafe.

Update January 1, 2014: the classic St. Louis park sign has been added and trees are being planted. (St. Louis w/design & revised design)

As you might expect, parks don’t happen overnight. Every park in the city was once newly created and not looking like much. Citygarden, opened in 2009, is a rare exception because it was privately funded. Construction on Chouteau Park began in the fall of 2011.

One sidewalk going up the hill just ended, I’m not sure of the future intent. A number of sewer inlets handle water runoff, hopefully in the future this water can be captured and refined onsite.

It’ll be fun to see this new park develop and mature over the years.

— Steve Patterson

Poll: Will The St. Louis Rams Opt Out Of Dome Lease?

The last regular season game for the St. Louis Rams is December 28th, at CenturyLink Field in Seattle. With a 1-4 record I don’t think we can expect to see the Rams in the post-season. At the end of this season the Rams need to decide if they’re going to opt out of the last 10 years of a 30 year lease at the Edward Jones Dome. They can opt out because the quasi-government entity that owns the Dome was unable to meet the contractual obligation to keep the facility within the top 25% of all NFL stadiums. If the Rams opt out of the last 10 years they’ll switch to a year to year lease.

The negotiating climate changes rapidly. I personally had positive feelings when they drafted Michael Sam. When they released him, understandably so, my feelings cooled immediately. With players in trouble for domestic & child abuse, this year hasn’t been the best for the NFL’s image.

The poll question this week asks what you think the Rams will do. Not what you’d like them to — what will they do? The phrasing is:

“At the end of the current NFL season the St. Louis Rams have the right to opt out of the last 10 years of their lease at the Edward Jones Dome. What’ll they do?”

The poll is in the right sidebar, mobile users will need to switch to the desktop layout to see the sidebar.

— Steve Patterson

Some Positive Changes In The Last Ten Years

In the last decade of blogging I’ve posted about the positive change that’s taken place in our region, it was fun looking back at the headlines of thousands of posts.

For today I’ve selected a positive post from each calendar year of this blog:

• 2004: Urban Places in St. Louis I am Thankful for
• 2005: Discover the Potential of Ivanhoe Street
• 2006: Locust St. Now Two-Way West of 14th!
• 2007: Tower Grove Farmers’ Market Kickoff Celebration, May 12th
• 2008: Fountain Park Residents Come Together In Park
• 2009: New Dog Park Opens in South St. Louis Neighborhood
• 2010: North 14th Street Finally Reopened To Vehicle Traffic
• 2011: Leather Trades Brings Art & Life To 16th & Locust
• 2012: MX Rises From Former St. Louis Centre, Pi Now Open
• 2013: Old Gas Station, New Use
• 2014: Rehabbed Corner Storefront Now A Bright Spot In Fox Park Neighborhood

Here’s one example, the former St. Louis Centre mall:

Lots more great things happened in the city & region. Next Friday I’ll list some of the bad things from this same period.

— Steve Patterson