There is a new plan for the redevelopment of the Pevely Dairy complex at Grand and Chouteau that may include residential and retail. I would imagine the views of downtown are great from the upper floors!
That'd be great. Hopefully a successful redevelopment of this building will lead to further investment in the neighborhood in the future. It's a prominent intersection with a lot of empty/underutilized land throughout the neighborhood.
Seems like Historic designation and Tax Credits for this would be a no-brainer. Now all they've got to do is wait for the economy to turn around.
Although I wonder, aside from a few SLU docs, how strong the residential market for that corner would be. Sure, the views would be great, but other than that, the residential amenities are about zero.
I could be wrong, but I get the feeling that a lot of the people complaining about this development have no problem at all with their municipalities granting tax credits to developers for shopping centers or businesses that locate in their community.
At least in the city, these tax credits are used to preserve historic buildings, and the projects may not be possible without them. In the county, suburbs routinely abuse TIF for “blighted” properties like a small yet successful mall (Des Peres’ West County Center), bluffs near a major highway intersection (Gravois Bluffs in Fenton) and floodplains (Chesterfield Commons in Chesterfield and St. Louis Mills in Hazelwood). And, since there’s very little population growth in the area, existing businesses in other suburbs suffer directly as a result. Crestwood and Sunset Hills suffer now that Fenton has Gravois Bluffs, and while Hazelwood robbed St. Ann and Bridgeton of businesses when St. Louis Mills opened, now that development is struggling after less than five years.
So, as usual on these forums, I think it amounts to an anti-city attitude. Historic preservation tax credits? Bad. Flagrant TIF abuse that results in zero-sum retail relocation and disinvestment in older suburbs? Meh…who cares. Be honest, those of you that oppose these tax credits pretty much oppose everything east of Skinker Boulevard. Fortunately, the city will be just fine without you.
In my mind their is a huge difference in tax credits versus TIF's. Tax credits are back by future state and federal tax revenue. That means an individual like me in the county has a contributed indirectly to a historic tax credit within the city. Not a huge contribution by any stretch of the imagination. TIF's are backed by allocating future sales tax revenues by taking it away from other parties (school districts) within the local taxing district. If you don't like the TIF, you don't have to shop there. Someone can enlighten me with details. But, I think I summarized the differences correctly.
I don't have a problem because a strong urban core has significant benefits to the region and state. Either way, the project still has to stand on its own such as the need to sell or rent all those lofts. The Laural being an example. This project still has a long way to go to qualify for the credits as well as sell/lease the space for someone to actually finance the work.
In the end, I think a lot more has been accomplished with Historic tax credits then TIF's have. I also agree that TIF's have actually held the region back by promoting winners (Maplewood - Walmart/Sam's/Lowes) and losers (St. Ann - Northwest Plaza) instead of finding ways to encourage growth for the region as a whole. However, I don't think you can fairly compare the two and say it is anti-city item (BPV will have a significant TIF at the expense of St. Louis School District, etc.).
^ If I'm being honest, I had one Guinness too many when I wrote in the comments section, and I knew I wasn't making an apples-to-apples comparison. Honestly, the comments about the article about the old Pevely dairy are really tame compared to what I typically see on STLtoday.com forums and comment sections following articles. I usually just avoid them altogether. Right or wrong, I just feel like a lot of people in this area are quick to criticize so much of what happens within the city's borders, but they're either unaware of or ambivalent toward egregious abuses of the system in their own communities.
I agree that it's difficult to compare these funding mechanisms, but I think you already touched upon a couple of important distinctions in your previous post:
- Projects funded with historic tax credits, like The Laurel or the Pevely Dairy, have to stand on their own merits at least to some extent. They have to sell a certain number of lofts and/or lease a set amount of space for the projects to move forward. While developers using TIF typically have major tenants line up, a portion of these projects are usually speculative, and getting properties designated as "blighted" is a mere formality in most cases.
- Historic tax credits bring investment, jobs, and residents to areas that haven't seen significant activity in years, or in the case of the Pevely dairy, a place of historic worth that might be senselessly demolished or at least lay dormant for a number of years. TIF, at least as it's been routinely (ab)used by many St. Louis County municipalities, results in winners and losers as much of the activity funded this way has simply resulted in zero-sum relocation of existing retail establishments.
All of that said, I really hope these plans for the former Pevely dairy complex go forward because I shudder to think of what will happen if they don't (I'm thinking Saint Louis University will want a parking lot there). Like Framer, I wonder if this particular development will support a residential component, but based on the site's potential and the developer's track record I am optimistic that we'll be pleased with what emerges.
Friday, April 23, 2010 Bruce Development, Yackey team to buy old Pevely Dairy property
ST. LOUIS BUSINESS JOURNAL - BY Lisa R. Brown
Read more: Bruce Development, Yackey team to buy old Pevely Dairy property - St. Louis Business Journal:
“Our preliminary idea is to convert the main historic structure located at Couteau and Grand into rental lofts,” Brian Bruce said.
Pevely Dairy, a St. Louis institution for more than a century, produced milk at the Midtown property for 91 years before its parent company, Prairie Farms Dairy Inc., closed the plant in 2008 and shifted operations to Hazelwood.
THANK GOD! I drive by this building everyday, and every time i see it I thought to myself: "SLU needs student housing, they need to expand the Med Campus, how the hell hasn't this building been turned into apartments yet?!" Not to mention I think it would be pretty sweet to have an apartment on the NE corner so I could see all of midtown and downtown!
When does the Chouteau Great/Complete Street program start? If that's historic route 66, shouldn't we make bit of effort to make it nice? SLU owns enough property to make a major difference if they thought street-front retail was worthwhile.
^Big changes are on the way for this intersection in conjunction with the rebuilding of the Grand Bridge. I heard the number of lanes is being reduced and planted medians are going in on Grand from Chouteau to Lafayette. Can anyone verify this?
I was at the Pevely complex yesterday and Yackey showed me the plans. Evidently the apartments will be market rate and not necessarily geared to SLU students.
I was there because he wants to turn the huge warehouse space in which Pevely used to service its vehicles into a school. I work with a number of charter schools that are interested. Massive building with some huge ceilings. It will be interesting no matter what they do with it. I hope he doesn't decide to tear it down if no schools come to the table.
Curious, did the plans incorporate any new construction to replace the building that burnt to the ground? I can assume the obvious anser, but you never know.
The Hilliker sign went up on Grand a few weeks ago: they're now marketing the entire Pevely property as available for sale or lease, with the option to divide it. It's currently the first item on their new listings page here:
