Just weeks before Tishaura Jones was sworn into the office of St. Louis Treasurer I posted about a problem with a city-owned parking lot on Olive (see Wheelchair Users Unable To Pay Parking Fee In City Parking Lot). In that post I showed how disabled drivers that use wheelchairs would be unable to pay the central machine.
Disabled drivers that use a wheelchair are unable to reach the payment machine because no ramp up was provided.
At the time the city said they planned for the two disabled spaces to be free of charge, so disabled users didn’t need ADA-compliant access to the machine. The other night I noticed the city installed two old fashioned parking meters between the two disabled spaces.
The city’s solution was two meters for the disabled spaces.
Problem solved, right? Wrong! This means those parking in the two disabled spots must carry coins to feed the parking meter while everyone else gets the option to pay by coin or credit card.
The pay-per-space machine accepts coins and credit cards, but not bills.
The city made an error and didn’t consider disabled users. Then in trying to fix their error on the cheap they created a problem of inequality.
— Steve Patterson
My only pic of the Kirkwood Amtrak station is this blurry one taken in December 2010 on the way to Kansas City.
Like trains? Two weeks from today is National Train Day across the country with many events, the St. Louis event will be at the station in Kirkwood (map):
Station open house at the historic former Missouri Pacific depot adjacent to the busy Union Pacific main line with displays from the National Museum of Transport, Kirkwood Historical Society, Big Bend Model Railroad Club, Kirkwood Fire Dept., Union Pacific Railroad Special Agents and National Railway Historical Society among others. Rail safety information display by Missouri Operation Lifesaver. An operating model train layout will be on display along with a telegraph display and demonstration from the Morse Telegraph Club. Food will be available from the Kirkwood Optimist Club. Amtrak will have a drawing for tickets to Chicago or Kansas City. Live music will be performed after 10am. (Amtrak)
It’s been 30+ years since I took driver’s ed in high school so I don’t recall what we learned about parallel parking. My guess is it focused on the mechanics of backing into a space between two cars. I do remember having to parallel park for my driver’s exam, we had to go to Will Rogers World Airport because no where else in south Oklahoma City had parallel parking.
This driver managed to center their car on the meter, halfway in two parking spaces.
It seems to me it isn’t common knowledge that spaces exist from meter to meter. When I took the above picture there were no other cars in front of or behind. I’ve seen people drive up and park this way simply because they don’t know any better. Not sure what they do in places like the 12xx-17xx blocks of Washington Ave where two meters are grouped to reduce the number of poles.
The Missouri license exam also focuses on the mechanics, but not identification of what is a space:
2. Park parallel to the curb, in a space 25 feet long and 7 feet wide. You will be tested for:
The position of your vehicle before backing.
Whether or not you bump into the space markers.
Moving into the space smoothly and at the right speed. • Parking no more than 18” from the curb.
Parking near the center of the space.
Ability to park the vehicle within two minutes.
Turning the wheels in the correct direction for parking.
Checking traffic and signaling before you leave the parking space.
Testing to make sure you get in the center of the space, the driver above may think they nailed it.
The obvious fix is to do what Clayton does, paint lines on the pavement to indicate the space start and end. But that would require lots of labor since the city has thousands of metered spaces. My preference is to remove the individual meters and go to a pay and display system:
Pay and display systems differ from road-side parking meters in that one machine can service multiple vehicle spaces, resulting in lower set up costs. In addition, this system theoretically prevents drivers from taking advantage of parking meters that have time remaining; this factor alone has doubled parking revenues in cities that have switched to pay and display.(A driver may occasionally take advantage of remaining time should a departing parker give away a ticket with remaining time, however.)
Message reads “This machine will calculate the correct parking period for whatever value of coins you insert subject to a minimum charge of 40p and a maximum of £9.60”
In addition, pay and display machines can also accept a wider variety of coins, and many even accept credit cards, making it unnecessary for drivers to carry large amounts of change. The use of credit cards has another advantage – the machines do not have to be emptied of coins as often, and the costs of counting coin and possible pilfering by employees who empty the parking meters also reduces their overall costs. (Wikipedia)
With pay and display you don’t have designated spaces, sometimes allowing for more cars to fit into a given area. However, you can still end up with drivers that park too far from another vehicle, reducing the number of cars that’ll fit.
