urbanSTL

^ Dang, that's unfortunate.  But it still sounds like you guys are gonna make the most of a bad situation.  Really curious about these other updates and how you can pull this off.   We need more guys like your crew around this city.

EssTeeEll wrote: ↑

Jun 28, 2021

^ Dang, that's unfortunate.  But it still sounds like you guys are gonna make the most of a bad situation.  Really curious about these other updates and how you can pull this off.   We need more guys like your crew around this city.

Well, what else can we really do besides make good out of a bad situation? What Terry did to the building was terrible. He wanted it gone for parking and there's proof of it. True demolition by neglect. Everyone on this forum knows all about that issue here in this city. It was rigged in a way where he overvalued the building in the original sale asking price to scare off potential buyers. Hell, he wants $4 million for the parking lot at 800 South 4th Street. The parking lot makes sense for new construction, but with that price plus building costs, it would be difficult, but not impossible, to build a new building there and make the numbers work. You'd have to fetch higher than average rents for the area to make the numbers work. 

Even then, you can't count on office space, so a risky bid to build housing would have to be made. Being so close to the highway, the sh*tty BP, the railroad bridges, and potentially having live music venues/bars on the first floor of the building makes this really difficult, but not impossible. Slash the cost of the parking lot in half, maybe even more than half, and the numbers can start to work for a mixed-use building with retail/restaurant space on the first floor, small office space on the second floor, and apartments on a third and fourth floor. Include a parking garage on the site too (like Chivvis/Steve Murphy envisioned in the mid to late 2000s) and you could have a winning combination. https://www.loopnet.com/Listing/800-S-4 ... /23033932/

But back to 744, we're being creative about this though. I'm continuing to research some options and feel like the compromise option is the best way to go. Whether or not my bosses agree remains to be seen. Whether or not the compromise is chosen, option 2 would still be unique in its own right and we'll make it as special as it can be.

$4M for 0.693 acres? Insane. I thought this city was in decline. The Assessor thinks it's worth $351k. Imagine if taxes were levied on what owners thought their property is worth.

chriss752 wrote: ↑

Jun 26, 2021

Perhaps I could figure out the cost of a compromise, which would be option 4. The compromise I have in mind is just rebuild the second story wall fronting 4th Street and side walls to show a roof pitch, but not put the roof back. Putting the roof back is what makes the cost go way up significantly since the walls would have to be engineered to hold the weight of the roof structure. What's happening now is definitely way different than what we wanted to do last year, but that's the way it goes thanks to Terry McDonald's neglect and the collapse prior to us buying the building. 

This sounds like a smart move, IMO.  You'd basically have something akin to Silky O'Sullivan's on Beale Street in Memphis (but without the braces):

If Tishaura wanted to do something popular and progressive she would push a use tax to punish surface parking lot owners in and around downtown. Would drive a stake right in the heart of operations like Terry's. Would probably be something developers would put some lobbying $$$ behind too.

Make Cardinals surface parking unprofitable and we would see a boom of development around the stadium. It's not like there is any shortage of room inside existing garages. Hell, one big garage at 601 4th would probably be enough to consolidate most of everything south of 64.

I'm sure filling it in makes the reuse easier/more affordable, but the exposed stone was so beautiful. it's a shame it couldn't have been transformed into a sunken venue of some sort.

urban_dilettante wrote:I'm sure filling it in makes the reuse easier/more affordable, but the exposed stone was so beautiful. it's a shame it couldn't have been transformed into a sunken venue of some sort.

Would’ve been a nice option, but the ADA requirements would’ve made it a bit hard to do. The space will still be unique and cool, at least in my view. I’ll post more later

^Glad to see you making progress on this. Good luck!

As promised, here's a little bit more about the future of the shell at 744 South 4th Street.

We looked into my 4th option idea and determined that it is not feasible without deconstructing the walls and buying brand new brick, which significantly increases the cost. So, what the plan is "option 2" which, as I explained previously, is to cap the building as-is with some enhancements to keep all the walls level and what not. What can be expected is along the lines of this (and subject to change as ideas morph into final plans)...

