Planning Commissioners Journal in the St. Louis Region

The publisher & editor of the Planning Commissioners Journal, Wayne Senville, recently passed through the St. Louis region on his cross country road trip along US Route 50.

Arriving in the St. Louis region from the east coast Wayne’s first stop is suburban O’Fallon IL where they are experiencing rapid growth and conflicting values about development types.  Wayne did three posts on O’Fallon starting here (use the site navigation to see the following posts).
Is This America? looks at some of the dispair in East St. Louis.  I intentionally gave Wayne directions from his O’Fallon hotel through East St. Louis on his way to ‘meet me in St. Louis.’  If anything, I knew St. Louis would look better to his eyes after having driven through East St. Louis.

In ‘Blog On, St. Louis‘ Wayne talks about our walk/drive around St. Louis.  In the next post Wayne looks at Crown Candy and the 14th Street Mall.
The final part of Wayne’s stay in our region was in suburban Creve Coeur.  Like so much of the region’s suburban areas, Creve Coeur is seeking a downtown where none currently exists.  In the first of three posts on Creve Coeur Wayne talks about his host, Creve Coeur City Councilperson and eminent domain opponent Laura Bryant.  Next up Wayne discusses a common problem in more affluent suburban areas, the older Ranch vs the McMansion.  Finally Wayne looks at Creve Coeur’s quest for a downtown with links to their planning documents on the subject in Wanted: One Downtown, Custom Built.

I enjoyed meeting and conversing with Wayne Senville  — and getting a fresh outside perspective on our success and problems.  From the St. Louis region Wayne continued westbound along Route 50 with his next stop in Jefferson City.  Use any of the links above to follow the journey across the US.

St. Louis Population: Census History, Estimates, Challenges and Projections

St. Louis, like most “rust belt” cities, experienced significant popuation loss during the later half of the 20th Century. Yes, old news but here is a recap:

In the 1950s St. Louis lost 106,770 people (12.5%), in the 60s that figure was up to 130,757 (17.4%), and in the 70s it continued to clime to 166,465 (26.9%). By the 80s we saw the losses slow to 56,119 for the decade (12.4%). In the 1990s the rate of decline dropped again, this time to 48,496 — the lowest decline in a decade, but still a major decline (12.2%). Added up we lost almost 60 percent of our population.

Nearly everyone we will agree the city is no longer hemorrhaging population as we had during the previous five decades. Today Mayor Slay and Planning Director Rollin Stanley announced the U.S. Census Bureau had once again partially accepted the city’s challenge to official 2006 population estimates. The Census had estimated a population of 347,181 while the city argued for 354,943. The final number per the Census for July 1, 2006 is 353,837.

Compared to the 2000 Census population of 348,189 we show a total net population gain of 5,648 in a six-year period. While an average annual gain of 941 people is not substantial it is certainly cause to celebrate compared to losing anywhere from 4,850 to 16,647 people per year (avg.) as in prior decades. Still, this represents a gain of only 1.6% since 2000 so I wouldn’t really call that gaining — more like treading water. When we have double digit gains in a decade then I think we can proclaim we are indeed increasing our population.

Census figures show a 1,175 drop in population from 350,214 in 2002 to 349,039 in 2003. The city’s figures, shown at today’s press conference, show our population lower than the census figures for 2001 & 2002 (347,954 & 347,252, respectively).  UPDATE @ 3:15pm – Director of Planning Rollin Stanley just returned my call from earlier with a clarification on why the census figures for 2001 & 2002 don’t match that of the city.  As the city had challenged 2003-06 figures the newly revised are etched in stone but the Census continues to make slight adjustments in those numbers which were unchallenged by the city (2001-02).  Regardless of the differences, the city & census seem to agree we continued to loose population very slowly between 2000 and 2003 for a net loss of 150 people.  Thus, our gains are only very recently. For 2006 we show an increase of 1,265 but in 2005 the increase was 1,867 and a large 2,666 in 2004. Each increase is a fraction of one percent of our population.

