urbanSTL

The development pattern around the mall site is so flawed, it forces a lot of wealth and space at this development and to access it to be devoted to supporting car trips in and out which is antithetical to resilient urbanity. The current drive-to mall was vulnerable to the next drive-to mall, might this drive-to downtown be undermined by the next drive-to downtown?
It's like how downtown STL suffers because the neighborhoods adjacent were destroyed.
Will someone working at a restaurant/retailer in the new downtown be able to afford to live there?
Will neighborhoods adjacent be zoned anything but single family? I see some non-single fam nearby; is enough to achieve urbanity politically feasible?
I've advocated for Crestwood to build a downtown on its former mall site. I think they're at a better starting point given its surroundings.

quincunx wrote: ↑

Feb 18, 2020

The development pattern around the mall site is so flawed, it forces a lot of wealth and space at this development and to access it to be devoted to supporting car trips in and out which is antithetical to resilient urbanity. The current drive-to mall was vulnerable to the next drive-to mall, might this drive-to downtown be undermined by the next drive-to downtown?
It's like how downtown STL suffers because the neighborhoods adjacent were destroyed.
Will someone working at a restaurant/retailer in the new downtown be able to afford to live there?
Will neighborhoods adjacent be zoned anything but single family? I see some non-single fam nearby; is enough to achieve urbanity politically feasible?
I've advocated for Crestwood to build a downtown on its former mall site. I think they're at a better starting point given its surroundings.

I highly doubt anyone working at a restaurant/retailer will be able to afford to live in the development.

Per the Business Journal in November, the redevelop of the Chesterfield Mall into "Downtown Chesterfield" is now $1 Billion. We now have plans and renderings of this project. Here we go. Austin-based Nelsen Partners is the architect.

To start, the plan establishes that all of this development will happen within a circle that symbolizes a 5 minute walk from the center of the development (or the core). The "core" is presently located where the center of the mall and the movie theater is now. The site would be broken up into blocks made up by streets of varying widths, along with pedestrian passageways and trails. The whole mall will be demolished with the exception of the Macy's Building, which will become an anchor retail building for the entire development.

The overall vision, at this point, is truly massive with approximately 6,233,499sf of space. Breaking that number up: 

• Retail: 634,000sf. 
• Office: 2,561,039sf. 
• Residential: 3,037,860sf (total of 3,105 units with average size of 1000sf). 
• Parking: A whopping 15,362+/- spaces.

The aerial drawings show off numerous high-rises & mid- to low-rise buildings filling the site, but leaving parcels along Chesterfield Parkway undeveloped. If those are developed, those parcels would connect to Wildhorse Village, which is across Chesterfield Parkway.

The renderings show off buildings that look like they're thoughtfully designed and present a vision that's very urban for Chesterfield. The pedestrian walkways and more look quite nice as well. You can tell that the high-rises are later phases based on their current designs, or lack thereof. The renderings provide close-up views of the street level of the development and show the pedestrian right of ways being thoughtfully integrated into the surrounding context.

This all seems to be of high quality and well thought out. Most of the parking is out of sight, which, in my opinion, is a good thing considering there is so much of it. If all goes well, reports have stated that the first phase of this should begin sometime next year.



CONNECTIONS...






SITE PLAN...


RENDERINGS...












MASTER PLAN AERIALS...

Office: 2,561,039sf

909 Chestnut 1.4M sf
RRX 1.2M sf
Butler Brothers 700k sf

quincunx wrote: ↑

Dec 22, 2020

Office: 2,561,039sf

909 Chestnut 1.4M sf
RRX 1.2M sf
Butler Brothers 700k sf

This is one of the aspects of this project I expect to be shrunk down a bit. The other is the parking as a result of less office space. Between this and Wildhorse Village, that's over 3.75 Million Square Feet of brand new office space 

I thought everyone was going to work from home now. At least that's the excuse I heard for not trying to locate jobs downtown on the radio today.

quincunx wrote: ↑

Dec 22, 2020

Parking: A whopping 15,362+/- spaces.

All structured? That's $200-300M

Not specified how that will work, but I do see on street parking. I imagine the rest will be structured and underground. The plan is linked here.

Do they even have tenants? I can see the residental working, but how long will the development take?  We talking 5, 10, 20 years? I know this is a huge boost to the region but will this hurt downtown development? So many questions, but the plan looks solid and has a good secure developer!

