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PostOct 15, 2022#5076

If a recession is coming, it’s pretty cool to start with $500m sitting around. Plus ARP. Plus growing revenues/surpluses. Plus big grant wins.

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PostOct 16, 2022#5077

^ & ^^ I would say yes and no.  In 5 more years it is going to cost you that much more to rebuild your streets, sidewalks and parks.   That much more to stabilize your properties and plant trees.  That much more to rebuild the Market/Forest Parkway interchange into a blvd and or expand the brickline and so on.    So i think you need a balance and take the opportunity of a more competitive recession to rebuild some of your infrastructure.   So yes on rainy day fund but no you need to spend some of those funds no for a better future, quality of life.   

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PostOct 16, 2022#5078

I mean you aren’t going to get any project off the ground in 3-5 years anyway. It’s late 2022 and the Tucker cycle path and road diet was started in 2018 and construction set for late 2023

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PostOct 16, 2022#5079

dbInSouthCity wrote:
Oct 16, 2022
I mean you aren’t going to get any project off the ground in 3-5 years anyway.    It’s late 2022 and the Tucker cycle path and road diet was started in 2018 and construction set for late 2023
I would disagree with your timeline as you can move things a lot faster when you have funds obligated and a political will to move things.    Heck, St. Louis even has  a 1000 yr flood event this year to help push things along (nothing like a crises to give political will) .  What is driving the 3-5 year timeline you referenced are studies (including a fair share of engineers, architects and engineers wanting to keep the billable hours up before it goes out to bid) permits (a fair share of public entities who want to have their final say) and environmental reviews on new projects from the ground up.  Even then, if you can at least commit the funds now for the environmental impacts and preliminary engineering to get things from a decision to a to budget to say 60-70% you have made huge strides in getting a project to solicitation and constructability timeline.   
Heck DB, thanks to your posts a lot people like myself didn't even know that DOT was seeking input on what to due with the whole Market St/FPP/Grand interchange mess.   Commit some funds now so you can pull trigger on at least the environmental and prelim engineering once the feedback is finalized next year.  That would probably save some serious time on the constructability timeline.   In the meantime, if the city is already considering an at grade Grand/FPP intersection why not pull the trigger and commit some funds.   Waiting is only means things are more expensive later.

Finally, I reference the fact that you can repave a lot of streets, replace a lot of sidewalks and upgrade a lot of playground equipment in a 3-5 year time span.    So the group hopes for a 5-10% equity gain sitting on money when inflation sitting at 8%.   What is really being gained for residents?  Have poor infrastructure longer so you can make some money to pay for more expensive infrastructure later while a financial manager is taking in a nice yearly cut.   Now, would it make sense for officials to wait for the new year to see what happens with private market? Yes, as you might have more bidders as the commercial and home builders slowly pull back.   The city might have some opportunity in better pricing on fleet replacement next year if we truly go into recession.   

The big winner I see for sitting on as much funds as possible are the finance guys making their cut on managing those funds.   Not saying to spend it all but City in a unique situation that a serious amount can go back into capital investments for the long term benefit of the city/its residents.   It would be shame to not take that opportunity as well. 

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PostOct 16, 2022#5080

dredger wrote:
dbInSouthCity wrote:
Oct 16, 2022
I mean you aren’t going to get any project off the ground in 3-5 years anyway.    It’s late 2022 and the Tucker cycle path and road diet was started in 2018 and construction set for late 2023
I would disagree with your timeline as you can move things a lot faster when you have funds obligated and a political will to move things.    Heck, St. Louis even has  a 1000 yr flood event this year to help push things along (nothing like a crises to give political will) .  What is driving the 3-5 year timeline you referenced are studies (including a fair share of engineers, architects and engineers wanting to keep the billable hours up before it goes out to bid) permits (a fair share of public entities who want to have their final say) and environmental reviews on new projects from the ground up.  Even then, if you can at least commit the funds now for the environmental impacts and preliminary engineering to get things from a decision to a to budget to say 60-70% you have made huge strides in getting a project to solicitation and constructability timeline.   
Heck DB, thanks to your posts a lot people like myself didn't even know that DOT was seeking input on what to due with the whole Market St/FPP/Grand interchange mess.   Commit some funds now so you can pull trigger on at least the environmental and prelim engineering once the feedback is finalized next year.  That would probably save some serious time on the constructability timeline.   In the meantime, if the city is already considering an at grade Grand/FPP intersection why not pull the trigger and commit some funds.   Waiting is only means things are more expensive later.

