urbanSTL

SoulardD wrote:

TGE-ATW wrote:Build around the extant buildings. Incorporate them into a high density design. Do not destroy beautiful, functional, historic buildings and then replace them with cheap copies to be used for the same purposes. Also, if your theory about Gilded age having the most to lose if this thing isn't done "right" were true, they wouldn't have gone ahead with phase I.

/not done right

//not even close.

I won't argue with you that phase I wasn't done right, if it looks like it does in the renderings. But, is it never ok to tear down three story buildings for 6 story higher density buildings? Isn't density what we're going for? Am I wrong in thinking that these homes were beautiful and functional when they were built, but after being cutoff the grid by the highway have lost their functionality and have gone to disrepair? Is it wrong to think that dense residential on top of retail/commercial would bring back some of that lost functionality and bring back some of that lost activity?

You and I have been in on this thing from the beginning, at least I think you were in this thread pretty early. I have already stated and re-stated my position on this ad nauseum. I am not against demolition when there is a sufficient justification and/or real civic improvement requires it. If you want more you are going to have to scroll back through the previous 39 pages of the thread. I do not believe that this development is planned well, and I see no reason to trust that the developers will do any better on phase II. Therefore, I am against demolitions on Bohemian Hill.

I think that what is shown in the rendering for Phase II is leaps and bounds better than what is shown for Phase I. I also believe that it is an improvement over vacant dilapidated buildings, even if architecturally significant. If we were going to fight this thing, I think we got it backward, and Phase I should have been opposed. I think that ideally, something that looks like Phase II would be built on the land that has already been cleared for Phase I and the buildings facing Tucker would be renovated and infill would be built, but that isn't going to happen. My fear is that Phase I will make what is left of Bohemian Hill functionally useless, and therefore not desirable to rehabbers. Phase I next to vacant dilapidated buildings is the worst case scenario, IMO.

I did two posts on the history of Bohemian Hill and the parameters of the Gilded Age development on a blog that I've not been good about regular posting for. Thus, I do not consider it advertisement--it's just fyi:



http://sluperb.wordpress.com/

SoulardD wrote:

TGE-ATW wrote:Build around the extant buildings. Incorporate them into a high density design. Do not destroy beautiful, functional, historic buildings and then replace them with cheap copies to be used for the same purposes. Also, if your theory about Gilded age having the most to lose if this thing isn't done "right" were true, they wouldn't have gone ahead with phase I.

/not done right

//not even close.

I won't argue with you that phase I wasn't done right, if it looks like it does in the renderings. But, is it never ok to tear down three story buildings for 6 story higher density buildings? Isn't density what we're going for? Am I wrong in thinking that these homes were beautiful and functional when they were built, but after being cutoff the grid by the highway have lost their functionality and have gone to disrepair? Is it wrong to think that dense residential on top of retail/commercial would bring back some of that lost functionality and bring back some of that lost activity?

IMO - you're asking the right questions. I have no idea why we aren't putting all of our collective time/effort/knowledge into preserving/protecting/promoting neighboods like Soulard, ONSL, TG's, etc. Instead we get fired up about two of three remaining row houses in midtown coming down, or a dozen isolated unexceptional for St. Louis home on Bohemian Hill. Places that have zero context and relatively little development potential. What were they going to do with the row houses in midtown? Build four more blocks of the same to the same standards to create a neighborhood? No way. Unless 55 and 44 are removed, Bohemian Hill will lack any context as well. I do hate to see these buildings come down, but let's keep some perspective. I hope that they keep some of the existing buildings and build around it, but I don't see the problem if they replace them with what's in the rendering for Phase II.

I hate the design of this project.

TGE-ATW is totally right. Doesn't everyone want a condo in the City Hospital overlooking a sea of asphalt illuminated by tall ugly lights at night? I think that people move into the city specifically to get good views of strip malls you can't get elsewhere. Reminds us that all is indeed within reach.

SoulardD wrote:I think that what is shown in the rendering for Phase II is leaps and bounds better than what is shown for Phase I. I also believe that it is an improvement over vacant dilapidated buildings, even if architecturally significant. If we were going to fight this thing, I think we got it backward, and Phase I should have been opposed. I think that ideally, something that looks like Phase II would be built on the land that has already been cleared for Phase I and the buildings facing Tucker would be renovated and infill would be built, but that isn't going to happen. My fear is that Phase I will make what is left of Bohemian Hill functionally useless, and therefore not desirable to rehabbers. Phase I next to vacant dilapidated buildings is the worst case scenario, IMO.

1. That phase II rendering is a fabrication. All they said, almost a year ago, was that they wanted to put in condos and offices in phase II. They never provided any detailed plans that I am aware of. The phase II you are looking at has no basis in reality. It is a distraction (apparently an effective one) shown to make phase I look better. Yeah, it looks great, almost as good as all the imaginary new skyscrapers that St. Louis has.



