urbanSTL

On the northeast corner will it stop short of Maggie O'Brien's? If so, they should start rebranding themselves as a soccer bar ASAP.

Does anybody think they might retain some of the current underpass to use as a pedestrian tunnel under Market? There is a hint of that at the left edge of the smaller picture above.

I think it'd be pretty darn easy for a bar with the name Maggie O'Brien's to rebrand as a soccer bar. .

Past renderings showed that Maggie O'Briens would be very near the stadium. I'm guessing that's going to still be the case. 

^The trick to being a soccer bar is finding bartenders willing to work at 6 am on Saturdays and Sundays for games in Europe. 

If there is any sort of actual soccer village that pops up around the stadium, you can rest assured in knowing that some bar is going to serve that market. 

I'd be highly surprised if there aren't bars in St. Louis that do that very thing already.

Oh there are a few. Amsterdam Tavern is one of my semi-regular haunts. But it will be interesting to see if the existing businesses try to get ahead of the game before whoever moves into the new development.

I think, like you said, that Maggie O'Brien's would be wise to become a soccer bar. I'm sure other businesses will try to adapt, too. 

But the reality is that much of that area is a swath of surface lots. Hopefully that changes with a stadium. 

https://www.kmov.com/news/mls-team-bidd ... 51671.html

Adding this here from the Union Station Thread and discussion around the Ferris Wheel. 

Can't wait to ride the levitating pool noodle!

Interesting; I had assumed that the field faced north - south. 

framer wrote: Interesting; I had assumed that the field faced north - south. 

It could be, I'm just matching the garage in the rendering to the drury garage location. 

That'd be incredible. 

If the aerial looked like that, I'd also want to see a wall of buildings down S 20th, between Drury and Maggie O'Brien's. And, if possible, on the other side of the stadium as well. I'd enjoy a super dense project. 

A tower to anchor the western end of the Gateway Mall would be brilliant, as would the "future development" on the other side of the mall.

Finally, you might have some real interaction between Market/Chestnut and the green space. Hopefully, in the future, we can see the same happen further east. Chriss mentioned Kiener West disappearing in the future, and hopefully the city would demand something that would truly engage the mall. 

 

Thanks Dmelsh.  I'm going run with the following because I think a few others have had this thought already...  

I would take the highlighted tower/development/Gateway mall area to the north, drop the Gateway Mall portion, bundle it as one property and let Soccer Village happen.  We can all spend the next several years talking about SV.  However, I would condition any public land sale and TIF like incentive contigent on 21st street extending to Market to break up the super block.  Maybe part of the development includes another cheesy competing entertainment component or maybe it is another swipe at a stand alone corporate campus with the tower situated in such a way to bookend the west end of Gateway & the C suite has killer views of the Arch (Think of when the next Centene happens).    

The other thought, it would be nice to re-align metrolink in such a way you could at least relocate metrolink station to be on the west side Union Station instead of the east side.  That would essentially give MLS team, Blues, and Cardinals each a metrolink stop at their door step and give better or percieved better access to West Downtown/future development around the stadium.

dredger wrote: I would take the highlighted tower/development/Gateway mall area to the north, drop the Gateway Mall portion, bundle it as one property and let Soccer Village happen.  We can all spend the next several years talking about SV.  However, I would condition any public land sale and TIF like incentive contigent on 21st street extending to Market to break up the super block.  

Please, no more villages.  The priority here should be to use the activity and spending attracted by stadium events to rejuvenate Union Station as much as possible.  Any new retail construction should be limited to the 3-block stretch of 20th Street between Maggie O's, Drury Inn and the Wheel.  Also, I believe there are still a couple of vacant retail spaces along the 20th Street side of Union Station that need to be filled. 

This is a challenging site, with a lot of potential planning pitfalls, but also some unique opportunities.  I will be very interested to see how they are resolved.  

A few things to keep in mind:

1.  There is a 30 to 40 foot existing grade difference between the east and west elevations of the stadium, and the lower grade extends around the west side, a couple blocks to the south, and under Market Street to the north of the stadium as well.  The playing field, er... pitch, will be at or below this lower grade elevation, i.e. at least 30' lower than the surface of 20th Street.  There won't be a better opportunity anywhere downtown to bury and cover a ton of parking, as it is mostly already excavated.  This could reduce the sea of parking north and south of Union Station, provide ample parking for both developments and future development to the north and south, as well as free up a lot of space for future entertainment phases, aquarium expansion, a water park, etc. on the Station property itself.

2.  This stretch of Market St. along the north side of the stadium is essentially a 6 lane highway overpass, but one which slopes downward significantly from west to east.  That slope, and the large, uninviting space underneath, is going to be difficult to incorporate into the stadium.  Ideally, that space can be enclosed, and the stadium itself built up to and under Market Street, with the north stadium entries on the NORTH side of Market Street.  I think that would make for a more seamless transition between a wider, more appealing sidewalk along the south side of Market, alongside a terraced concession plaza / patio along the north side of the stadium - within the stadium confines - similar to Ford Plaza (or whatever it is called) past center field at Busch.