Finally, I reference the fact that you can repave a lot of streets, replace a lot of sidewalks and upgrade a lot of playground equipment in a 3-5 year time span.    So the group hopes for a 5-10% equity gain sitting on money when inflation sitting at 8%.   What is really being gained for residents?  Have poor infrastructure longer so you can make some money to pay for more expensive infrastructure later while a financial manager is taking in a nice yearly cut.   Now, would it make sense for officials to wait for the new year to see what happens with private market? Yes, as you might have more bidders as the commercial and home builders slowly pull back.   The city might have some opportunity in better pricing on fleet replacement next year if we truly go into recession.   

The big winner I see for sitting on as much funds as possible are the finance guys making their cut on managing those funds.   Not saying to spend it all but City in a unique situation that a serious amount can go back into capital investments for the long term benefit of the city/its residents.   It would be shame to not take that opportunity as well. 
No DB is pretty right. I too would see 3 years being the fastest. That’s personal experience on projects in the city though.

Other cities not so much.

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PostOct 16, 2022#5081

Another layer to add is that we have $500m in federal $ with a statutory deadline to spend by 2025, and we’ve spent almost none, we’ve allocated some but not spent yet

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PostOct 17, 2022#5082

My friends, there is great beauty in compounded returns. DB is 100% right. Spend that Fed money with a time horizon, and let cash grow. Plus, having such a cash reserve will almost certainly be a feather in our cap when our muni bonds are being rated by Moody's and Standard & Poor's. 

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PostOct 17, 2022#5083

This is sickening.



$800 million from the owners of the Titans.
$1.4 billion from taxpayers with it sounds like a $500 million from the state and $800 million raised by the city via a hotel room tax.

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PostOct 18, 2022#5084

dweebe wrote:
Oct 17, 2022
This is sickening.



$800 million from the owners of the Titans.
$1.4 billion from taxpayers with it sounds like a 50/50 state and city split. $700 million from the state and $700 million raised by the city via a hotel room tax.
Nashvegas is growing a lot faster than St. Louis, if anything STL isn’t growing.

Clearly what they are doing is working.

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PostOct 18, 2022#5085

retractable roof? or or those passé now?

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PostOct 18, 2022#5086

Nashville burying the Midwest in general and making mincemeat of STL.

Cue the STL defenders: “But Nashville is a state capitol.”

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PostOct 18, 2022#5087

whitherSTL wrote:
Oct 18, 2022
Nashville burying the Midwest in general and making mincemeat of STL.

Cue the STL defenders: “But  Nashville is a state capitol.”
It's true though.  Tennessee is giving the Titans $500,000,000 for the new stadium. IIRC Missourah was "only" going to put $150,000,000 towards National Car Rental Field.
Nashville's not stealing from us, they're taking from Atlanta and elsewhere. Plus it helps when Tennessee is a Right to Work state and has no state income tax

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PostOct 18, 2022#5088

Nashville is a nice place.  Nashville benefits from a trendy national reputation as a music mecca.  They are leveraging it to great effect.  Eventually the shine will fade but i don't expect it to be soon.

St. Louis suffers from chronically poor reputation.  I don't feel St. Louis' is fair, but there is no use complaining about it.  The only thing that can be done are either address the underlying problems of crime education and aging infrastructure or, reorganize such that the stats reflect the more positive reality of the whole region rather than just neglected urban core.  Preferably both.