2. Phase I was opposed. Maybe you haven't been here from the beginning? Many people mobilized and actively opposed phase I through fliers, meetings, editorials, blogs, and newspaper articles; many more bitched emphatically about it and did nothing. We didn't get it backward.



3. Phase I has a very good chance of making what is left of Bohemian hill "functionally useless." you are right. Plays right into the developer's and Alderwoman Young's plan. Build Phase I in a way that further isolates the existing buildings, wait for the last holdouts to crack, pay them a pittance either through the market or using eminent domain, demolish, proceed as planned. OBVIOUS.

TGE-ATW wrote:I disagree. The new faux LaSalle Park is a barrier ("mixed use housing"????) It has an institutional, sterile feeling that is at complete odds with the personalities of Soulard and LaFayette Square.

Thank you, yes it does.



The faux Victorians built by gubmnt mandate are hideous.

ecoabsence wrote:TGE-ATW is totally right. Doesn't everyone want a condo in the City Hospital overlooking a sea of asphalt illuminated by tall ugly lights at night? I think that people move into the city specifically to get good views of strip malls you can't get elsewhere. Reminds us that all is indeed within reach.

Read what I said a few posts ago about how Phase II should have happened instead of Phase I. Look at the Phase II rendering, no huge parking lots.

TGE-ATW wrote:
1. That phase II rendering is a fabrication. All they said, almost a year ago, was that they wanted to put in condos and offices in phase II. They never provided any detailed plans that I am aware of. The phase II you are looking at has no basis in reality. It is a distraction (apparently an effective one) shown to make phase I look better. Yeah, it looks great, almost as good as all the imaginary new skyscrapers that St. Louis has.

Huh? That's quite a conspiracy theory.

TGE-ATW wrote:2. Phase I was opposed. Maybe you haven't been here from the beginning? Many people mobilized and actively opposed phase I through fliers, meetings, editorials, blogs, and newspaper articles; many more bitched emphatically about it and did nothing. We didn't get it backward.

I was around, I think I even remember that the term 'CAVE' was used for 'Citizens Against Absolutely Everything', which is an ignorant statement that the developers used with the press to belittle the request for intelligent design. What I remember most about it wasn't the fight for intelligent design of Phase I, though. I remember a huge Eminent Domain fight that was futile and successfully killed any chance of negotiating with the developers to build successful urban design. I won't take sides on the ED thing because nobody is trying to take my house, but by screaming, "Don't take those houses." it seems we lost our chance to scream, "Don't build suburban style strip malls in the city." Now we lose on both fronts.

Not a conspiracy theory. I have never seen any real plans for phase II, just vague statements about what they wanted to put there. If somebody can find actual plans or renderings for Phase II, I'll retract, but those renderings some of you are getting excited about are focused on Phase I with imaginary development around it.



The fight that I was a part of had two points: 1: The buildings on Bohemian Hill should not be demolished to make way for the development that was proposed 2: The proposed development was not harmonious with the historic nature of the surrounding neighborhoods and should be changed to reflect the existing historic urban fabric, and to take advantage of the opportunity to create a pedestrian-friendly linkage between Soulard and Lafayette Square. Jim Roos and his eminent domain folks had their own arguments, but I along with others were focused on the unjustified demolitions and the suburban nature of the proposed development. We were screaming "don't build suburban strip malls in our city," the problem was that not enough people got out from behind their computers and screamed with us.

ecoabsence wrote:TGE-ATW is totally right. Doesn't everyone want a condo in the City Hospital overlooking a sea of asphalt illuminated by tall ugly lights at night? I think that people move into the city specifically to get good views of strip malls you can't get elsewhere. Reminds us that all is indeed within reach.

I generally think you have some great insight into the historic fabric of the city, but WHAT? I think people will want to move to the Georgian if there's a grocery store, coffee shop and pharmacy directly across the street. This will actually shield the view of the massive Interstate interchange for some! And given your train of thought, who would want to move anywhere with bright lights and people? OK, that's overstating what you said, but this isn't really a sea of asphalt, it's more like a Chouteau's Pond of asphalt!

Grover wrote:I generally think you have some great insight into the historic fabric of the city, but WHAT? I think people will want to move to the Georgian if there's a grocery store, coffee shop and pharmacy directly across the street. This will actually shield the view of the massive Interstate interchange for some! And given your train of thought, who would want to move anywhere with bright lights and people?

I think shielding the interstate is a laudable goal, but my guess is that it will be visible from upper floors at City Hospital over the top of a fairly ugly strip development and its parking lot. I guess that's an improvement, but hardly the best one possible -- and totally inconsistent with the upscale image of The Georgian.

True. Unfortunately, as I see it, the Georgian is surrounded by so much public housing that it will never really be upscale. Some of the new development directly in Lafayette Square sure.

