urbanSTL

olvidarte wrote:

I would say the closing of Macy's had little-to-no effect on the vibrancy of the immediate area (bounded by Olive and Locust from Broadway to 7th). It was largely dead before Macy's closed and largely dead now. No dis intended. I love this area and the potential is unlimited. Just calling it how I see it.

I'm not saying it was hopping with Macy's there, but Macy's closing did have an effect on pedestrian traffic here during the day. During lunch there aren't a whole lot of people on this stretch whereas before, there was some activity in this block with Macy's open. It wasn't completely dead during the day the way it is now.

That's exactly how I see it. The block wasn't exactly busy during Macy's last days, but it's consistently empty now, 24/7. It wasn't that long ago when the Railway Exchange literally had thousands of people passing through its doors every day.

It's disheartening because it doesn't seem like the current owner has anything on the horizon in terms of new tenants and uses for the building, and it's disappointing that city leaders doesn't see its redevelopment as the key to reactivate this dormant part of downtown.

roger wyoming II wrote:(I also forgot Paradowski owns one of the smaller properties on the Broadway block; they gave up on downtown a while back.)

303 North Broadway:


It was occupied by what seemed to be some sort of small business for about a year. I want to say this was in 2012. It has been empty the last year or so. Googling turned up this: http://downtownstlbiz.blogspot.com/2009 ... d-for.html

I believe a downtown city target would boost downtowns perception a great deal. It would help bring in more residents possibly attract more businesses as well. In all it would get things moving

You know what would boost downtown's image. . .JOBS. Its awesome the arcade is finally going but its doing nothing for daytime traffic because by the time its finished AT&T tower will finally be closed and the VA will have shipped out 900 jobs also by then. So its, at best, balancing out those daytime losses. We need good paying jobs and corporations to invest in downtown. Not a dunkin donuts or a target(which would be cool though). Until then i just couldn't imagine why downtown would look good to a major retailer. Its not exactly booming during the day. I think the recent article saying that the developer is thinking of putting apartments in the first floor retail of the Roberts lofts speaks loudly about retail demand. Id argue that SLU's impact has been also offset by job losses because i dont see any retail boom in the area surrounding them. They have def helped fill up a few lofts though

^Man i hope your right. And i do think it has the potential you state. But i look at Slu and the Park Pacific across the steet. THose numbers are even larger. Throw in the supposed increase of activity on tucker and what have we seen. . .a smothie king that is always empty? I guess the Arcade being more central will help a bit.

On a different note. What is it going to take to fill up those spots of retail on the two north corners of wash and tucker(The bogen spots and the one across) It appears the new bridge traffic isn't having the impact hoped. Maybe its too early still

TheNewSaintLouis wrote:I believe a downtown city target would boost downtowns perception a great deal. It would help bring in more residents possibly attract more businesses as well. In all it would get things moving

In my dreams, it would occupy the first two or three floors of the former Famous-Barr flagship. Not only would it fill a void- arguably much better than Macy's did in its last days- it would also be a magnet for additional stores to locate nearby. Target also has a reputation of respecting the history of buildings in which they locate- the CityTarget in the former Carson Pirie Scott flagship on State Street in Chicago is a prime example. That said, I think we're still at least five years away from attracting something like CityTarget to downtown. RogerWyoming is correct about patience being the key- there is a lot of space to fill in the RRX and in downtown overall.

Aren't a lot of the residential units going in to the OPOP area income sensitive? What kind of increase in disposable income to support additional retail is moving in to the OPOP area? Realistically, how much net new retail or restaurant activity, if any, can the downtown support? Or will the opening of whatever is "new" just result in the rapid failure of the "new" or the closing of something or things that is/are "old"?

Between OPOP Tower and the Arcade-Wright there will be 208 new market rate units and 202 affordable units added to the downtown apartment stock.

I agree with Roger...I think the 400+ additional units in the OPOP District will be a good mix for that part of downtown. And who knows, it may put some life back into Olive Street as a retail corridor eventually.

So as more and more problems unfold daily i was wondering what peoples opinion of the short and long term impacts of all this will be on downtown and STL as a whole, on our ability to attract new people and business etc. Ive waited a few days to ask this question as not to appear insensitive. I apologize if Im asking this question too soon.

I assume short term its not good at all for St. Louis. Long term, well i know people have short term memories, but once a city gets a label, its hard to shake it. I would assume if someone was contemplating moving here for a job they might have doubts?? Do you think corportations think the same? I know it make me second guess the future of STL and my future here, but ive been tettering on that for while. I would like to keep this discussion to Business and Resident growth. If you have opinions on how it was handled, etc i think that best talked about in the crime thread

I think demographic trends and lifestyle preferences will continue to support growth in the central corridor for years to come, with most of that growth centered around Downtown, Central West End, and Downtown Clayton. I think that the strengthening urban fabric will continue to attract both people and businesses from around the region and beyond.

