Someone just got bridged.symphonicpoet wrote: ↑Apr 06, 2023Minneapolis is a pleasant enough town. I wouldn't personally make the trade, but I don't think someone would be foolish for doing so. That said, I will take issue with one minor point. The Stone Arch Bridge, while lovely, is nothing like the Eads Bridge. It's less than half the length, a quarter of the height, narrower, and, with only a fraction of the clear span. It's a nice bridge. Don't get me wrong. It's a good path to walk across a scenic spot on the river and look at the waterfall. But Eads is a damned engineering marvel. It looms over you, tells you it's tamed a wonder of the universe, that it means business, carries legions, and ties a nation together. It's an absolute statement. They're barely even the same species. The stone arch bridge would have been quite impressive in ancient Rome, but not quite record breaking even then. And what's more? Eads is actually older! (Just to clear up that one minor point.)GoHarvOrGoHome wrote: ↑Apr 05, 2023
- Stone Arch Bridge is such a fantastic piece of connective tissue (and only a little bit shorter than the Eads)
Sorry, back to the usual ranting.
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Never hurts to have a Big Ten university adjacent to Downtown. The structural advantages of our midwestern peer cities are significant. For Example:
Columbus: State Capitol, Big Ten University
Indianapolis: State Capitol, Downtown Med Center, Major Commuter University Downtown (IUPUI, think UMSL with a Med School), Zoo is adjacent to Downtown
St. Louis suffers from an Urban Sprawl where many typical downtown or downtown adjacent anchors are in the city, but not in Downtown St. Louis:
Columbus: State Capitol, Big Ten University
Indianapolis: State Capitol, Downtown Med Center, Major Commuter University Downtown (IUPUI, think UMSL with a Med School), Zoo is adjacent to Downtown
St. Louis suffers from an Urban Sprawl where many typical downtown or downtown adjacent anchors are in the city, but not in Downtown St. Louis:
- Park and associated museum attractions (Forest Park)
- Medical Center
- Theater District/mid-size concert venue (Fox Theater, The Pageant, etc.)
- Innovation District (Cortex)
and Clayton...TalkinDev wrote: ↑Apr 06, 2023Never hurts to have a Big Ten university adjacent to Downtown. The structural advantages of our midwestern peer cities are significant. For Example:
Columbus: State Capitol, Big Ten University
Indianapolis: State Capitol, Downtown Med Center, Major Commuter University Downtown (IUPUI, think UMSL with a Med School), Zoo is adjacent to Downtown
St. Louis suffers from an Urban Sprawl where many typical downtown or downtown adjacent anchors are in the city, but not in Downtown St. Louis:The locations of these anchors helps the city in other ways, but it does disadvantage Downtown. On the plus side, all three major sports teams are located in Downtown which is not typical. I'm not saying it is wrong or should be changed, its just a structural disadvantage of Downtown St. Louis when comparing to many other Downtowns.
- Park and associated museum attractions (Forest Park)
- Medical Center
- Theater District/mid-size concert venue (Fox Theater, The Pageant, etc.)
- Innovation District (Cortex)
Downtown St. Louis competes with lots of outer neighborhoods and districts for entertainment, nightlife, dining and employment. If you think about how vast and diverse St. Louis’ urban core is compared to a city like Indianapolis, it’s easy to see why downtown Indy thrives- it’s about the only truly urban part of Indianapolis. People who seek an urban lifestyle have very few options in a newer, smaller, sprawly metro like Indy. Even a locally“hip” neighborhood like Broad Ripple is about as “city” as Brentwood. For real. St. Louis has so many more options to experience city living than Indy or Columbus, so no wonder those cities feel more centralized- outside of their downtowns, they’re basically Creve Coeur (with a few exceptions, obviously).
Such a shame the obvious place to put UMSL wasn't one of the urban renewal clearance areas.
Could any of our local colleges build a secondary downtown campus? SLU or WashU should increase their student body with a downtown campus. We have a prime north riverfront just waiting to be revived with something like a college campusquincunx wrote:Such a shame the obvious place to put UMSL wasn't one of the urban renewal clearance areas.
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^ Webster University has one between the Arcade Building and the Old Post Office. SLU's law school is downtown. Lindenwood had one at one time, but I'm not sure they do anymore.