^ Chesterfield's goal is to hurt downtown development. Both Chesterfield and St. Charles think they're going to become the new St. Louis City (just without any actual "city"). It's the most insane, dysfunctional, counterproductive city/suburbs relationship in the country.

2020STL wrote: ↑

Dec 22, 2020

Do they even have tenants? I can see the residental working, but how long will the development take?  We talking 5, 10, 20 years? I know this is a huge boost to the region but will this hurt downtown development? So many questions, but the plan looks solid and has a good secure developer!

They do not have tenants for the office space, at least from what I know. Maybe they're talking to someone, but that's probably unlikely. 

Putting my general annoyance about this project aside, a few thoughts:

• Looks like they aren't half-assing the urban vibe. It will certainly be a cool place if/when it happens
• Holy parking
• Of all things to save from the Chesterfield Mall, they are saving the Macy's monolith? Hopefully they can rework the surface level. That or they can read the writing on the wall and plan to build a skyscraper or something after Macy's inevitable demise.
• Hopefully they run Metrolink down here eventually. The 64 corridor makes more and more sense every year, but getting Chesterfield residents on board is probably an exercise in futility  
• This would also be an interesting candidate for Transit X integration assuming it ever becomes a thing. DTC could be the center of a Chesterfield system that individually connects to the spread out shopping and employment centers endemic to the area. Maybe a line connecting to a city system as well.

I don't think 14 miles of Metrolink to reach this island of walkability would be worth it.

chriss752 wrote: ↑

Dec 22, 2020

I get your point here but in all honesty, is this really going to hurt downtown development? In my opinion, I don't expect the people who choose to live out in the West Suburbs to go to Downtown St. Louis for anything other than a Cardinals, Blues, or City SC game.

The City of St. Louis appeals to people who want it just like "Downtown Chesterfield" and "New Town St. Charles" appeal to others. We can't win everything. So to keep this relatively short, I do not think this will impact Downtown St. Louis any as this will appeal to people whose minds are already set on the suburbs. Downtown St. Louis will continue to evolve and be up against Clayton when it comes to landing office jobs. Time will tell though.

i mean, both Nation and Ehlmann have made it pretty clear that they think their respective exurbs should become the new heart of the region. it's nuts. people choosing to live out there is one thing, but every employer that chooses Chesterfield over the city does, indeed, hurt downtown. otherwise those employers would locate in the city and draw more residents and revenue to the city, and some portion of that growth would end up downtown.

I guess I'm not that familiar with the layout of Chesterfield: Where is that other big proposal, with office and residential surrounding a lake, in relation to this one? Could someone site it on a map for me? 

urban_dilettante wrote: ↑

Dec 22, 2020

^ Chesterfield's goal is to hurt downtown development. Both Chesterfield and St. Charles think they're going to become the new St. Louis City (just without any actual "city"). It's the most insane, dysfunctional, counterproductive city/suburbs relationship in the country.

I don't think this is true at all.  Chesterfield isn't doing this to hurt the city, they're just capitalizing on demand for development in their neck of the woods. What do we expect them to do?  Say "No, sorry.  We don't want $1B of investment in our city... you should really talk to the city instead!" That's never ever ever ever ever going to happen. 

Until the city get's it's (expletive) together, it can't point fingers at the rest of the region and claim they're being insane, dysfunctional, or counterproductive by simply letting developers respond to supply/demand with these types of proposals. Would it be awesome if this was in the North side, near NGA instead?  Of course.  But let's not be mad at Chesterfield or St. Charles for looking to create more dense hubs of their own.

Between this, Watermark, and Wildhorse Village (which I'll include the Pearl at Wildhorse Creek and Aventura), this area could have a total of...

• 4,556 housing units (apartments, condos, townhomes and single family homes).
• 3,711,039 sf of office space (1,150,000sf at Wildhorse Village).
• 760,500sf of retail and restaurant space (114,000sf at Wildhorse Village).
• 128 hotel rooms (AC Hotel at the Pearl at Wildhorse Creek only).

If Wildhorse Village and the Chesterfield Mall redevelopment are both completed to their fullest potential and extent, then this will be a hub of activity for the Western Suburbs. I personally find this to be impressive. 