I don't feel like Nashville is stealing investment that would otherwise be made in St. Louis.  I am sure there are some examples but in general i think their rise is not at our expense.

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PostOct 18, 2022#5089

Despite our issues, as a region we are about $35,000,000,000 ahead of Nashville metro in GDP

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708

PostOct 19, 2022#5090

https://www.cbssports.com/nfl/news/rams ... er-report/
Rams owner Stan Kroenke forced to pay staggering $571 million of NFL's St. Louis settlement, per report

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PostOct 20, 2022#5091

STLEnginerd wrote:
Oct 18, 2022
Nashville is a nice place.  Nashville benefits from a trendy national reputation as a music mecca.  They are leveraging it to great effect.  Eventually the shine will fade but i don't expect it to be soon.

St. Louis suffers from chronically poor reputation.  I don't feel St. Louis' is fair, but there is no use complaining about it.  The only thing that can be done are either address the underlying problems of crime education and aging infrastructure or, reorganize such that the stats reflect the more positive reality of the whole region rather than just neglected urban core.  Preferably both.

I don't feel like Nashville is stealing investment that would otherwise be made in St. Louis.  I am sure there are some examples but in general i think their rise is not at our expense.
I love midwestern cities like Nashville, Memphis, and KC.  But it is particularly annoying that our own print and media outlets in St, Louis promote "city" crime rankings instead of "metro area" crime rankings, knowing that city rankings are stupid because city boundaries are set by politics and hence vary wildly metro to metro, especially comparing St. Louis to a city like Nashville.  By contrast, "Metro Area" MSA boundaries use consistent boundary rules set by the federal government.  The goal of St. Louis media seems to be -- convince St. Louis locals to move to Nashville.

EVERY "metro area" crime rankings ranks Nashville metro violent crime rate higher than St. Louis metro crime rate.  And St. Louis metro property crime seems to be far lower than most other US metros property crime. 

https://listwithclever.com/research/most-dangerous-and-safest-metros-in-the-us/

But you find things like this online from Mapquest Travel:  "The Worst Cities To Visit In The United States".  
https://www.mapquest.com/travel/the-worst-cities-to-visit-in-the-united-states/
Guess which place and downtown photo is at the top.  You know readers assume it is referring to the entire metro area, so are fearful of visiting any part of our metro.  And forget moving here.  This hurts our entire metro area reputation.  

I'm having trouble getting my relatives to visit me in Kirkwood, even though neighborhood crime web sites show it is safer than Lafayette, CO, Evergreen, CO, and Boulder, CO, where they live.  

Imagine moving to Nashville to avoid crime only to discover the truth the hard way.

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240

PostOct 20, 2022#5092

gary kreie wrote:
STLEnginerd wrote:
Oct 18, 2022
Nashville is a nice place.  Nashville benefits from a trendy national reputation as a music mecca.  They are leveraging it to great effect.  Eventually the shine will fade but i don't expect it to be soon.

St. Louis suffers from chronically poor reputation.  I don't feel St. Louis' is fair, but there is no use complaining about it.  The only thing that can be done are either address the underlying problems of crime education and aging infrastructure or, reorganize such that the stats reflect the more positive reality of the whole region rather than just neglected urban core.  Preferably both.

I don't feel like Nashville is stealing investment that would otherwise be made in St. Louis.  I am sure there are some examples but in general i think their rise is not at our expense.
I love midwestern cities like Nashville, Memphis, and KC.  But it is particularly annoying that our own print and media outlets in St, Louis promote "city" crime rankings instead of "metro area" crime rankings, knowing that city rankings are stupid because city boundaries are set by politics and hence vary wildly metro to metro, especially comparing St. Louis to a city like Nashville.  By contrast, "Metro Area" MSA boundaries use consistent boundary rules set by the federal government.  The goal of St. Louis media seems to be -- convince St. Louis locals to move to Nashville.