However, I don't think it bodes well for the future of North St. Louis County, which is obviously a huge part of the region. Sadly, I imagine white flight from North County will accelerate to some extent. It's not a perfect parallel, but your inquiry makes me think of the race riots in Cincinnati in 2001. A lot of great urban core redevelopment and new development is going on in Cincinnati right in and around where those race riots occurred. However, Cincinnati proper did lose 10% of its population in the 2000-2010 decade.

L.A. bounced back from the Rodney King riots, New Orleans is bouncing back from the post-Katrina turmoil, Cincinnati has a lot of momentum right in the Over-the-Rhine neighborhood. These tragic and tumultuous events can define a city without destroying it.

wabash wrote:However, I don't think it bodes well for the future of North St. Louis County, which is obviously a huge part of the region. Sadly, I imagine white flight from North County will accelerate to some extent. It's not a perfect parallel, but your inquiry makes me think of the race riots in Cincinnati in 2001. A lot of great urban core redevelopment and new development is going on in Cincinnati right in and around where those race riots occurred. However, Cincinnati proper did lose 10% of its population in the 2000-2010 decade.

L.A. bounced back from the Rodney King riots, New Orleans is bouncing back from the post-Katrina turmoil, Cincinnati has a lot of momentum right in the Over-the-Rhine neighborhood. These tragic and tumultuous events can define a city without destroying it.

Well said

wabash wrote:However, Cincinnati proper did lose 10% of its population in the 2000-2010 decade.

I suspect that Cincinnati's 2000-2010 loss was largely just a continuation of the trend, though it may have been accelerated slightly by the riot. My guess is that this will have virtually no impact on St. Louis City's numbers and not much impact on North County's numbers in the long term. The county overall is in decline, so it may be difficult to distinguish the effects of this incident from others (unless N. County empties out overnight that is).

I suspect a lot of realtors in St. Charles County are licking their lips right now

All good points. Who knows maybe it will boost the city residential base too. What i would guess though is there is no way they are going to shut down Larry Rice anytime soon. And honestly until this cools down i sure hope they dont. The national media would jump all over that. Thats too bad as he really needs to go

I don't think it would have any affect on the city at all, and except for north county, and northwest county most of the county wouldn't be impacted by this at all. In the end money decides where investment goes and no developer is going to stop investing in the st louis region because of a young man sadly being shot, in the end if it doesn't effect bottom line, or the ability to attract growth investors won't care. If every bad incident riot or street crime strongly effected where investment would be then no urban area anywhere would be reviving right now in this country. Look at OTR in Cincinnati its revival didn't inter high gear until after the 2001 riot (starting about circa 2003)

Everything seems to be so stagnant here even before all the Chaos in Ferguson seems as if soon as that 14 floor tower got the axe things have imploded .. Does anyone know whats going on with the opus project is that still a go? I know that they are suppose to be making some sort of announcement about Midtown Station this fall i also hope phase 2 of BPV will be announced sometime the ending of this year or early next year if not it be very embarrassing that we can't even get a 1 floor building off the ground downtown..

i,Iive,to,draw wrote:I don't think it would have any affect on the city at all, and except for north county, and northwest county most of the county wouldn't be impacted by this at all. In the end money decides where investment goes and no developer is going to stop investing in the st louis region because of a young man sadly being shot, in the end if it doesn't effect bottom line, or the ability to attract growth investors won't care. If every bad incident riot or street crime strongly effected where investment would be then no urban area anywhere would be reviving right now in this country. Look at OTR in Cincinnati its revival didn't inter high gear until after the 2001 riot (starting about circa 2003)

It really depends on how people react to it, and that we won't likely see any long-term reprocussions for a few years anyway. It also could give the impression that the regions problems are not centered in the city anymore but that the county has worse problems now, which could impact viewpoints.

One thing ive noticed is most of the STL bashing is done on local site, forums, etc. If you look at comments on national sites people accept that the situation in ferguson could happen in any major city and they are not equating it to just STL. So that is one positive to take away from a situation full of negatives.(Not sure positive is the best word) I would imagine short term maybe a little drop in tourism, but long term maybe minimal. I hope that is

bigmclargehuge wrote:One thing ive noticed is most of the STL bashing is done on local site, forums, etc. If you look at comments on national sites people accept that the situation in ferguson could happen in any major city and they are not equating it to just STL. So that is one positive to take away from a situation full of negatives.(Not sure positive is the best word) I would imagine short term maybe a little drop in tourism, but long term maybe minimal. I hope that is

I am noticing that too, that its more a larger national thing that just happened to flare up here. I'm also thinking the news stories that a lot of the problems are coming from people outside of the area is another factor.

But it could wind up being a game-changing event that could address long-standing regional issues that may have played a role.

In terms of downtown development, is some of the pause in it related to developers wanting to get the currently built things done first due to a concern of overbuilding? Another issue I was thinking is some places have had lack of construction workers since many left the field when the market crashed and some areas are now facing worker shortages.

I think it is important to keep in mind that while it could have happened anywhere, it did happen here for very identifiable reasons, and though various combinations of similar reasons exist elsewhere, a lot of what has happened since the shooting has had a St. Louis signature.