Don't know Amos? Get to know him here:

http://www.stlmag.com/St-Louis-Magazine ... -Believer/



I don't know much about Amos nor Spinnaker but I love the way he thinks. He'd be a great guy to work for/with.

Wow. What an interesting person. I like his idea of lighting up the 70 overpass though, since it doesn't look it's coming down. And I've never really thought about downtown as a circuit like that, but it's a good way to think about it.

Alex Ihnen wrote:I do, however, think that bus with a hot chick driving is an all-time bad idea.

What do you have against hot chicks?

8th Street is a much more pleasant street, but I can see how 7th Street is logistically better suited for transit. 7th and Olive will also be a major transit intersection with the proposed streetcar line and N-S Metrolink. 7th Street runs right into Ballpark Village and will give a great view of the Arch through the a soon to be revamped Kiener Plaza. The only problem I see is that 7th Street is flanked by 40 year old parking garages throughout its entire length and it will take $100s of Millions to make this street attractive or "touristy" in any sense.

I thought it was a great article. The kind you can't put down after you start. I thought it was very interesting to hear his take on the Century bldg and the Rams.

I wish downtown had 10 others like Amos.

Alex thinks it's a bad idea, because hot chicks can't drive. Everybody knows that.

goat314 wrote:8th Street is a much more pleasant street, but I can see how 7th Street is logistically better suited for transit. 7th and Olive will also be a major transit intersection with the proposed streetcar line and N-S Metrolink. 7th Street runs right into Ballpark Village and will give a great view of the Arch through the a soon to be revamped Kiener Plaza. The only problem I see is that 7th Street is flanked by 40 year old parking garages throughout its entire length and it will take $100s of Millions to make this street attractive or "touristy" in any sense.

Seventh Street, along with Sixth Street, was once downtown's north-south retail axis. This picture was taken in 1974, when the developers of Mercantile Tower thought the retail surrounding Famous-Barr and Stix Baer & Fuller was functionally obsolete. The plans changed drastically along the way, but as a result of this thinking, we wound up with St. Louis Centre, Mercantile Tower,and eventually, the US Bank Plaza, all of which did more to screw up Seventh Street than anything else in my opinion. I'd give anything to see it this busy again. This picture is from 1974, the year in which I was born:



Thankfully, I am just old enough to have this mental image seared into my memory without the help of this photo, because even though the early 1980s, this is how downtown looked before St. Louis Centre turned downtown retail outside in and stifled street activity to a large extent.

I'd like to think that Seventh Street could be this vibrant again, and that it could be an interesting street from America's Center to Ballpark Village, but there are many gaps to fill as you said. Aside from the impending departure of Macy's, I think the most unfortunate shortcoming of Seventh Street is the hole...er plaza...where the Ambassador Theater used to be. Just imagine how much better that intersection would look if that building was still standing, whether it was used as a theater again or repurposed. The surface lot to its south has been there for decades and it's in desperate need of a better and higher use as well. The garages suck the life out of this area, and the retail spaces in the Kiener West and Famous-Barr garages look so dated.

Seventh Street needs the same love and attention given to Washington Avenue. But Washington has most of its original built environment intact. What can be done, apart from replacing parking garages, surface lots, and plazas with something that's actually good, to improve the Seventh Street experience? Would a new streetscape help? Can what's there be improved to make it more appealing? Or should the focus shift to Eighth Street as the primary north-south axis since so much has been lost on Seventh Street comparatively? Maybe we should just say "screw it" and focus on that hot chick bus.

I don't have the answers, but I know that I really like Amos Harris. What an interesting chap. And the article in St. Louis Magazine is great as well.