• The south wall, up against the garage, will be trimmed down to be at the roofline of the garage. That wall is the most worrisome right now as it is not supported above the garage's roofline and in the worst shape. This will be capped.
• The west wall, fronting 4th, will see bricks relaid up to where the second floor windowsills were. This will be capped with a limestone-like material to prevent the bricks from deteriorating. 
• The north wall, leaning up against Nephews Grill, will be tuck pointed but remain as-is as it's supported and not in too bad of shape. It's dirty though, but that's really the only negative there. In fact, based on how the collapse went and clean up, this side of the building was built the best and experienced the least amount of damage to the walls and most of the second floor structure was still there holding up the former roof. But it was too far gone to save that half.
• The remnants of the east wall will be trimmed to remove any jagged bricks. Loose bricks will be relaid and the old doors to the basements will be filled in. Tuckpointing will also take place to just keep it from going loose. Again, this side will be capped to prevent further deterioration of the bricks.
• All remaining loose wood and metal will be carefully removed from the walls.
• The dirt/mud will be pressed down a bit and covered with gravel and then concrete. This will also help fill in the holes underneath the south wall where stone once stood. The concrete will also make the floor level with the street and garage, so no stairs will be required to get into the shell.
• The historic double doors and transom facing 4th Street will be replicated along with creating new double doors on either side of the middle door (replacing the old doors added in the 50s/60s or so). The glass blocks are a challenge, but will more than likely remain. There are a few that are broken though and we don't know how we're going to replace them/fill them in.

The garage parcel (750) and 744 have been merged, so they're now one parcel. The shell at 744 will become additional space off of the garage and play a role with the plans there (which we aren't ready to announce yet). For 744 though, the working plans are to string lights inside of the shell, build a bar along the south wall, and do some landscaping inside the shell and out into the back lot to create a "beer garden" style thing. Highway decibels back there range, presently, from 66 to 55 decibels. Our plans should reduce that a little bit more. Right now though, you can talk to one another back on the back lot without having to raise your voice much, so that's a benefit. Also, we do want to include space for two food trucks to park at the back of the back lot of 744. 

I told my boss that the white concrete on the walls in the building should be painted black (or a very dark gray) to juxtapose with the exposed red brick. He wasn't opposed to that. Same with maybe trying to run LED lights up to highlight the old second floor fire places. I also think it would be cool to preserve the two windows at the northeast corner of the shell.

We believe that the shell will be a monument of sorts to those who demolish buildings by neglect and to the people who try and make the best out of a terrible situation. I am personally saddened that we won't be able to rebuild the facade fronting 4th Street and put a roof on the place, but maybe later on down the line when property values are higher, I'll pursue a true reconstruction project here. For now though, we're doing what we can.

The one thing that we are still worried about though is whether or not the engineers will say it's all good to do our idea. It's such a simple idea, but there's a lot of complex things in it that worry us. What we don't want to hear is, "The walls are too weak for your idea. Bring it all down". We'll know within a month or two what the decision is. Fingers crossed.

I do think something akin to Shady Jack's or Silky's would be a really cool addition.  Really interesting bones, and as much as it pains me to say it, I think the graffiti would add some character rather than washing away what is really kind of a gritty area of the city.

Couldn’t get a better picture, but it appeared the abandoned trestle connecting to the MacArthur Bridge was having some work done on my way home from work today. Possibly being demolished? Anyone know anything?


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CG91 wrote: ↑

Jul 08, 2021

Couldn’t get a better picture, but it appeared the abandoned trestle connecting to the MacArthur Bridge was having some work done on my way home from work today. Possibly being demolished? Anyone know anything?

The TRRA has been in communication with us since some of our properties border the train bridge. They're supposed to remove whatever concrete is left (what you see here) and remove the slats that once held up the road deck on the Municipal Bridge. Since the bridge is old, they want to try and reduce as much weight on the piers as possible. The truss bridges over Broadway will also be replaced. It's going to be a decent project, but nothing that changes the appearance of the bridge much. They promised that if any damage is caused to our property while they conduct the work, they'll fix it and cover the costs.

sc4mayor wrote: ↑

Jul 08, 2021

^ I can't make out a whole lot in that picture...but if they're working on the abandoned roadway deck they're probably removing the old girders.  The actual deck has been gone since maybe 2014 on the bridge itself...not sure about the Missouri approaches.

The most recent USGS satellite images show hollow girders over 6th Street and some more to the east of that towards the bridge.

There's still a little bit of concrete between Broadway and 6th. They were jack hammering it yesterday and a little bit today.

Where exactlydid the bridge drop automobile traffic off in Illinois back in the day?

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Miss Shell wrote: ↑

Jul 08, 2021

Where exactlydid the bridge drop automobile traffic off in Illinois back in the day?

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10th St and Piggott Ave was the east end of the road portion of the bridge. It's close to the 13th St/Tudor Ave exit off the current interstate.

A large portion of the eastern approach including where it meets the ground is still there on google earth.

^There's a video on YouTube, as a matter of fact.

Tuckpointing work has started on 744 South 4th Street and we applied for our building permit for the garage a few weeks ago. 

As I watched the HR Derby in Denver, I noticed there are still a lot of surface parking lots around Coors Field. If a hot city like Denver can’t develop those lots, it’s hard to see StL doing it

Difference being that Coors is on the northern edge of Denver’s downtown. So a lot of the lots north and west of the stadium are next to industrial. Walking to the HRD and ASG, and then back to my hotel, while there were some parking lots all of the bars and restaurants were packed. And food trucks posted up in the lots. I didn’t notice the lots as much as I did all of the new construction happening.

