The design teams chose are truly impressive. I for one am excited, even if there are no St. Louis based design firms on board. HOK is the only one that could have been chosen for a comp. this large in scale.
These teams especially grab my attention, as they have been part of great projects:
Did anyone else notice the subtle Rushmore quote at the bottom of Arch Genesis' post? Genius!
I like the thought of incorporating the I-70 redux into this project. I just don't know how realistic that is given budget constraints.
I've said this time and time again. Any major infrastructural change that will occur in St. Louis will have to happen in conjunction with a public private partnership. North side needs new plumbing? That will have to happen with McKee's development ( I realize the TIF isn't exactly public/private partnership; close enough, however.) Need more mass transit? Want to bury I-70 downtown and reclaim some density? A major company would have to invest large sums of money in order to make these things happen. The city doesn't have the revenue; never will (unless improved infrastructure helps to expand our tax base, thus the cyclical nature of our problem). The city/county divide both physically and mentally consistently works against any substantial tax increase that would create the funds needed for these types of projects. You'll say in response, "what about Prop A?" Half cent sales tax increase? $75 million annually? Mere pittance, friends. In lieu of reviving closed bus routes, Metro would be better off spending the $75 million a year attempting to lure a Cintra Concesiones de Infraestructuras de Transporte or Macquarie Infrastructure Group a'la Indiana Toll Road. We're talking GLOBAL, multi-billion dollar transportation companies, kids.
Sorry to crap in everyone's coffee, but hoping one of the neato, coastal architectural firms gets creative and submits a rendering with a buried highway is naive at best. Besides, the stodgy, all-white country club decisions makers don't care about buried highways.
Global Transportation Companies. Get them here now. Indiana did it for crying out loud.
Sidebar: I couldn't confirm nor deny the existence of a "secret meeting" for the major power players in St. Louis' leadership and business circles. Either way, it sounds sexy as hell.
I disagree with you thoughts ttricamo. I believe St. Louis City and Downtown can have some fundamental changes with projects that are not significant amounts considering their impacts nor do we need to attract public private partnerships nor do I see the county/city divide impacting the outcome. These projects include and revolve around the fact that the Feds/State/Local governments have already invested or investing in two huge projects, I-64 rebuild and new Mississippi River Bridge.
- A new 22nd interchange, that is roughly 20-25 million. The is fundamentally changes the west end of the Gateway Mall, provides even better 1-64/Hwy 40 acccess and essentially restores a street grid while givng west Downtown a big chuck of unencumbered developable land. The city and MoDOT are already working on a partnership to split cost. It is a plus when MoDOT wants to see a failed inner freeway go away.
- At grade Memorial Drive, rought 75 to 85 million. Their is a good possiblity that the Feds would kick in a good part of that if the right design is chosen and is doable with the start of the new MRB construction, essentially the re-routing of I-70. This fundamentally changes the Riverfront without the cost of an expensive tunnel. Heck, The Feds might even demand that it be removed from park grounds altogether thus forcing a change that they will have to pay for and let state and local politicians off the hook for taking a position.
- Rebuild street infrastructure at foot of new MRB, roughly 50 million. A new casino proposal, another round of infrascture stimulus, a multi year transportation needed after the mid term elections, McKee's TIF proposal. The possibility of putting some funds together is doable.
- Rebuilding bridges over I-64 between CWE and FPSE. For an additional investment of 5 million you could probably greatly enhance the bridges as well as sidewalkrs/streets in the immediate area to better accomondate pedesterian traffic. Barnes Jewish is already partnering with MoDOT to fund another ramp for Boyle Ave.
More importantly, private investment will never touch these relatively small amounts when you consider most projects like Indiana toll road were in the billions nor would they ever see a return on investment demanded by their share holders. To me, it would be better if MoDOT pursue such a plan with priate investors for rebuiling intersetates in return for toll revenue. Now your talking the scale and the ability to generate revenue that PPP's demand.
Singapore's Double Helix Bridge was finished this week. This is very exciting for them. This means their Marina Bay is more or less complete. I blogged about this a while back, http://stlelsewhere.blogspot.com/2009/1 ... a-bay.html
The Poplar Street Bridge needs a pedestrian/bike bridge attached to it with viewing pods like the one in Singapore. It'd be wonderful.
the double-helix bridge is curved so it only connects to the highway bridge next to it in the middle of the span. The ends curve away. In St. louis this would mean the pedestrian bridge would start closer to the arch go out as far as the bridge and then curve back in to the east side park. It would take the box like quality of the river between the two bridges and round it a little bit.
I don't think we'd want to add "viewing pods" off the side of it, but the Eads is the obvious ped/bike connection to the east side (and not the PSB). The Eads should drop to 2 traffic lanes with wide bike/ped lanes.
Ok, viewing pods are optional. The main point is that people should be able to stroll around in a circle. What makes Marina Bay great is that you can walk around it and always see things from new angles. The skyline is set up to be seen from the other side of the bay. No matter where you are, there's something interesting to see on the other side of the water. All the major subways lines are accessible from different points along that walking path.
