urbanSTL

stldotage wrote:

addxb2 wrote: ↑

1:44 PM - Mar 25

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I asked Google AI to create some interesting architecture here in place of the garages (and told it the site was close to the Gateway Arch) and this is what it came up with:

I meant this is torcher…..


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Even just a facade upgrade on those buildings would be a massive improvement. Im sure some of you would disagree, but I wouldn't even mind seeing billboards or electronic signs placed on them. Then the city could also make some more money off them.

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PlatinumBlues wrote:

stldotage wrote:

addxb2 wrote: ↑

1:44 PM - Mar 25

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I asked Google AI to create some interesting architecture here in place of the garages (and told it the site was close to the Gateway Arch) and this is what it came up with:

I meant this is torcher…..


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That didn’t help your meaning. What do you mean?

StlAlex wrote: ↑

9:54 PM - Mar 25

Even just a facade upgrade on those buildings would be a massive improvement. Im sure some of you would disagree, but I wouldn't even mind seeing billboards or electronic signs placed on them. Then the city could also make some more money off them.

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Agree. There should be standards for the signage. I would like something more like the "shot on iPhone" ad on the side of Enterprise and less like "Jungle Law!" If it currently isn't allow the city could give them a special five year waiver where they could use the funds accrued for future facade renewal and financial carrots to lure retail tenants

StlAlex wrote: ↑

9:54 PM - Mar 25

Even just a facade upgrade on those buildings would be a massive improvement. Im sure some of you would disagree, but I wouldn't even mind seeing billboards or electronic signs placed on them. Then the city could also make some more money off them.

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Again, who do we annoy about doing something, anything, to improve the look of these? Even just painting every other concrete band would go a long way.

who do we annoy 
The owners of the buildings?

Tell Bob Clark to stop preventing the city on closing on it and drop his appeal of the judges price

Drop his home address, maybe we can bang some drums outside around 3am

Private owners of property, as always, the worst advocates for private ownership of property.

In a serious country, the city would just be able to seize the property. But we live in a country where even the lowest level of government is beholden to the local shitstain who contributes nothing but holds power for some reason.

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TheWayoftheArch_V2.0 wrote: ↑

5:42 PM - Mar 30

dbInSouthCity wrote: ↑

7:58 PM - Mar 29

Tell Bob Clark to stop preventing the city on closing on it and drop his appeal of the judges price

Why is Clayco's CEO appealing the ED price? 

One of his firms has a lien for some work

kg2024 wrote: ↑

2:48 PM - Mar 24

GoHarvOrGoHome wrote: ↑

2:02 PM - Mar 24

Are they planning to preserve 224 N 7th? It's a shame Gitto's couldn't be saved, the interior was gorgeous.

Their onus for leaving was a pipe bursting during COVID, so unfortunately I doubt it's in good shape. Sad because there aren't many old school bars and restaurants left downtown

There's no indication the Gill Building is in any danger. It's owned separately from the rest of the block and was renovated in 2010 so should be in decent shape. It is also listed on the NRHP since 2009. Hopefully it is fully structurally independent of the parking garage which it abuts and there's not issues when it is removed.

Credit goes to the St. Louis Pictures of the Past Facebook group for matching this 1937 photo of the historic building at 224 N. 7th St., near the northwest corner of the parking garage.



It may be a better idea to postpone demolition to allow the future developer to decide which parts of the garage and Charlie Gitto’s should be saved or demolished.

resurrectus wrote:

kg2024 wrote: ↑

2:48 PM - Mar 24

GoHarvOrGoHome wrote: ↑

2:02 PM - Mar 24

Are they planning to preserve 224 N 7th? It's a shame Gitto's couldn't be saved, the interior was gorgeous.