EVERY "metro area" crime rankings ranks Nashville metro violent crime rate higher than St. Louis metro crime rate.  And St. Louis metro property crime seems to be far lower than most other US metros property crime. 

https://listwithclever.com/research/most-dangerous-and-safest-metros-in-the-us/

But you find things like this online from Mapquest Travel:  "The Worst Cities To Visit In The United States".  
https://www.mapquest.com/travel/the-worst-cities-to-visit-in-the-united-states/
Guess which place and downtown photo is at the top.  You know readers assume it is referring to the entire metro area, so are fearful of visiting any part of our metro.  And forget moving here.  This hurts our entire metro area reputation.  

I'm having trouble getting my relatives to visit me in Kirkwood, even though neighborhood crime web sites show it is safer than Lafayette, CO, Evergreen, CO, and Boulder, CO, where they live.  

Imagine moving to Nashville to avoid crime only to discover the truth the hard way.
So basically you’re saying we need a city merger and we need to grow as a city to avoid all these stereotypes. I agree!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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PostOct 20, 2022#5093

^I 100% agree. Our media outlets have absolutely failed us.

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PostOct 20, 2022#5094

That Nashville stadium will be hosting Super Bowls and NCAA championships in no time.  

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PostOct 20, 2022#5095

debaliviere wrote:That Nashville stadium will be hosting Super Bowls and NCAA championships in no time.  
Yep. It will have a lid for all-weather events. They are saying look to the Las Vegas dome for a model.


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PostOct 20, 2022#5096

debaliviere wrote:
Oct 20, 2022
That Nashville stadium will be hosting Super Bowls and NCAA championships in no time.  
It might get A Super Bowl, but the NFL seems pretty keen on keeping the LA(nee SD x3) x8/Miami x11 /New Orleans x10/TB x5 Rotation going, with dashes of ATL/Hou/PHX/Presumably LV every now and then (Next 3 are PHX/LV/NO, for reference). Of the Super Bowls between 2000-2025, all but 7 have been in the cities mentioned, and 6 of those 7 were new stadiums.  NFL wants warm weather for all of the hoopla surrounding the SB, not just the game itself.   

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PostOct 20, 2022#5097

Remember the days when STL was an AWESOME host of big-time sporting events? Wasn’t that long ago. Sadly, now our priorities are social justice, economic equity and reparations.


Weeeeeeeeee! What a town.

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PostOct 20, 2022#5098

I also think Nashville is quickly heading towards becoming Austin TX 2.0 when it comes to traffic. Every time I've been there or driven through regardless of the time of day
1) I hit some sort of jam
2) the drivers are some of the most angry/aggressive around.
And there's a reason

PostOct 20, 2022#5099

Bart Harley Jarvis wrote:
Oct 20, 2022
debaliviere wrote:
Oct 20, 2022
That Nashville stadium will be hosting Super Bowls and NCAA championships in no time.  
It might get A Super Bowl, but the NFL seems pretty keen on keeping the LA(nee SD x3) x8/Miami x11 /New Orleans x10/TB x5 Rotation going, with dashes of ATL/Hou/PHX/Presumably LV every now and then (Next 3 are PHX/LV/NO, for reference). Of the Super Bowls between 2000-2025, all but 7 have been in the cities mentioned, and 6 of those 7 were new stadiums.  NFL wants warm weather for all of the hoopla surrounding the SB, not just the game itself.   
The NFL still doesn't forget the ice storm in Atlanta when the St. Louis Rams won. 

Or how Jerry Jones shot his mouth of about how Dallas/Arlington would become a regular, if not permanent host for the Super Bowl but has only had one? One of the issues was the time they had the Super Bowl the weather was grey and in the 40s.

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PostOct 20, 2022#5100

Imagine being so dumb to think that it’s a bad thing to lift the bottom up and how that benefits everyone, I wonder how some of you even tie your own shoes

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