3.  This is a small stadium (22k capacity) and only ~20 home games a year, so not even 10% of the annual visitors to Busch Stadium.  Maybe this stadium will be able to attract another dozen or so big events annually, but what about the other 333 days a year?  By itself, there isn't enough traffic to fill another new entertainment / dining district, and obviously there isn't much else to attract people to this area.  A successful Soccer Pitch Village district would need all the game and event activity from the stadium AND the hundreds of thousands of visitors to a greatly-rejuvenated Union Station, so I think the focus for the city should be on how to optimize this plan to achieve the latter, first.  

Completely agree that it would be cool to preserve the buildings on Market, have an entry plaza between them. It would be a lot more like early 1900s stadiums that were built into the urban fabric however the could fit. Unfortunately the powers that be don't really have the creativity or interest in the quirky. 

aprice wrote: Completely agree that it would be cool to preserve the buildings on Market, have an entry plaza between them. It would be a lot more like early 1900s stadiums that were built into the urban fabric however the could fit. Unfortunately the powers that be don't really have the creativity or interest in the quirky. 

You mean along 20th Street?  There are only two buildings along Market in this area besides Union Station: Maggie O'Brien's and the 1-story Police Retirement System office.  Both buildings are about as ugly as they come. 

I hope something can be worked out with Maggie O'Brien's to either move across the street into the Union Station headhouse or invest a bit on the exterior of their existing building, because right now it is just a drab, gray box with a porch, a covered patio and a few awnings.

STLEnginerd wrote: In general I think the layout above is fairly close to the vision they are working to.  Some thoughts and ideas though.

3) I really don't see a need to expand the gateway mall.  I would hope that any new land would be developed.  The bookend tower is a no brainer, though what to anchor there is a question.  Personally I always liked the idea of it being the central government for the combined city county, Not for practical reasons, more for the sake of symmetry.  But it would be hard to argue against a major corporate anchor or a luxury residential as long as it didn't have to come with piles of tax givaways on top of being in what SHOULD be one of the most attractive lots to develop in the whole city.

4)  Sadly I strongly suspect the area south of Clark will most likely be surface lots.  Hope to be wrong but...

5) I agree that the new stadium will not support a bar mall like ball park village but i think it can attract interest in living in Downtown west.  I hope they focus on launching construct of several very achievable midrise (4-7 story) residential developments, with a moderate amounts of street fronting retail.  With the exception of that lot at the end of the mall which really ought to be something very special.

6)  22nd street should be reopened through to Olive and beyond.  ideally I would like to see additional grid repair but in addition to connecting Clark through to the station reconnecting 22nd through to the north is almost the least you could ask for in that regard.

7) Might as well start playing with an idea of what to do with the FBI building while you are at it.  Also the small industrial building south of Drury Hotel is another opportunity for redevelopment.  Plus all the businesses along Clark.  Not trying to push good businesses out of the city, but the land value there will almost certainly increase for alternate uses.

Agree pretty much with all of it,  The one item I don't agree with is that it is way to early to spend millions for metrolink along market when the city could use those dollars to re-introduce street grids, get Grand & FPP to at grade intersection and strengthen some N-S transit corridors by at least adding BRT on Grand or Jeff, etc.  I would rather see some money to maybe adjust metrolink alignment just enough so that the current station on east side of Union Station goes on the west side.

One thing that I would add is that it is going to decades to redevelop west downtown.  So the priority in my mind is get the street grid back in place & kill any notion of extending the gatemay mall, develop north side of market as priority, get FBI to NGA, and south of Clark being surface parking lots is going to be the reality for a decade after the stadium built..  

I would consider tax incentives worth a gateway mall bookend tower for Wells Fargo Securities, or a Enterprise/National or heck, a Express Scripts/Cigna if doesn't take away the chance at getting an anchor tenant for ATT buildings.   Get the team & stadium built, get an anchor tenant for ATT building and then look it will take to bookend the current gateway mall.



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Sounds like this is a done deal.

"Hearing from a few different sources that MLS coming to St. Louis is a done deal and that the announcement will be made during MLS All-Star Weekend."



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dmelsh wrote: Sounds like this is a done deal.

"Hearing from a few different sources that MLS coming to St. Louis is a done deal and that the announcement will be made during MLS All-Star Weekend."



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Do we trust this source?

Timing makes sense though. There was an article a day or two ago that said "Most folks think it’s all but a sure thing that St. Louis will be selected for an MLS team. We may hear an announcement at the end of July or the end of August at the latest. A sponsor for the stadium and one for the team is still being negotiated."

A guy I have been talking to in Sac that is a season ticket holder there said he got an email recently that made it sound like would be announced by August also. So timing lines up for both teams for all the things coming out.

pattimagee wrote:Anyone want to guess which rectangle the stadium is going in? Quite an interesting map here...

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">St. Louis is embarking on a major project to re-establish the street grid and return excess highway ramp infrastructure to productive use around Jefferson, I-64, &amp; 20th St. Board Bill authorizing a funding agreement for $50M of work moved through committee today. 1/2 <a href="https://t.co/jX4jZnFSJB">pic.twitter.co ... </p>&mdash; Scott Ogilvie (@ScottOgilvieSTL) <a href=" 25, 2019</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

^ tweet didn’t link so here it is again.




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My guess would be the rectangle at the Northeast corner of 22nd and Clark.

I agree with Chris. I could see them altering this plan slightly though in regard to 21st street - I could see 21st essentially going away. But at least Clark would still likely connect to both 22nd and 20th in that scenario.