Thanks for the map, Laife

One more post from me on this, I drew a shape around the entire "Downtown Chesterfield" site (which includes Watermark, Central Park, the Amphitheater, Wildhorse Village, Aventura, Pearl at Wildhorse, and the Mall site). I then went and dropped it over Downtown Clayton. This project area is somewhat bigger.

Current site...

Overlaid with Clayton...

chriss752 wrote: ↑

Dec 22, 2020

urban_dilettante wrote: ↑

Dec 22, 2020

^ Chesterfield's goal is to hurt downtown development. Both Chesterfield and St. Charles think they're going to become the new St. Louis City (just without any actual "city"). It's the most insane, dysfunctional, counterproductive city/suburbs relationship in the country.

I get your point here but in all honesty, is this really going to hurt downtown development? In my opinion, I don't expect the people who choose to live out in the West Suburbs to go to Downtown St. Louis for anything other than a Cardinals, Blues, or City SC game.

The City of St. Louis appeals to people who want it just like "Downtown Chesterfield" and "New Town St. Charles" appeal to others. We can't win everything. So to keep this relatively short, I do not think this will impact Downtown St. Louis any as this will appeal to people whose minds are already set on the suburbs. Downtown St. Louis will continue to evolve and be up against Clayton when it comes to landing office jobs. Time will tell though.

I think the main grumbles come in the form that this level of economic development could, and in many eyes, should, she in the urban core.  Not manufacturing another faux urban leisure center.  It feels like another municipal bandaid with some bedazzlement.  Of course, this is not unique to Chesterfield, or St. Charles, or St. Louis County, or City.  You can see lots of municipalities trying to employ these shots in the arm whether for outward appearance of prosperity, progressiveness, or a new embrace of that unholy buzzword "walkability".

It's great that stakeholders can get the ball rolling.  I think it's a silly waste of energy that should be devoted toward making the cultural center of our region the best that it can be.  The fragmentation is maddening.  In the same vein, though, islands of activity and investment are popping up over the city that I don't agree with either.  I feel like Steelcoate has been playing the grassroots development game properly versus these 'mixed use villages' that will end up being as antiquated as the malls, floodplains, vacant plots of land they are paying to pave over.

In the end, no, I don't believe building a faux urban center in Chesterfield is the greatest use of our economic, cultural, or social energy.

Laife Fulk wrote: ↑

Dec 22, 2020

urban_dilettante wrote: ↑

Dec 22, 2020

^ Chesterfield's goal is to hurt downtown development. Both Chesterfield and St. Charles think they're going to become the new St. Louis City (just without any actual "city"). It's the most insane, dysfunctional, counterproductive city/suburbs relationship in the country.

I don't think this is true at all.  Chesterfield isn't doing this to hurt the city, they're just capitalizing on demand for development in their neck of the woods. What do we expect them to do?  Say "No, sorry.  We don't want $1B of investment in our city... you should really talk to the city instead!" That's never ever ever ever ever going to happen. 

Until the city get's it's (expletive) together, it can't point fingers at the rest of the region and claim they're being insane, dysfunctional, or counterproductive by simply letting developers respond to supply/demand with these types of proposals. Would it be awesome if this was in the North side, near NGA instead?  Of course.  But let's not be mad at Chesterfield or St. Charles for looking to create more dense hubs of their own.

How does the city get its blank together when it's constantly undermined? Those levees snd highways and bridges and sewers and TIFs aren't free. Imagine if that money had been spent in already existing places.

Is it constantly undermined or is it just shooting itself in the foot repeatedly? Has the city taken the Board of Freeholders process seriously? Has it taken crime seriously? Has it done anything at all to kick out Paul McKee and his demolition by neglect tactics? 

My point is that peoples annoyance or anger over these developments isn't going to stop them from happening. For every company like Square or Stifel who chooses to be downtown, there are others who just... well, they just don't. Same with residents. Someone wants to live in New Town instead of TGS? I get it.

I feel like the suburbs never can win on here. If they build this people are mad it isn't in the city, if they put a costco there and a bunch of other strip mall like stores then people complain it is a horrible use of space with tons of surface parking.

Personally, I like it. My hope is they don't draw a business from in the city out to it and they find a way to market it to out of the area companies. I appreciate they thought out the entire thing and didn't just piecemeal it together as they went (which seems to happen too often). If people want an urban feel in the suburbs then I say great. It is much better than many alternatives they could have done with the land. If it draws more people to the region that then I am happy. I would rather have people in the city but Chesterfield is better than not coming at all.