Maybe it's time for those who are sick of suburban style developments such as these to take it to the street a la Grand/Chippewa McDonalds. At least a stink/showing could be made to let people/developers/media know folks who choose to live in the city are not here for the worst schools, crime stats and developments like these; rather the history, contiguous neighborhoods and cohesiveness of street/pedestrian-respectful development.



I'm sick of reading and talking about suburban developments like these on this board, without trying to do something about it. Maybe action is necessary.



Let's get this started: groth_stl@hotmail.com

Just to clarify, public housing in this area pre-dates the Georgian, which had been for decades a public hospital.

^ For further clarification, mound-building Native Americans pre-date public housing in this area.





What we're talking about here is building sustainable, vibrant, walkable, safe communities. The concentration of public housing anywhere is an issue that needs to be addressed, but public housing adjacent to CBD's and affluent areas such as Lafayette Square are of particular interest.

Grover wrote:What we're talking about here is building sustainable, vibrant, walkable, safe communities. The concentration of public housing anywhere is an issue that needs to be addressed, but public housing adjacent to CBD's and affluent areas such as Lafayette Square are of particular interest.

La Saison / King Louis Square is a reworking of the Darst-Webbe housing project using the federal HOPE VI program. The result is actually a mix of subsidized and affordable units, senior housing buildings and low-side market-rate homes. In my opinion, the biggest problem is the terrible design of all buildings and the weird street layout that perpetuates the inside/outside feel. For instance, 13th Street was rebuilt but at Park Avenue a median blocks through traffic. North of Park, 13th makes a weird dog-leg. Carroll Street terminates at 13th, with the section between 13th and Tucker planted as a flower bed. Thus there is little circulation of non-residents and within the development. That reinforces the disconnect between the project and surrounding areas established by the bad architecture.



Coupling the Darst-Webbe mess with the strip mall (not to mention Truman Parkway), we will have Lafayette Square and LaSalle Park visually broken apart for at least the next thirty years. The strip mall could have helped mitigate the effect of La Saison / King Louis Square.

^And what pre-dates both King Louie and Darst-Webbe was more of what you find remaining in Bohemian Hill or LaSalle Park. It's ironic that the proponents of sterile, market-rate Phase II covering Bohemian Hill would dislike the sterile, mixed-income development across the street. Visually, the two will look very similar, though the newer has a chance to be more eerily faux-historic.



I can see large-scale projects that follow new urbanism being less offensive when they replace "garden city" or "tower-in-the-park" designs like Darst-Webbe. But when New Urbanism replaces Old Urbanism such as the Phase II plans for Bohemian Hill, that's completely ridiculous.

Affordable housing is by its very nature built "afford ably". Think of the ruckus that would have ensued if the former gov't housing was gentrified out of existence.





The street configurations seem to work fine in that any open plan would expose the neighborhood to excessive commuter traffic.





The present mgmt. (McCormack Barron I think) appears to be doing an excellent job in that we often bike or walk through between Ls and Soulard without any threatening feeling.





In sum, I say mission accomplished. Now if they can get some traction on the market rate stuff.

alphalfa wrote:Affordable housing is by its very nature built "afford ably". Think of the ruckus that would have ensued if the former gov't housing was gentrified out of existence.





The street configurations seem to work fine in that any open plan would expose the neighborhood to excessive commuter traffic.





The present mgmt. (McCormack Barron I think) appears to be doing an excellent job in that we often bike or walk through between Ls and Soulard without any threatening feeling.





In sum, I say mission accomplished. Now if they can get some traction on the market rate stuff.

Did they want to deter Downtown residents and LS residents from walking from Downtown to LS down 14th street or Tucker? If so, mission accomplished.



Here's a crazy idea, don't clump poverty stricken people together and instead, spread them out among wealthier communities so that the children can attend good schools and learn to break out of their circle of poverty.

Affordable housing does not, however, have to be synonymous with poor design, of which these are great examples-it pains me just to look at them (and the fact that it bridges two of our most wonderfully intact historic neighborhoods adds insult to injury).

alphalfa wrote:The street configurations seem to work fine in that any open plan would expose the neighborhood to excessive commuter traffic.

Open plans and traffic do more good than harm. Closed-off spaces are fine until the buildings start to decay -- then they are perfect spots for criminal activity. What happened at old isolated Darst-Webbe could very well happen at new isolated King Louis Square. Management of King Louis Square is good, but that won't stop problems when the 30-year buildings deteriorate and good tenants refuse to live there.

True true true. Mark my words. It'll all get leveled again. The buildings are cheap and have virtually no chance of making the transition from housing project to neighborhood. Closed off streets populated by generic, cheap, subsidized rental units that still have the stigma of housing project hanging over them; this area will be an impediment to southside progress for decades more.

^But there's quite a few owner-occupied houses there as well.