urbanSTL

quincunx wrote:Mayor Slay tweets:

The city's Cultural Resources Office will not approve an application to demolition the Pevely complex.

SLU can appeal that decision to the Preservation Board.

Step one, check. Big stance of strong conviction by the Cultural Resources Office. SLU's a force many wouldn't go against (and haven't, in the past). Now, hopefully the Preservation Board follows suit and there's a room full of supporters to speak/stand on behalf of structural preservation.

If this "development plan" by SLU is thwarted, coupled with the Saucer outcry, it's a coup for the City's past and future. As more demolition plans are denied, the tides of change are building in politics as usual. The new standard will require an actual, well-defined, contextually-sensitive design plan -- not careless and causeless destruction, as is too often the case now.

What time should we be at the Preservation Board meeting on Nov 28?

Article in Post today about SLU's land banking. They refuse to speak on what their plans are.

http://www.stltoday.com/business/local/ ... 0017d.html

Alex Ihnen wrote:Right or wrong, 17th Ward Alderman Joe Roddy is the one who is likely best positioned to make SLU present a development plan for its holdings. No mention of him in the Post-Dispatch story of course. If the press actually covered how these things work, people might just get upset enough to do something about it.

^ I sense a forthcoming citizen's editorial...

In looking at the Preservation Board agenda for their November 28th meeting, it appears that SLU's appeal has been deferred to a future meeting at their request.

http://stlouis-mo.gov/government/depart ... r-2011.pdf

The optimist in me would say that SLU is reconsidering, but the realist in me thinks that they are just waiting for the initial opposition to fade.

keep your eyes open for fortuitous blazes. i don't imagine that Biondi is above breaking a few eggs for the "greater glory of god" or whatever it is the jesuits say.

Pevely to be Reviewed by Preservation Board on December 19th

http://www.landmarks-stl.org/news/pevel ... dec._19th/

RobbyD wrote:Odd to see a Post-Dispatch comment thread taking shape here...if anything the reality is SLU s campus has ended up in a deeply deteriorated urban space while largely competing against schools in non-post war like neighborhoods for kids who grew up in suburbia...

yep, SLU's campus was just plopped down one day in the middle of a deteriorated urban space. except, weren't they around midtown long before, say, all of mill-creek valley was razed? i don't recall hearing anything about SLU decrying the mass relocation of the inhabitants of the city's largest black neighborhood into housing projects instead of, say, working with the inhabitants to improve their neighborhood. do you?

RobbyD wrote:Not sure who slept with your dog urban...but clearly dirspect for a highly thought of institution and faith is the enlightened path towards solutions and improvement of st Louis...

oh, please. no less so than your blind defense of that institution and faith. i've been around the catholic church for many years -- jesuits in particular -- and the idea that it deserves some kind of sacred respect is beyond hilarious. Biondi is just some guy, one with a history of doing what he wants when he wants and, as many SLU students will attest, he has no interest in actual dialog (go read about how SLU took over the student newspaper and their lawsuit against Dr. Avis Meyer, for example). i'm sorry that my opinion offends you, but there are countless examples of crimes carried out by "men of the cloth", and numerous examples of unnecessary demolition by SLU around midtown. those are facts.

@NextStl tweeted an example of how new construction can work with the old facade. Beautiful.



Article here: http://dig-b.blogspot.com/2010/03/devel ... recap.html

That is a fantastic picture. I think that would be a very attractive result with the modern blocking on the ends of the building.

look what Chicago did with this former brewery
http://www.wbez.org/blog/lee-bey/2011-1 ... sent-94381

Nearly EVERYONE else has left midtown...SLU has remained and by all accounts thrived...is it perfect? Of course not...does of deserve credit for investing significant amounts of money into the city? Yes...does it need critique and improvement? Yes...does it deserve public assertions that it is no better than crime syndicates operating in this city? Not a chance....[/quote]

I would have a tough time going along with that comment considering that some of the cultural institutions stuck it out in Grand Center and its coming to life and will soon have its existing stock filled if the Hyatt comes through. I don't give SLU very much credit for Grand Center nor do they seem to support any housing stock that isn't on their campus. Very different from Wash U that has purchased housing stock immediatey off campus to support its facility and grad families.

RobbyD wrote:LOL...blind faith in the Catholic Church...? Hardly...respect for the honored and sometimes sacred in our community no matter the source? I will always fight for that...

ah, i see. well, i respect people who earn it.

whether its the procedure and pomp of our legitimate government or the sacred ritual of the Catholic, Jewish or any church (and I have good Muslim friends in Afghanistan with whom I have much respect) I respect it...

i respect your respect, but i think pomp and ritual are silly.

argue with the decisions and policies, fine...

but don't take issue with the people making the decisions? ridiculous.

but suggest that respected individuals within highly respected institutions are inherently predisposed to felony arson...

inherently? where did that come from. i don't trust that Biondi won't rationalize the unlawful destruction of Pevely based on some sense of moral superiority. to think that he would go set the fire himself is absurd, i agree. he would have someone else do it.

or unnecessarily mock words that mean something (eternity?) to millions or associate felonies with completely innocent people...

not mocking. just taking issue with Biondi's interpretation/enaction of those words. and apparently your definition of complete innocence is different than mine.

and I will vehemently object...

okay.

our city is in need of real solutions...

which are not precluded by anything you or i have said. this is a false conditional employed every time somebody gets offended. "unless you stop saying such things we can have no solutions."

Nearly EVERYONE else has left midtown...

see my earlier comment about mill creek valley. and as others have noted, it doesn't help that SLU keeps demolishing the neighborhoods around its campus.

SLU has remained and by all accounts thrived...is it perfect? Of course not...does of deserve credit for investing significant amounts of money into the city? Yes...does it need critique and improvement? Yes...

agreed.

does it deserve public assertions that it is no better than crime syndicates operating in this city? Not a chance....

which is why i made no such assertion. you're putting words in my mouth. SLU is a big place that employs lots of people. however, there are a handful of people that make the biggest decisions. Biondi is one of them.

So the cultural resource office is urging approval of demolition for the garage (a low-slung building set back off Grand past Motard) and the plant (which is directly west of the Pevely offices and pretty expansive). The office is urging preservation for the stack and the office building.

My take is that the plant connected to the office is what gives the Pevely Complex its sense of place and sense of history. More so than the smokestack, by my take. I feel like an equal effort should be taken to preserve both the plant and the office. Without the other, the first becomes just another classic St. Louis brick on an island.

The garage, I suppose, can be sacrificed since it sits so far off of the main road(s) and will be swallowed up by the SLU complex anyway. And whoever still owns the property just south of the smokestack -- hold strong! That building should be saved too, and if you sell to SLU, it most assuredly won't be. Find a tenant, make it even tougher on SLU!

Also, with the Imagine Academy (of Environmental Science and Math) right next door at Chouteau and Spring, the buildings' preservation and subsequent renovation would serve as a very hands-on opportunity to learn about structural reuse, applied sciences, preservation and design. Coincidentally, I would be curious to see if SLU supports this school or if it will try to snag that land/building in the near future too.