The International Photography Hall of Fame and Museum Opens Today in Midtown

The International Bowling Hall of Fame left St. Louis a few years ago, but we’ve more than made up for the loss by attracting the Susan Polgar Institute for Chess Excellence, the World Chess Hall of Fame, and this year, the International Photography Hall of Fame and Museum.

IPHF was founded in Chicago, in Oklahoma City for a while, and now at 3415 Olive in midtown. This is the 2nd floor space over Triumph Grill.

Today is your chance to see it for free:

The International Photography Hall of Fame and Museum is pleased to announce that it will celebrate the museum’s GRAND OPENING on Friday, October 4, 2013.

In conjunction with First Fridays in Grand Center, the IPHF will be providing FREE ADMISSION to the general public to celebrate its grand opening and will have extended hours from 11:00 AM – 9:00 PM. Regular museum hours and admission prices will begin on Saturday, October 5th from 11:00 AM – 4:00 PM. You can find more information to help plan your visit on our website www.iphf.org/contact/plan-your-visit/

The fall exhibition, The Past, Present and Future of Nature Photography, will run from October 4, 2013 through January 25, 2014 and features Hall of Fame inductee Peter Dombrovskis, Noppadol Paothong, a photojournalist from the Missouri Department of Conservation, and select images from the National Geographic Young Explorers (ages 20-28) and North American Nature Photography Association High School Scholarship Students (ages 14-19). (source)

I had a chance to see the IPHF a few days ago, speaking with Executive Director John Nagel and board president Robert Wagner. Wagner is from Kirkwood, but is a practicing attorney in Oklahoma City.

I’ll suggest they add transit directions to their website, the #10 MetroBus will get you there from the Central West End, Downtown, and from much of south city. And the #70 MetroBus is very close.

— Steve Patterson

St. Louis Civil Rights: Jefferson Bank Protest

Fifty years ago today, just days after the 1963 March on Washington ended, protestors were staging a sit-in at Jefferson Bank, then located on the SW corner of Jefferson & Washington, 2600 Washington Ave. The dispute, however, wasn’t new, it had been ongoing for seven years by this point.

As I detailed a few years ago, Jefferson Bank moved into their new building in 1956. After the move, all their cashiers were suddenly white. Black customers were no longer represented behind the teller windows. To learn more about the struggle, protest, and change consider attending an event tonight at the Missouri History Museum:

Commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Jefferson Bank protests, one of the most important chapters in St. Louis civil rights history, with those who lived the experience and those who continue the work today. 

Jefferson Bank Protests: Looking Back, Looking Forward Friday, August 30 • 7pm • Lee Auditorium • Free

I still find it weird that I was born just three and a half years after the March on Washington. I know society has progressed immensely since then, but work remains.

— Steve Patterson

One Spot On Sidewalk A Challenge, Who’s Responsible?

I’ve used many sidewalks throughout St. Louis, most are adequate. It just takes one bad point though to made a decent sidewalk barely adequate. That happened to me on Saturday going from Kingshighway to Grand for yesterday’s post. The entire length, over 1.5 miles, was good until I was almost at Grand.

I see these often, I think they’re lids for vaults. Everyone I’ve encountered are raised above the adjacent sidewalk.  Who’s responsible? The City? MSD (Metropolitan Sewer District)? The adjacent property owner, Saint Louis University? I haven’t a clue, but I’ll email this post to a few people and find out.

— Steve Patterson

Competing Visions for Forest Park Avenue Corridor

Forest Park Ave from Kingshighway to Grand (map) is 1.6 miles long with the potential to be a dense urban corridor. Developers, however, would like to make it a typical low-density big box chain retail corridor. I’d like to show you why I believe two big box retail developments at Forest Park Avenue & Vandeventer are out of character, why these will undo the work others have done recently.

I had enough photos of various buildings along Forest Park Ave to write this post, but Saturday I spent about 90 minutes taking around 150 photos as I traveled the entire length in my wheelchair. Why go to such trouble? I believe cities can’t be properly understood driving through in a car, or worse, relying on Google street view. You’ve got to hit the pavement to really get what an area is about.

I got off the bus on Forest Park Ave at the first stop east of Kingshighway and returned downtown from the Grand MetroLink station, about 2 miles of travel.  Don’t worry, I’m only going to show you a small percentage of the images I took.

As you can see each block for the last 1.5 miles from Kingshighway has buildings fronting Forest Park Ave, nearly all 2 or more floors. Seems like every decade since the early 20th century new buildings have followed this pattern. But now Pace wants to change the pattern drastically, a new vision.

Pace Properties wants to build a retail center, called Midtown Station, on Forest Park Ave. between Vandeventer and Spring.

Pace says the site is ideal because of its proximity to St. Louis University and Washington University, as well as major employers like Ameren Missouri, BJC and Wells Fargo. (KSDK)

From the development flyer:

Next to Saint Louis University should be walkable retail shops, not the blank walls of the back of big boxes. I’m not opposed to retail, I’m opposed to the form these developments will likely take. I’m gathering examples of how this could be done much better, look for another post next month.