Their onus for leaving was a pipe bursting during COVID, so unfortunately I doubt it's in good shape. Sad because there aren't many old school bars and restaurants left downtown

There's no indication the Gill Building is in any danger. It's owned separately from the rest of the block and was renovated in 2010 so should be in decent shape. It is also listed on the NRHP since 2009. Hopefully it is fully structurally independent of the parking garage which it abuts and there's not issues when it is removed.

Credit goes to the St. Louis Pictures of the Past Facebook group for matching this 1937 photo of the historic building at 224 N. 7th St., near the northwest corner of the parking garage.



It may be a better idea to postpone demolition to allow the future developer to decide which parts of the garage and Charlie Gitto’s should be saved or demolished.

All redevelopment efforts for downtown St. Louis should go towards rebuilding what has been lost like what’s pictured in the top image. In the coming era of AI and automated robotics, it should not be that hard to rebuild these buildings.

At this point, everybody knows that was a better version of downtown St. Louis and the urban renewal efforts to tear it down was a terrible decision. The era of high rise office buildings is pretty much over for cities like St. Louis anyways so the focus should be on creating a beautiful, vibrant, and charming downtown full of these 4-5 story gems.

STLcommenter wrote:

resurrectus wrote:

kg2024 wrote: ↑

2:48 PM - Mar 24

There's no indication the Gill Building is in any danger. It's owned separately from the rest of the block and was renovated in 2010 so should be in decent shape. It is also listed on the NRHP since 2009. Hopefully it is fully structurally independent of the parking garage which it abuts and there's not issues when it is removed.

Credit goes to the St. Louis Pictures of the Past Facebook group for matching this 1937 photo of the historic building at 224 N. 7th St., near the northwest corner of the parking garage.



It may be a better idea to postpone demolition to allow the future developer to decide which parts of the garage and Charlie Gitto’s should be saved or demolished.

All redevelopment efforts for downtown St. Louis should go towards rebuilding what has been lost like what’s pictured in the top image. In the coming era of AI and automated robotics, it should not be that hard to rebuild these buildings.

At this point, everybody knows that was a better version of downtown St. Louis and the urban renewal efforts to tear it down was a terrible decision. The era of high rise office buildings is pretty much over for cities like St. Louis anyways so the focus should be on creating a beautiful, vibrant, and charming downtown full of these 4-5 story gems.

Actually agreed.

StL was better (and it’s best neighborhoods today) when built at this scale

Embrace the old American city and European built environment


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STLcommenter wrote: ↑

9:25 PM - 22 days ago

resurrectus wrote:

kg2024 wrote: ↑

2:48 PM - Mar 24

There's no indication the Gill Building is in any danger. It's owned separately from the rest of the block and was renovated in 2010 so should be in decent shape. It is also listed on the NRHP since 2009. Hopefully it is fully structurally independent of the parking garage which it abuts and there's not issues when it is removed.

Credit goes to the St. Louis Pictures of the Past Facebook group for matching this 1937 photo of the historic building at 224 N. 7th St., near the northwest corner of the parking garage.



It may be a better idea to postpone demolition to allow the future developer to decide which parts of the garage and Charlie Gitto’s should be saved or demolished.

All redevelopment efforts for downtown St. Louis should go towards rebuilding what has been lost like what’s pictured in the top image. In the coming era of AI and automated robotics, it should not be that hard to rebuild these buildings.

At this point, everybody knows that was a better version of downtown St. Louis and the urban renewal efforts to tear it down was a terrible decision. The era of high rise office buildings is pretty much over for cities like St. Louis anyways so the focus should be on creating a beautiful, vibrant, and charming downtown full of these 4-5 story gems.

Couldn't agree more just like Dresden after WW2

Agree, but we don't need repeat historic infill. 

It would be smart to focus on well-designed low-rise and mid-rise infill. Could be heavily incentivized to encourage small and mid-sized developers to build. I would love to see bridge grant funding for energy-efficient builds (solar, high r-value, passivhaus architecture that could supply energy back to the grid). 