I'm not sure I see the need for established universities that already have large campuses to build additional campuses downtown. That's just more money and overhead. Leasing space (Webster) or moving a program downtown (SLU) makes more sense to me. What I would rather see is local universities move back office jobs into downtown buildings. For example, WashU could close their office "campuses" in Clayton and the West End and consolidate those jobs downtown.
I'm not sure I see the need for established universities that already have large campuses to build additional campuses downtown. That's just more money and overhead. Leasing space (Webster) or moving a program downtown (SLU) makes more sense to me. What I would rather see is local universities move back office jobs into downtown buildings. For example, WashU could close their office "campuses" in Clayton and the West End and consolidate those jobs downtown.
Board rules state that we are never ever allowed to site other mid sized cities (MSP, Nashville, Columbus, Indianapolis, Austin) and their major universities and/or state capital status. /sarcasmTalkinDev wrote: ↑Apr 06, 2023Never hurts to have a Big Ten university adjacent to Downtown. The structural advantages of our midwestern peer cities are significant. For Example:
Columbus: State Capitol, Big Ten University
Indianapolis: State Capitol, Downtown Med Center, Major Commuter University Downtown (IUPUI, think UMSL with a Med School), Zoo is adjacent to Downtown
St. Louis suffers from an Urban Sprawl where many typical downtown or downtown adjacent anchors are in the city, but not in Downtown St. Louis:The locations of these anchors helps the city in other ways, but it does disadvantage Downtown. On the plus side, all three major sports teams are located in Downtown which is not typical. I'm not saying it is wrong or should be changed, its just a structural disadvantage of Downtown St. Louis when comparing to many other Downtowns.
- Park and associated museum attractions (Forest Park)
- Medical Center
- Theater District/mid-size concert venue (Fox Theater, The Pageant, etc.)
- Innovation District (Cortex)
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They tried to move Rolla and the engineering school to UMSL back in the day. While it would have hurt Rolla as a town back in the 70s, having that engineering school in STL for the last 50 years would have been better. For both schools and STL.
I'm with Sc4mayor on his thoughts about satellite campuses even though it would be nice to see Wash U consolidate some admin downtown, near metrolink stops like Sc suggested. I believe California State University main back office functions are in downtown Oaklandsc4mayor wrote: ↑Apr 06, 2023^ Webster University has one between the Arcade Building and the Old Post Office. SLU's law school is downtown. Lindenwood had one at one time, but I'm not sure they do anymore.
I'm not sure I see the need for established universities that already have large campuses to build additional campuses downtown. That's just more money and overhead. Leasing space (Webster) or moving a program downtown (SLU) makes more sense to me. What I would rather see is local universities move back office jobs into downtown buildings. For example, WashU could close their office "campuses" in Clayton and the West End and consolidate those jobs downtown.
To me and much better choice would be to support and expand Harris Stowe as much as possible!! To me that would be a huge impact for the long term.
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Sports on top of sports in downtown this week
4/11: @USWNT vs Ireland
4/12: #stlblues vs Dallas
4/13: #STLCards vs Pirates
4/14: #STLCards vs Pirates
4/15: #STLCards vs Pirates & #allforCity vs FC Cincy
4/16: #STLCards vs Pirates &
#battlehawks vs Seattle (playoff spot w/win)
Those events should bring in at least 250,000 people over the next 6 days.
4/11: @USWNT vs Ireland
4/12: #stlblues vs Dallas
4/13: #STLCards vs Pirates
4/14: #STLCards vs Pirates
4/15: #STLCards vs Pirates & #allforCity vs FC Cincy
4/16: #STLCards vs Pirates &
#battlehawks vs Seattle (playoff spot w/win)
Those events should bring in at least 250,000 people over the next 6 days.
There are a lot of things we get wrong in this town, but putting our sporting venues downtown wasn't one of them...
Which also means two concerts this weekend at Enterprise.courtland wrote: ↑Apr 11, 2023There are a lot of things we get wrong in this town, but putting our sporting venues downtown wasn't one of them...
