Food Trucks Welcomed At Wells Fargo Restaurant Desert

You’re likely familiar with the term Food Desert (“any area in the industrialized world where healthy, affordable food is difficult to obtain”), but what about “restaurant desert” for areas where restaurants are hard to find? One such restaurant desert is the area surrounding Wells Fargo Financial Advisors.

I arrived at 11am on Tuesday March 6th and found three food trucks set up on Pine St between Beaumont St and Leffingwell Ave. Even with three bright trucks the street felt totally lifeless.

As I took the above picture a couple drove up in the red car to get pizza. Unlike the Central Business District, there are no restaurants in this area to complain about competition from the mobile food trucks. Here’s an idea, why not begin to rethink the space surrounding Wells Fargo and create small commercial storefronts serving workers and others in this area, perhaps creating a destination for other to visit?

– Steve Patterson

2011: MetroBus Growth Rate Double MetroLink

Ridership on the region’s bus service (MetroBus) grew at more than twice the rate of the region’s light rail service (MetroLink), according to figures in a new report by the American Public Transportation Association. Looking at 2011 compared to 2010 the light rail service increased ridership a below average  4.62% while bus ridership increased a whooping 10.04%, way above average for the report.

APTA reported large bus systems like MetroBus in St. Louis grew by 0.4 percent nationally. Columbus, Ohio at 10.1 percent showed the strongest bus ridership growth in the nation while St. Louis at 10 percent experienced the second largest growth, and Orlando, Florida at 8.4 percent, the third strongest bus ridership growth in the nation. (Metro Press Release)

Outstanding!

As a result of the substantial increase the humble bus is carrying an even greater percentage of the region’s transit riders. MetroBus carried 61% of Metro’s passengers in 2010 but that increased to 62% for 2011. Conversely the light rail service dropped from 38% to 37% from 2010 to 2011, see pie charts below.

It’s no wonder since MetroBus service covers so much more of the metropolitan area. MetroBus likely has a stop near your home and work/school whereas light rail isn’t as convenient. I can catch three different MetroBus lines within a block of my house (3min) but the nearest MetroLink station is 12 minutes away! Sure the MetroLink is faster than MetroBus but when I factor in time getting to/from each mode the bus usually wins if both are a choice.

Some will point out that MetroLink has a higher farebox recovery than MetroBus (27.8% vs 19.9%; source page viii). True enough, but MetroBus covered 5.7 times as many “revenue miles” as MetroLink in FY2011 (18,198,927 vs 3,147,407; same source). Naturally bus service isn’t going to have the same farebox recovery rate given how much of the region the service covers — those routes to low density areas just aren’t as efficient as other routes. We could never afford to provide light rail service to all parts of the region now served by bus.

St. Louis bus & rail ridership was down in 2011 from what it was in 2008, but current gas prices might push ridership levels for 2012.

– Steve Patterson

Poll: Would You Support A 3/16¢ Parks/Arch Sales Tax Increase

In November voters in St. Louis, St. Louis County and St. Charles County may be asked to approve a 3/16¢ sales tax increase:

An obscure bill moving through the Legislature includes a provision that would allow residents to vote — possibly in November — on raising sales taxes in St. Louis, St. Louis County and St. Charles County by three-sixteenths of a cent (0.1875) for the Arch project and other area parks. (STLtoday.com)

The CityArchRiver group and Civic Progress say the sales tax revenue is needed to pay off bonds to complete planned improvements to better connect the Arch to the city. Much of the money would fund parks in each taxing jurisdiction:

Susan Trautman with the Greenway District says only 30 percent of the tax would go to the Archgrounds. The rest would go towards improving local and regional parks and trails.

[snip]

The tax increase would only last 20 years and collect enough money to pay for a $120 million bond issue to help pay for the project. (KMOV)

Voters in Illinois may also be asked to support a small tax increase as well. This is the subject for the poll this week — the poll is located in the right sidebar.

– Steve Patterson

Remembering Wendell O. Pruitt and William L. Igoe

Pruitt & Igoe will forever be known around the world as the names on the biggest failure in modernist public housing, Pruitt-Igoe. When the Pruitt-Igoe complex was designed it was to be racially segregated. The black portion was named after Wendell O. Pruitt and the white portion after William L. Igoe. Who were these men?

Pruitt

Wendell Oliver Pruitt (June 20, 1920–April 15, 1945) was a pioneering African-American military pilot and Tuskegee Airman originally from St. Louis, Missouri. He was killed during a training exercise in 1945. After his death, his name, along with William L. Igoe’s was given to the notorious Pruitt–Igoe public housing complex in St. Louis.

Pruitt grew up in St. Louis, Missouri, as the youngest of ten children to Elijah and Melanie Pruitt and attended Sumner High School. He then furthered his education at Lincoln University in Jefferson City, Missouri, becoming a member of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity.

Pruitt, already a licensed pilot, enlisted in the Army Air Corps Cadet Flying Program in Tuskegee, Alabama, eventually graduating and being commissioned as a Second Lieutenant on December 11, 1942.

After graduating from flight school at Tuskegee, Pruitt was assigned to the 332nd Fighter Group, then stationed in Michigan. The 332nd was transferred to the Mediterranean theater in late 1943 where Pruitt flew the P-47 Thunderbolt.

In June 1944, Pruitt and his occasional wingman, 1st Lt. Gwynne Walker Peirson, landed direct hits on an enemy destroyer that sank at Trieste harbor in northern Italy. He received the Distinguished Flying Cross for this action. Thereafter, the 332nd flew the P-51 Mustang as their primary fighter aircraft.

Pruitt teamed with Lee Archer to form the famed “Gruesome Twosome”, the most successful pair of Tuskegee pilots in terms of air victories. The “Gruesome Twosome” are featured in a History Channel show entitled Dogfights: Tuskegee Airmen. Pruitt flew seventy combat missions, was credited with 3 enemy kills, and reached the rank of captain. (Wikipedia)

Wow, a very impressive young man! Read more here and here. Pruitt is buried at St. Peters Cemetary in Normandy (source). His parents died in the 1960s and are also buried there.

Pruitt couldn’t have been any more different from Igoe.

Igoe

William Leo Igoe (October 19, 1879 – April 20, 1953) was a United States Representative from Missouri. He attended the public and parochial schools of St. Louis and graduated from the law school of Washington University in St. Louis in 1902. He was admitted to the bar in the same year and commenced the practice of law in St. Louis. He was member of the municipal assembly of St. Louis from 1909 until March 3, 1913, when he resigned to enter the United States Congress.

Igoe was elected as a Democrat to the Sixty-third and to the three succeeding Congresses (March 4, 1913-March 3, 1921). He declined to become a candidate for renomination in 1920. He resumed the practice of law and was an unsuccessful Democratic nominee for mayor of St. Louis in 1925. He was chairman of the St. Louis Board of Police Commissioners 1933-1937. He died in St. Louis on April 20, 1953 and is buried in Calvary Cemetery. (Wikipedia)

Igoe lived a long life — 73 — and had an impressive career. Clearly he was a man of privilege, maybe his accomplishments were just average  given his background?

Two men who likely never crossed paths are forever linked.

– Steve Patterson

Four Decades Since First Demolition At Pruitt-Igoe

Forty years ago today the first of Pruitt-Igoe’s 33 high rise towers was leveled by implosion. Today most of the site remains vacant and overgrown.

I first walked the site over 20 years ago, it was easier to traverse in 1991. Amazing the site can sit vacant for a longer period than the buildings did.

Here are a couple of short videos you might find interesting:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYrMUcT1jP4

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kVpN6Wl7Qm0

– Steve Patterson