Those builds would probably range at $400 - $600 a sq ft, so I don't think current rents would support it. 

dylank wrote:Agree, but we don't need repeat historic infill. 

It would be smart to focus on well-designed low-rise and mid-rise infill. Could be heavily incentivized to encourage small and mid-sized developers to build. I would love to see bridge grant funding for energy-efficient builds (solar, high r-value, passivhaus architecture that could supply energy back to the grid). 

Those builds would probably range at $400 - $600 a sq ft, so I don't think current rents would support it. 

It definitely doesn’t all have to be historic. The best cities have a great mix of styles. But I would love to see an effort to rebuild some of these buildings as they originally were. It would be a great opportunity to revive civic pride and show St. Louis can still build great architecture

stlgasm wrote: ↑

3:02 PM - 21 days ago

I'd love to see some rowhouse infill on vacant lots on the periphery of downtown, a la Philly.  Center City Philadelphia seamlessly connects to outer neighborhoods because its dense with walkable human-scale development. There are so many sites begging it.  And it would offer something different to the downtown market that is currently almost non-existent. 

Design Downtown already recommended this. Unfortunately, in typical St. Louis fashion there has been no movement in actually implementing that plan. 

I agree, fix as many historic buildings as we can, keep our history alive. However, I've always thought it looks so cool how the historic brick buildings contrast with new modern glass towers. I think we can still build residential or mixed use towers, but agree, the days highrise office towers could be sparse at best here & in most cities that are not considered mega-cties ie.. LA, NY, Chicago, etc. 

stlgasm wrote: ↑

3:02 PM - 21 days ago

I'd love to see some rowhouse infill on vacant lots on the periphery of downtown, a la Philly.  Center City Philadelphia seamlessly connects to outer neighborhoods because its dense with walkable human-scale development. There are so many sites begging it.  And it would offer something different to the downtown market that is currently almost non-existent. 

A great relatively nearby example in action is the city of Des Moines, IA. They're experiencing rapid infill construction actively in their urban core. That is a city that is going all-in on townhouse and mid-rise infill around the downtown area. St Louis could have this variety of infill easily... I mean.. we'd want to outline a form-based code obviously.. to make it "feel" right for St Louis. But this is the model right here. I highly recommend going up there, walking around these areas and seeing them in their context. Architectural taste aside...it's pretty damn impressive what is happening.

SRQ2STL wrote: ↑

8:42 PM - 21 days ago

stlgasm wrote: ↑

3:02 PM - 21 days ago

I'd love to see some rowhouse infill on vacant lots on the periphery of downtown, a la Philly.  Center City Philadelphia seamlessly connects to outer neighborhoods because its dense with walkable human-scale development. There are so many sites begging it.  And it would offer something different to the downtown market that is currently almost non-existent. 

A great relatively nearby example in action is the city of Des Moines, IA. They're experiencing rapid infill construction actively in their urban core. That is a city that is going all-in on townhouse and mid-rise infill around the downtown area. St Louis could have this variety of infill easily... I mean.. we'd want to outline a form-based code obviously.. to make it "feel" right for St Louis. But this is the model right here. I highly recommend going up there, walking around these areas and seeing them in their context. Architectural taste aside...it's pretty damn impressive what is happening.

It's very odd that no developers have thought of this. Literally every city in the country is doing this. Connecting activity nodes with missing middle. St. Louis could create some really good density and activity between Downtown and Grand Center with some thoughtful infill. It's really a no brainer. 

gone corporate wrote: ↑

9:58 PM - 21 days ago

@SRQ2STL This belongs in Downtown South, between Busch Stadium and Soulard. It's begging and pleading to turn from parking lots into a residential neighborhood. Also, if it could be a hip place to live for white collar workers 23-39, we'd have a sustainable Downtown workforce that could fill a few towers. Heck, you get that so close to Downtown, and you could run a streetcar up 4th and down Broadway, turning around at Choteau. 

We should build these between Busch and Soulard.