Fri 4/14: Kane Brown (country music)
Sat 4/15: New Edition + Guests
Interesting data from a market research newsletter this morning. St. Louis is in the bottom third/fourth with 57%. This corroborates my experience that downtown feels substantially emptier on a day-to-day basis relative to pre-COVID (outside of convention/game day activity).
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You mention something that may be a statistically signficant variable in the data. Was there a significant difference in number of Cardinals home games and conventions with their attendances between the two time periods. Since if there was a sizable difference then it could explain some of the data (as would in many other places). Also have seen mentions that depending on how the data is collected due to changes with phones and how it gets data there may be a methodology issue popping up if theres differences over time.kipfilet wrote: ↑Apr 24, 2023Interesting data from a market research newsletter this morning. St. Louis is in the bottom third/fourth with 57%. This corroborates my experience that downtown feels substantially emptier on a day-to-day basis relative to pre-COVID (outside of convention/game day activity).downtowns.png
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As a baseline and high level look this is probably accurate but for us I think we lose out when you go a little deeper and consider that we have many attractions in downtown that are geared towards children(not really a norm in other downtowns) who aren’t carrying a cell phone, ie city museum or all the stuff at union station, we probably squeeze another 5-7 % maybe. I would be interested to see how this looks for March and April 2023 vs 2022 and 2019 with extra 200,000 people in each of those months showing up for games at City Park and Battlehawks games. If this is calculated the way i think it is, those would probably add 7-10%
Compelling data to look at. Anyway you slice it, we have to fill the gaps with stronger residential and retail as corporate offices will continue to lag.
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Also would need to know what the definitions of downtowns that are being used here. Union Station and City Park may not count due to being too far west. The boundaries they use may only go as far west as Tucker.dbInSouthCity wrote: ↑Apr 25, 2023As a baseline and high level look this is probably accurate but for us I think we lose out when you go a little deeper and consider that we have many attractions in downtown that are geared towards children(not really a norm in other downtowns) who aren’t carrying a cell phone, ie city museum or all the stuff at union station, we probably squeeze another 5-7 % maybe. I would be interested to see how this looks for March and April 2023 vs 2022 and 2019 with extra 200,000 people in each of those months showing up for games at City Park and Battlehawks games. If this is calculated the way i think it is, those would probably add 7-10%
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If you bring your kids to city museum you may be taking them to the Arch too or staying at hotel or getting something to eat . Also daily I see buses of school kids make trips to the Arch and most don’t have cell phones.imperialmog wrote: ↑Apr 25, 2023Also would need to know what the definitions of downtowns that are being used here. Union Station and City Park may not count due to being too far west. The boundaries they use may only go as far west as Tucker.dbInSouthCity wrote: ↑Apr 25, 2023As a baseline and high level look this is probably accurate but for us I think we lose out when you go a little deeper and consider that we have many attractions in downtown that are geared towards children(not really a norm in other downtowns) who aren’t carrying a cell phone, ie city museum or all the stuff at union station, we probably squeeze another 5-7 % maybe. I would be interested to see how this looks for March and April 2023 vs 2022 and 2019 with extra 200,000 people in each of those months showing up for games at City Park and Battlehawks games. If this is calculated the way i think it is, those would probably add 7-10%
Interesting data on downtown cell phone data usage compared to 2019
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Over 40,000 tonight in downtown west for City SC game and the Lizzo concert at enterprise
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I know a few people that went to each event and then went to downtown restaurants or bars before/after. I'm hoping the businesses down there saw some unexpected action on a Tuesday night.
It's a bit unfortunate that the sidewalks around the Old Courthouse are going to be closed for years. Some of the busiest downtown and there's no effort to provide an alternative.
On Chestnut, there's only one driving lane west of Broadway, so to carve out a temporary sidewalk with jersey barriers wouldn't even be a traffic problem. You'd just continue the one driving lane another block. Market also has ample space to take a lane away.
I thought we passed some ordinance about providing alternative walking paths during sidewalk closures.
On Chestnut, there's only one driving lane west of Broadway, so to carve out a temporary sidewalk with jersey barriers wouldn't even be a traffic problem. You'd just continue the one driving lane another block. Market also has ample space to take a lane away.
I thought we passed some ordinance about providing alternative walking paths during sidewalk closures.