urbanSTL

I've always disliked out the federal courthouse fills in the Arch coming East on I-64.

Great photo.

What could have been? It is what IS STL today. This IS the entire Skyline West to East ...

And if it could be in 3D and allow us to rotate and zoom in - all the way to streetview please!

matguy70 wrote:Great photo.

What could have been? It is what IS STL today. This IS the entire Skyline West to East ...

I think the point was what could have been if we didn't needlessly fracture our city's Central Business District into two separate, relatively dilute CBDs, as opposed to having one strong, concentrated CBD.

terence d wrote:^Interesting photo. It'd be cool to see a timeline of these, same angle, maybe one from each decade from the 40s to present day.

I'd like to see a photoshop of what Saint Louis City (and Clayton) skyline could look like each of the next several decades.

wabash wrote:^Throw in CWE and Midtown while you're at it.

yeah. Actually, what I'd really like to see is a simulation of what the city would roughly have to look like at populations of 350K (starting to regain population) and then every additional 100K through 850K. Of course, this growth would also go hand in hand with more commerical and corporate rebirth.

How high would we have to go in downtown and the midtown-CWE corridor while roughly keeping intact our historic neighborhoods? Given what I assume to be a continued social construct of smaller families and fewer people per household unit than in the heydays, what would be our population if existing housing stock were maxed out?

It's a shame that so many people have the wrong impression of our skyline because they base their assumptions on the typical postcard view, which in many cases depict the city as dated, underwhelming, short and small. The fact is, outside of Chicago and perhaps Detroit, St. Louis has by far the largest collection of pre-war high-rises outside of the CBD in the entire Midwest. There are no high-rise districts in Cleveland, Cincinnati, Milwaukee, much less Kansas City, Columbus or Indianapolis that come even close to the scale of Midtown, CWE, Skinker or Clayton. Even DeBaliviere Place as seen from Forest Park Parkway comprises one of the most urban cityscapes in the Midwest. Minneapolis- a much younger city than St. Louis- has plenty of new towers, but hardly any from the pre-war era outside of downtown. As a whole, St. Louis' central corridor is quite expansive. I think it's misunderstood and overlooked because we don't have any supertall skyscrapers. Even downtown, the size and density isn't visible from skyline shots because our building stock is short and squatty. Look at Downtown West-- it's a big, dense section of the city but almost completely hidden from view.

Looking at aerial shots like this, it's easy to see St. Louis' early ascent and then its abrupt free-fall. Very few tall buildings in the skyline (particularly east of Kingshighway) were built after the middle of the 20th century (except for a mini-boom of boxy buildings in the '80s). It's as if someone pushed pause in about 1970. You can imagine how new towers would've filled in the gaps had St. Louis continued to grow. I'd bet Forest Park would be surrounded by highrises, and the Central West End would be filled with tall, sleek modern towers. What could've been... Oh well, what we have now is still more impressive than 90% of cities in this country, and out-of-towners are the first ones to notice it.

framer wrote:I see the entire central corridor filling-in over the next few decades. We will essentially have a continuous high-density district stretching from Downtown all the way to Clayton.

^This. 100% This. I would like nothing better than to see mid and high rises running all the way down lindel and olive with a streetcar system and street level life.

stlgasm wrote:It's a shame that so many people have the wrong impression of our skyline because they base their assumptions on the typical postcard view, which in many cases depict the city as dated, underwhelming, short and small.

Can anybody find a high resolution version of the other picture above? It would be awesome to use that as the "presentation picture" of St. Louis to be used on Wiki and other such sites.

wabash wrote:Clayton "Skyline" 1968:

Reminds me of Houston from the 60s:

Here's a pic I love, I swiped it from this forum a couple years ago. Apologies and credit to the owner.

(The hosting service cut off the right side with downtown and the arch. Good lord, can any recommend a good image hosting site? A couple years ago it was so easy, now it's a pain.)

^Any idea where that was taken from? Based on the angle, I'd have to think Deaconess hospital or somewhere close. The view fom my place is similar, except my view of downtown is blocked by the Park Plaza. That means this photo must have been taken from somewhere about a mile south of me, across the park.

I like this view better than mine.

stlgasm wrote:It's a shame that so many people have the wrong impression of our skyline because they base their assumptions on the typical postcard view, which in many cases depict the city as dated, underwhelming, short and small. The fact is, outside of Chicago and perhaps Detroit, St. Louis has by far the largest collection of pre-war high-rises outside of the CBD in the entire Midwest. There are no high-rise districts in Cleveland, Cincinnati, Milwaukee, much less Kansas City, Columbus or Indianapolis that come even close to the scale of Midtown, CWE, Skinker or Clayton. Even DeBaliviere Place as seen from Forest Park Parkway comprises one of the most urban cityscapes in the Midwest. Minneapolis- a much younger city than St. Louis- has plenty of new towers, but hardly any from the pre-war era outside of downtown. As a whole, St. Louis' central corridor is quite expansive. I think it's misunderstood and overlooked because we don't have any supertall skyscrapers. Even downtown, the size and density isn't visible from skyline shots because our building stock is short and squatty. Look at Downtown West-- it's a big, dense section of the city but almost completely hidden from view.

Looking at aerial shots like this, it's easy to see St. Louis' early ascent and then its abrupt free-fall. Very few tall buildings in the skyline (particularly east of Kingshighway) were built after the middle of the 20th century (except for a mini-boom of boxy buildings in the '80s). It's as if someone pushed pause in about 1970. You can imagine how new towers would've filled in the gaps had St. Louis continued to grow. I'd bet Forest Park would be surrounded by highrises, and the Central West End would be filled with tall, sleek modern towers. What could've been... Oh well, what we have now is still more impressive than 90% of cities in this country, and out-of-towners are the first ones to notice it.

Yeah, I think you and I touched on this in whatever thread we were talking about that Verizon commercial where the chick flies over in the helicopter. Although not as popular, downtown St. Louis's skyline arguably looks best actually looking at it from the south (facing north), as from that view you can see the full expanse of the downtown area's impressive collection of skyscrapers. Even if it means you have to sacrifice a head-on view of the arch.

Wow. And I was thinkng I had found a great pic from the southwest:

^ thanks rrb and masked for the suggestions and info. Didn't know about the fixed 800px width.

Pres—I believe your you're right.

I was on top of SLU med center on Grand (little portal on the green copper roof get you outside) Seems to be the same view. Actually, the parking garage by Doisy has the best views in town. There really should be high-rise apts and condos there to take advantage of the views. Being a med center, you would think that area would have a little more life.