In the meantime, I’d like to see these motorists get a warning along with an educational piece explaining how to park at parking meters.
It has been 15 years since St. Louis-based Venture stores closed.
The chain was founded in 1968 when Target founder John F. Geisse went to work for May Department Stores. Under an antitrust settlement reached with the Department of Justice, May was unable to acquire any more retail chains at the time, and the department store company needed a way to compete against the emerging discount store chains. When May’s Executive Vice President Dave Babcock learned that Geisse had resigned from Target Stores, he spoke with Geisse about starting a new discount retailer, resulting in the founding of Venture.
The first Venture store opened in 1970 in the St. Louis suburb of Overland (after Venture closed, the location became a Kmart, which later closed & was demolished for the current Home Depot). In 1976, Geisse retired and left Venture Stores, which had by that time expanded to 20 units. (Wikipedia)
When I was a kid, following the failure of the Woolco discount chain, Venture expanded into Oklahoma City (source). A Woolco/Venture was very close to my parent’s house, I biked there often to buy 45s & later cassingles.
Last week, as I stepped into a former Venture store at 5401 Collinsville Rd in Fairmont City, IL, I recalled biking to Venture as a kid and even visiting a Venture after moving to St. Louis.
Venture sign remainsThis Venture store is now Gateway Classic Cars, click image for websiteThe old Venture name is covered by the current signThe interior is very original, complete with the paint scheme of the walls.
When a building gets built we should assume it’ll be around for at least half a century. Often this longevity is a good thing, but not always. I took a picture of the men’s restroom but I decided to spare you that sight.
Older structures do provide good low-rent options for businesses, while not making a positive contribution to the area’s image. This is a good example of why we need to think beyond the original depreciation schedule when building.
In architecture school I had two semesters of classes on materials, so when I read sentences like the following I get irritated:
Cement is a binder used to make concrete
Today, the 750-foot-long face of the old Cotton Belt Rail Depot is in pretty rough shape, a wall of cracked cement and busted-out windows, with a string of graffiti wherever the taggers could reach. (stltoday)
“Cracked cement?” First, what is cement?
The common name for Portland cement, the most important modern construction material, notably as a constituent of concrete. In the manufacturing process, limestone is ground into small pieces (about 2 cm). To provide the silica (25%) and alumina (10%) content required, various clays and crushed rocks are added, including iron ore (about 1%). This material is ground and finally burned in a rotary kiln at up to 1500°C, thus converting the mixture into clinker pellets. About 5% gypsum is then added to slow the hardening process, and the ground mixture is added to sand (for mortar), gravel and crushed rock (for concrete). When water is added, the cement solidifies gradually, undergoing many complex reactions. The name “Portland” cement arises from a resemblance to stone quarried at Portland, England. (click image at right for source)
Cement is an important ingredient used to manufacture concrete, which is what the Cotton Belt building is made of.
There are three basic ingredients in the concrete mix:
Portland Cement
Water
Aggregates (rock and sand)
Portland Cement – The cement and water form a paste that coats the aggregate and sand in the mix. The paste hardens and binds the aggregates and sand together.
Water- Water is needed to chemically react with the cement (hydration) and too provide workability with the concrete. The amount of water in the mix in pounds compared with the amount of cement is called the water/cement ratio. The lower the w/c ratio, the stronger the concrete. (higher strength, less permeability)
Aggregates- Sand is the fine aggregate. Gravel or crushed stone is the coarse aggregate in most mixes. (ConcreteNetwork.com)
Thus, none of the following exist:
A cement sidewalk
Cement blocks
Cement silo
You get the idea…
The concrete Cotton Belt building
The Rally Saint Louis project is very interesting, click here for information.
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