^And Busch is on the southern edge of downtown nearly all of the lots replaced former industrial and railroad structures. (Warehouses, freight houses, factories.) If we had the same level of construction that might make a great many things better, but we have so much to convert first since historically we were so much bigger than Denver. (And right now we are spectacularly not growing.)

I'm back to provide a nice update on the progress made on 744.

I'm happy to say that the hardest, and most worrying, part of repurposing 744 South 4th Street is complete. Our bricklaying crew took down the scaffolding this morning and cleaned the new bricks to reveal the new front facade. With this, the street-wall is retained. However, a roof will not be added back and the south wall will not be rebuilt. However, the appearance of the shell will still change over the next few weeks. Additional enhancements include

• New windows: Yes, the "second floor" windows will have glass installed and the glass blocks on the first floor will be removed for normal looking windows. The transom in the middle of the first floor will also make a return.
• New doors: The historic double doors will be replicated and brought back along with the two side doors. 
• Paint: This is one of the things we're still looking at and talking about. We either plan to paint the new red bricks a tan/white color (as seen in the first picture) or paint the yellow bricks on the first floor to match the new red brick. This type of paint will not be like the red paint on Nephews (which closed by the way). This will be a much more appropriate red brick paint. I actually prefer that option, but we'll see what our consultant says.
• The back wall remnants will be shored up and cleaned up to prevent any further collapse, making this a safe and clean shell.

Additional work still has to be done including pouring a new concrete pad inside the shell and outback, running and electric and water lines to the shell, and putting up a nice wooden fence in the back. But overall, we're satisfied with what we have so far.






With the front wall rebuilt, the street wall is maintained. Just without the south wall and pitched roof, the block visibly has less volume. 





Taking pictures of old building detailing does help people replicate what was lost. Last year, a few months before the collapse, I took my zoom lens and my good camera and took up close pictures of the cornice and second floor windows. These pictures were printed out and given to the bricklayers who then went and did a spot-on replication of the lost cornice. Only difference is the new bricks and slightly closer spaces. But if you're not that much into detailing, it's a spot-on match. 





Additional area updates...

• A new owner should be taking over the Beale on Broadway property soon.
• Nephews Grill at 740 and 742 South 4th Street apparently closed. They haven't been open for several weeks now and Google lists them as "temporarily closed". I'd imagine it's permanent since they opened a location in Tempe Arizona. But we'll see. We're under contract to buy those buildings and would like them vacant when we take them over so we can perform much needed interior and exterior alterations.
• Two windows were removed from 754 South 4th Street after stray bullets shot them out. They'll be put back in soon. Plans there have changed a little bit since last year and so has the cost. Construction should start on that in the next few months.
• The 750 South 4th Street Garage is currently a staging area for all materials needed for 744. After 744 is mostly complete, work should begin at the garage. The building currently has electric and security cameras have been installed. The interior camera is positioned in a way where we can make a time-lapse of interior alterations once work starts.
• The buyer for Chouteau's Landing, different from the Apted Brothers, seems like they'll be walking away. A difficult property owner and minimal to no communication by the buyer is not the type of signal you want to see from someone like that.
• Speaking of Chouteau's Landing, Terry McDonald is presently demolishing the old M.A. Bell Building, which burned in December 2019. The good bricks are being salvaged and trucked off to God knows where.
• The TRRA has been removing the old road deck and trusses from the Municipal/MacArthur Bridge. This will soon take place over Broadway and 4th and continue over our garden on the 900 Block of South 4th Street. This is the nail in the coffin for the old road deck and now requires Great Rivers Greenway to consider a different path when it comes to the Brickline.
• I sent out an email this morning to Alderman Jack Coatar about the next steps we need to take to replace some sidewalks get those new super bright LED streetlights and light strips in our part of Downtown. We believe that the new streetlights will help eliminate the shadowy places and make people feel safer. The new sidewalk in question would be the 700 block from the Meineke Tire Center to Gratiot. I want to make sure this sidewalk includes some tree boxes so we can plant Dogwoods or other types of trees to add some shape and beautify this area. Curb bump-outs are also being pushed at this block. Later on, I'd like to see raised cross walks but for now, we can take other measures to make it feel safer, and look better, down there.
• Regarding sidewalks, a similar push for new sidewalks between Cerre and Gratiot will be made once Beale is taken care of. If you've walked that stretch you know how the sidewalk just ends and it becomes a dirt/muddy mess.

Holy crap, Chris, you and your friends, cohorts, and associated local masons have worked nothing short of a minor miracle there. If this is the second then one more of these and someone should get a fat non-denominational interfaith UrbanSTL Preservation sainthood. Well done to you and everyone working with you. I wish you all every success in this project.

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