The view changes as you walk.
If downtown is the center of our region and we want East St. Louis and Illnois to be part of it all, then we should frame the river between the respective cities. Eads absolutely should be pedestrian and bike friendly on its southern side. Likewise the Poplar Street Bridge should be so on its northern side.
Both riverfronts and both bridges should be made into one circular walking path and made romantic enough that its the hottest place to take a date in the whole area. That's what Singapore seems to have created. All the teenagers on the island go there with their dates to stare across the water and into each other's eyes. heh.
We don't have to have viewing pods, but that section of the river should be made beautiful if we want a complete waterfront and a sense of togetherness straddling the river.
The forum for meeting the finalists for the design of the new Arch grounds is tomorrow, Wednesday the 28th, at the Roberts Orpheum Theater. I don't know what time it starts. I coincidentally got the opportunity to speak with one of the executives of Metro today and she said the event had been poorly organized and many people had not been contacted about their tickets. She said she is telling people to "just go." This is a fantastic opportunity to make your views heard about the future of our city, get educated, and at the very least, see some cool architecture. Everyone should go!
Overall, I found the presentations to be very, very dull. None of the teams did a good job outlining their vision or really referencing St. Louis. It was mostly a dog and pony show of "here's who our teams are" and "here's what we've done in the past."
The loser that stands out was the final team, Weiss/Manfredi. They said it best when they commented on how exciting car and train traffic is. They kept showing a development in Seattle that looked like total utter crap - disconnected from the city via a highway/train tracks, and just a mess. I pray they don't win.
The best team, imho, was SOM - it sounds like they have a clear vision and understand the need to connect the city to the arch grounds and river.
The first two teams were dreadfully boring. I barely paid attention.
Perhaps you were confused about the "meet the design team" concept. This was the first time many of them toured the arch grounds and while I am sure that many of them had concepts for what they wanted to do, there is no reason to make promises without proper research.
I personally was in awe of overall collection of talent that we have in this competition. Yes the architects were a little boring but I expected that. Overall I have confidence that one of these teams will put forth a plan that connects our city to its landmark and makes it an even better tourist attraction.
jmstokes wrote:The loser that stands out was the final team, Weiss/Manfredi. They said it best when they commented on how exciting car and train traffic is. They kept showing a development in Seattle that looked like total utter crap - disconnected from the city via a highway/train tracks, and just a mess. I pray they don't win.
They must have LOVED seeing the depressed section!
I thought it was good. They weren't allowed to go over any of their design ideas, so I'm sure they were really careful not to go over any of their visions for the site. The intention was for us to know who they are. And they only had 15 min to talk. That's not a lot of time to introduce yourself, your team, your architectural background, and then go into your vision of the Arch and St. Louis.
I feel they each gave a good indication of what they typically do with this type of project. I just hope that the project is more focused on the urban element and connections to the city rather than doing some beautiful landscaping (the last two teams seemed to focus on that). The grounds are already very beautiful, we just need better ways to get to it and more activities to do when we're there.
I enjoyed myself. I will also restate that this was a "get to know the teams" event. And they did just that. They introduced their teams, background, and displayed some previous work.
From reading this thread earlier it seemed that many are concerned that this project will not address the roads, highways, and other connections. I thought that it was stated time and time again that the project must connect the city and the river to the arch. I feel that this project could be truly great and after thinking about it all night, I think we may see alot of great ideas for the east bank.
Driving east on Washington this morning I thought how cool it would be to see the 1. skybridge gone, 2. see the elevated 70 gone, and 3. maybe see some nice modern construction on top of the garage at the arch for a new museum or something (sticking out of the trees on the arch grounds).
I can't wait to see ideas and plans. I really liked the SOM tag team...
I'm a little surprised STL lovers were bored. These are 5 amazing teams, with exceptional portfolios. This is going to be nothing short of transformational to the area. The shots of Allegheny Riverfront Park in Pittsburgh and the Louisville Waterfront Park were awesome. These firms are the best of the best. My only concern was the over-emphasis on several teams regarding landscaping. While it's true we can do better than mowed grass and trees, what we really need is a connection between Chouteau's Landing and Laclede's Landing as well as removing the Interstate barriers to the west. I think we're in good hands and can't wait to see how this plays out. Again, if you aren't awestruck by the work of these firms, I'm not sure what will make you happy, or what you are hoping to get out of all of this. The other good news is, they seemed dead set on making this happen by 2015 for the 50th anniversary of the completion of the Arch.
Moorlander wrote:Can't wait for a recap from those who attend.
It was good. The first team was kind of dull, but I was ready to hire every team after that. Each one pointed to other projects they've done which relate to this project. The last team was really good, showing how they created Seattle's sculpture park, with some of the same challenges we face here. Other's did similar things. I was ready to hire all four of them! There will be another meeting later (I think around August) where they will present their plans.
What especially struck me is that there are some real heavy hitters working on this thing.