So while the census and the Mayor annually hug and come to agreement something is still not right with population figures: projections on future population from the East-West Gateway Council of Governments. Their most recent figures, from the Legacy 2030 Transporation Plan (adopted March 2005), shows St. Louis continuing to decline through 2010 before making a slow climb by 2030 to a figure lower than today:

This is not exactly a rosey picture. The 2000 figures shown above are from the 2000 Census, the balance are projections. We will know in a few years after the 2010 Census how accurate the projections, published in 2005, really were. I confirmed with East-West Gateway these are the most recent public projections they have released. A spokesperson indicated they are in the process of revising their projections and was uncertain what decisions, if any, were based on these figures from their Legacy 2030 Transportation Plan.

I put together the above chart to see the differences between the 2005 estimated projection by E-W Gateway and the Census estimates for the same year. Most were close but three stand out: St. Louis City, St. Louis County and St. Charles County. E-W Gateway under-estimated the populations of both St. Charles County (4.6%) and St. Louis City (7.4%) while over-estimating St. Louis County (a minor 1.6%). Clearly, the population is moving around differently than E-W Gateway had anticipated in just the first five years of their transporation plan, much less the remaining 25 years.

It Ain’t Easy Being Green

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa is getting criticized by environmentalists for trying to bring solar, geothermal and nuclear power from other areas to LA. The rub is the impact of an 85-mile corridor of high power lines going through forests and other areas.

Many preservation and community groups have condemned the mayor for a plan that they say would destroy priceless vistas, natural areas and wildlife corridors. Justin Augustine of the Center for Biological Diversity recently wrote Villaraigosa a letter saying that not only was such energy consumption not ‘green,’ but unacceptable under any name. The ends cannot justify the means, he said.

Further, the anger over the proposed route underscores challenges nationwide over how to ship wind, sun and steam power from remote rural reaches to booming urban centers. (Source w/links to LA Times and other sites)

Wow, tough crowd.

Sunday the CBS News program 60 Minutes had a feature on the return of nuclear plants as a source of green energy — the power plants do not create the greenhouse gases that we get from coal-fired plants. Much of France is powered by nuclear energy. They currently recycle spent rods rather than bury them as we’ve done in the US for decades. The downside is the recycling creates plutonium which can be used for bomb making. Apparently the US Government is researching new methods of recycling the waste without creating plutonium as a by-product. We may well see more nuclear power plants in our future.

Meanwhile back in St. Louis, the Ameren “fact sheet” shows a major reliance on coal & natural gas. Out of a capacity of 16,200 megawatts (mw) only 1,190mw of that is from their single nuclear plant located in Callaway County, MO. Three hydroelectric plants, including the non-functioning Taum Sauk, total 800mw. The remaining 87% of their capacity relies on coal or natural gas. Not exactly green. What are the alternatives for Missouri and Illinois customers of Ameren?

Well, one option is net metering. Per Sustainablog, the Missouri Senate is considering such a bill:

Missouri is one of a handful of states that don’t have a net metering law. In other words, if you install a grid-tied renewable system on your home or business, utilities in the state are not required to credit your electric bill at the retail rate for excess energy produced — the current system that the state government calls net metering only requires utilities to credit energy-producing customers at the avoided-cost rate. That could change as early as this year, as Missouri Senate bill 674, the Easy Connection act, has been introduced, and is now under consideration by the Senate’s Commerce, Energy and Environment committee.

One thing is certain, I don’t hear our regional elected officials speaking on the topic of future energy sources. The LA Mayor may be getting a bad rap over his proposal but at least he is looking for solutions beyond his term in office.

The Next Conservatives are Pro-Aesthetics?

Last month the Saint Louis Metropolitan Area Council of Conservative Citizens had an interesting post about the end of “new right” and discussing the “next conservatism” and referenced Urban Review STL.  Now, I know what you are thinking, I’m about as conservative as Rush Limbaugh is liberal.

They started off referencing an article in The American Conservative magazine:

If the New Right is dead, or dying, what could be offered in its place? What will be “The Next Conservatism”?

Weyrich and Lind say that it must be a social conservatism, and it must be a cultural movement (not economic) and not a political movement (although the political sphere must not be surrendered).

