urbanSTL

Brickandmortar,some time back StlUrbanWorkshop (Grover) wrote about a possible metrolink station at Sarah next to CORTEX. Either Boyle or Sarah would allow decent access to the grove. That'd be really exciting. I'd love an update on that as well.

I'm very happy to see parking lots replaced by tall buildings. I have a shriner uncle that lives in Festus and he's actually excited about this, so this is certainly a good thing. Maybe there will be a lot of FezHeads walking around the Grove soon.

I'm still curious to know street boundaries for the CORTEX district though. It seems like a pretty loose term to me.

The new renderings look great. Very proud looking building.

While I'm glad to think this'll provide more encouragement for the Grove, I'm much more excited for what it could mean to CORTeX as a going concern. While the end goal is the creation of a district of clustered companies, having a specialty hospital relocate from the County to the City, and within this area, shows confidence in the region's strengths in the medical and biotech industries. This is further strength to our ability to attract new companies to the region.

CORTeX can already claim two hospitals for children; this will make it 3, and a grand looking third at that. Add in the three general hospitals, the two medical schools, the College of Pharmacy, a few publicly traded companies, incubators, and multiple new research facilities, and it sounds all the better. Plus, having this hospital being built so close to the highway gives further credence to the talents of the region in medical sciences to visitors of the city. While grand on its own, having it look like the other new buildings (CORTeX Building, Solae HQ) also demonstrates unity in our approach to proactively growing the business cluster.

Really exciting times. And considering the costs associated with in (in conjunction to the decrease in the Shriners' endowed monies as of late), StL's hospital being selected for the allocation of these monies by the Shriners' national organization should be seen with regional pride.

Perhaps this and another project can get the apartments and other housing started in Forest Park Southeast.

^ Man, if I had the money in hand, I'd buy up a few spots over in the Grove and turn them into a boutique long-term hotel. Target market: families of patients at BJC, SLU Med / Firmin Desloge, even County hospitals. If you have a nationally-recognized children's hospital, specializing in burn trauma, you'll have parents who want to be near proximate to a neighborhood seeking revitalization.

Further: Shriners' Hospital and such a hotel concept would work perfectly together. BJC already has that one hotel at Forest Park Parkway & Euclid, and SLU has a Ronald McDonald house. However, the idea still qualifies on a boutique basis, especially for families with children. Drury Hotel already is thinking of tower hotels nearby for hospital guests; why not take empty houses in FPSE north of Manchester & retrofit them for patient families and physical rehab? Best practice: focused on child patients. Put the right business plan together, and you've got a good income and a revitalized Grove.

If any of you run with this idea, make sure to give me the credit for concept.

^ Well, WU has a long-term patient family facility at Clayton and Taylor (Barnes Lodge, southwest corner) and I think that the American Cancer Society has overnight facilities on Lindell as well. When Drury was considering(still considering? who knows) the hotel they were also exploring exactly what you're suggesting.

That's disappointing. At least the site is a well maintained parking lot and not a gravel hole in the ground...I'm looking at you West Pine/Euclid!

I hope it's still at least 2-3 stories and not a single-story spread out over the lot.

I'm not sure there's a real conspiracy here, but it was strange to read that the current hospital at times has one or two patients. If true, why would they ever consider building a new hospital?

Good news I suppose even though 12 beds sounds really small. It's a start and hopefully they can expand in the near future. Were there any renderings in the article?

Assuming building on the same site, I hope they still go 4 stories or so and leave room for another building(s) on that block (4400 Clayton Ave).

^ don't think so - the Euclid stop will still be closer - or perhaps equidistant if Shrine is built at east end of 4400 block.

A Biz Journal article today notes that the Shriners submitted Missouri's second-largest "Certificate of Need" with the Missouri Health Facilities Review Committee in 2012.
Source: http://www.bizjournals.com/stlouis/news ... -with.html

The article notes that, yes, this is for the smaller, 12-bed facility rather than the original 40-bed hospital.

Also, it states the Shriners plan to break ground in April 2013, with the hospital up and running by November 2014.

Remind me, 4400 Clayton is currently a surface parking lot, right? $47M investment in the city is great, even if it is down from the originally proposed $170M. It'll be highly visible from I-64. The rendering looks like it would fit in the Highlands development.