I don’t want this new suburban big box vision to reverse the urban corridor.

— Steve Patterson

City Planning Student Critique of Proposed St. Louis Streetcar

Regular readers know I’m a supporter of public transit, and an advocate for modern streetcars, in particular. When I received an email from a planning student asking about publishing her paper on her evaluation, I was curious. Here’s how Jill Mead described herself to me in that email:

I’m a Masters in Public Health and Masters of City Planning student at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill. I also work for the Pedestrian & Bike Info Center at UNC’s Highway Safety Research Center. If that weren’t enough, I’m very much a St. Louisan. I grew up in Forest Park Southeast (in the 80s!) and am a K-12 graduate of the SLPS. I went to UMSL for one year and Wash U for the rest of my college degree. 

Though I don’t agree with her analysis and conclusions in the paper, I thought it would spur some good discussion. Here is a brief summary of her paper:

Spurred by the availability of federal funds and inspired by the success of streetcar projects in other cities, the non-profit Partnership for Downtown St. Louis released a feasibility study for a downtown St. Louis streetcar project in March 2013. The feasibility study recommended the project based on its likelihood of achieving its two main objectives: (1) enhancing the region’s transit system and (2) catalyzing economic growth throughout the streetcar corridor. While the St. Louis Streetcar Feasibility Study is optimistic about the achievement of these two objectives, reviewing the study calls some of their claims into question. Ridership estimates seem inflated given the slow travel speeds of the streetcar and methodology used. The choice of alignment fails to prioritize the city’s densest areas and is out of sync with plans being made at the regional level. In terms of the streetcar’s ability to catalyze economic development in St. Louis, the study inadequately addresses the wide variety of contextual factors, such as land use policy and the existence of strong public-private partnerships and market demand that were characteristic of other cities’ success in attracting development to streetcar corridors. The paper concludes that strategies to improve economic growth and public transportation are necessary in St. Louis, but it is not clear that the proposed St. Louis Streetcar project is the best use of public resources to achieve these goals.

Here’s a link to Mead’s full paper: Evaluation of the St. Louis Streetcar Proposal (19 page PDF).

Mead must have missed the reason for looking at a modern streetcar now, mentioned on page 2 of the Final St. Louis Streetcar Feasibility Study:

When St. Louis University announced plans to move their law school from midtown St. Louis to downtown, the Partnership for Downtown St. Louis once again began the discussion of a streetcar for downtown. This move presented an opportunity to link the two campuses with a streetcar and fulfill the goals of the Downtown Next Plan.

The idea of SLU running shuttle buses every day between midtown and downtown meant only a small segment of the population would be served, pollution would increase, roads would be see additional traffic from the continuous loop of shuttles. Us regular transit riders along Olive/Lindell would still have 30-40 minute headways on the existing #10 MetroBus.  Why not improve the public transit system for all?

Connecting to south St. Louis wouldn’t help SLU with transporting students, faculty, and staff between the main campus in midtown and the new law school building downtown. By including a north-south segment on 14th the proposal recognizes future expansion into south & north city.

The existing MetroBus isn’t slow, it doesn’t take me long to get to the Central West End from my downtown loft, but the streetcar will come every 10-15 minutes instead of every 30-40 minutes — that’s far more important than whether it takes 8 minutes versus say 12-15 minutes to reach my stop! The streetcar will be faster than the bus, the center dedicated right-of-way, off-board fare payment, etc. will  make the trip no longer than bus, very likely shorter. Buses are sometimes late; they get stuck in traffic, wheelchair lifts malfunction, rerouted around events, etc. When the bus takes 10 minutes to get to my stop but arrives 10 minutes late that puts me way behind. If I take the 30 minute earlier bus I arrive way too early and it uses more of my day.

Also from page 2 of the final study:

The purpose of the study was to: 

• support the goals established in The Downtown Next 2020 Vision to improve Downtown’s accessibility; 
• create a catalyst for continued economic development; 
• provide additional opportunities for alternative transportation; 
• support the region’s and City’s sustainability initiatives;
• and  promote an environment that will retain and attract new jobs and residents to the City.

I’ve invited Mead to come downtown and ride the #10 MetroBus with me, to midtown and back, to better understand the existing conditions, then I think she’ll see how the streetcar will be a potentially massive improvement. She’s in town visiting family, we’re talking about doing this later in the week.

Mead is correct when she said, “the study inadequately addresses the wide variety of contextual factors, such as land use policy.” The word  “zoning” appears just four times in the final study report. “Proper zoning” is mentioned, but not defined. My fear is we won’t set up the necessary land-use controls to guide new development over the 10-20 years following the completion of the streetcar. If the prevailing Laissez faire attitude in St. Louis is allowed to squash good form-based zoning then the streetcar investment will be at least partially wasted.

But if we can get the formula right, it will be a boon and expansions can follow every few years, as we’ve seen in other cities. But I’ve been here long enough to know the old guard isn’t going to change so easily. Will this time be different?

Please share your thoughts on Mead’s paper, or my response, below.

— Steve Patterson