Themes of “the next conservatism” in article:

– pro-homeschooling
– rejection of mainstream culture
– anti-affirmative action
– anti-political correctness in all forms (e.g. charges of ‘racism’, ’sexism’, etc.)
– anti-abortion
– anti-gay “marriage”
– anti-illegal immigration, anti-amnesty, and pro-reduction in legal immigration
– pro- strong national defense based in America’s concrete interests, but an abandonment of the Bush/neocon Wilsonian foreign policy
– pro-agrarianism
– anti-two party system in Washington
– pro-environmentalism in the sense of pro-conservation
– skeptical of big business
– pro-aesthetics (and disdain of ugly growth, such as strip malls)
– pro-trains and streetcars

This sounds like the Council of Conservative Citizens almost to a tee.

There is so much to talk about in the above list but the short answer is very little of that fits me, except at the end.  Of course, my views on urbanism are not based on aesthics although that does play apart.  It is more about the relationships between buildings and the related public space.  They then go on to reference my site in serveral places, such as here:

The irony here is that URSTL blog has a liberal political bias; however, I think its emphasis on urban uniqueness and its opposition to suburban uglification is more in tune with a properly understood and historically correct version of “conservatism,” (and what Weyrich/Lind think it will be again), that is, opposition to homogenization in all its forms.

It almost sounds as if a rational conversation could be had around common ground but then they speak on trains & streetcars:

Yes, that “preponderance of racial minorities utilizing public transit by necessity” is such a problem in our society.  Too bad decades of policy decisions have created such a necessity.  And too bad they can’t all drive single occupancy SUVs spewing pollutants into the air.

Click here to read the full post from the Saint Louis Metropolitan Area Council of Conservative Citizens.  For the article reference click here.

Mississippi River Bridge: Last Option is the Best Option

A proposed new bridge across the Mississippi River is back in the news of late. Missouri and Illinois still cannot agree on how to pay for the bridge “now estimated to cost between $999 million and $1.76 billion.” (P-D 2/1/07). Call me a synic but if they are estimating such a range I’m going to go with the high end or better when the final bill is paid. In no way do I believe that it would come in under a billion. I’m going to go with $1.5 billion.

So we have several choices: the big highway bridge, a more cost-effective “coupler” built near the existing King Bridge and lastly we have a proposal to fix some of the existing interchanges, a new I-64 interchange in Illinois and redo parts of Illinois Route 3. The feds have already earmarked $239 million for the bridge project — money that presumably can go for this work. Interestingly, these little third option strategies are all items that need to be done anyway. I say stop wasting time on the bridge debate and get to work on fixing the areas that need fixing. Get the bottleneck areas resolved. Is this too short term and not the long-range planning I prefer we do? Perhaps.

I still question the “need” for a new bridge, especially one costing over a billion dollars to construct. Keep in mind that the old McKinley bridge will be reopening for traffic (including cyclists) in September connecting just north of downtown to Illinois Route 3 to Granite City and Madison County. This combined with the King Bridge and Eads Bridge into downtown can handle considerable local traffic. The new bridge as proposed will, in my view, simply shift sprawl from the Western edge of our region (St. Charles County) to the far Eastern edge of the region. Proponents say this will help re-center the City of St. Louis within the region. I suppose that is true, but so would curbing the sprawl through various Smart Growth measures employed by other regions. A billion or so would do wonders in the region for curbing sprawl and building more localized transit.

Frankly, if someone wants to buy a big house way out in Illinois and doesn’t like the traffic on I-64 they have several choices. One, move closer so the drive is not so long. They can get off the highway and take local streets that will get them across the river on other bridges besides the Poplar Street Bridge (aka the PSB). They can utilize the excellent MetroLink light rail system that serves a good portion of St. Clair County in Illinois or bus service to the city from Madison County Transit. Perhaps Illinois with its substantial transportation funding could help out Madison County by helping fund their proposed MetroLink extension.

This bridge, if finally built will not grow our region. It will simply shift suburban sprawl around a bit — a zero sum gain for the region. And simply put, the more lanes you build the more volume will increase putting you right back where you started at some point. As we’ve seen in the past, the city will remain a pass-through. Let’s fix the areas that need fixing and then work on moving people & jobs closer to the center — both in Illinois and Missouri.