urbanSTL

Tim wrote: ↑

Mar 01, 2025

Auggie, defending that these cars are "no big deal" is a very interesting argument.

I don't think that the city should allow free junk storage in its downtown business district in a parking garage that it paid millions of dollars to build.

I will continue to try to make this city a better place. Sometimes that means calling out the city's complacency when they fail to operate with basic common sense.

As someone who works downtown, I am proud to share my love of the neighborhood to family and friends in a continued effort to challenge the general perception that the, "city is lawless".

But, I'm not willing to accept that this is fine. No city, neighborhood, or individual private property owner having any self respect would allow this on their property.

This is the city's own garage. It makes them look bad. That has an economic impact. Further, they lose direct revenue on these spots. It's a waste of the city's investment.

What number of abandoned vehicles would make this a problem? 50? 100? 500? Where do you draw the line?

Just so you are fully aware, because it seems like you're unaware, the other place these cars would go is a city-owned impound lot that's already strained as it is.

Is the garage 100% occupied every weekday? Wouldn't bet on it.

If the number of abandoned cars is so high that there is not enough open spaces for everyday drivers to park their car in the garage, then it can be considered a problem. Until then, 20 abandoned cars parked in a not-fully-occupied garage is not an issue, certainly not an issue worth taking pictures of and posting online about.

Maybe when we've solves homelessness, poverty, and have enough downtown workers to fill our garages, we can worry about this. Until then, it's not a real issue and not something that's negatively impacting the city in any meaningful way.

Tim, next time you report the cars as abandoned, tell the city that you saw kids playing in them. They’ll get removed.

I've never understood the attitude of not caring about legitimate problems (no matter how small) in the city because we haven't solved giant issues like homelessness and poverty yet. Governments should be able to walk and chew gum at the same time.

Yes, these abandoned cars in a garage are small potatoes, but taking care of small potato issues is core to the city governments value proposition to its residents. STL City is widely considered to be dysfunctional because they leave too many small potato issues unaddressed.

GoHarvOrGoHome wrote: ↑

Mar 03, 2025

I've never understood the attitude of not caring about legitimate problems (no matter how small) in the city because we haven't solved giant issues like homelessness and poverty yet. Governments should be able to walk and chew gum at the same time.

Yes, these abandoned cars in a garage are small potatoes, but taking care of small potato issues is core to the city governments value proposition to its residents. STL City is widely considered to be dysfunctional because they leave too many small potato issues unaddressed.

Because it's not an actual issue. These cars negatively affect 0 people. They aren't small potatoes because they aren't potatoes at all.

It makes literally no sense at all to use city resources to move these cars from a city-owned garage that isn't used to capacity to a city-owned impound lot that is used to capacity.

No one would even know they exist if the OP wasn't posting it online, and even with that, next to no one even knows they exist.

An actual problem would be abandoned cars on residential streets in front of people's houses as seen here:

https://www.stltoday.com/news/local/gov ... 8635d.html

Sounds like the city needs a new impound lot. I wonder if they own any vacant lots zoned industrial? Obviously yes they do.

Also, who do you think parks here? Hundreds of people live in the connected building. This impacts residents, just like cars abandoned on the street do. Additionally, thousands of downtown visitors and workers use this garage every year. Not sure how that qualifies as, "no one knows these exist."

I'd argue that just as many if not more people know that these exist, compared to an abandoned vehicle left on a residential side street in a less populated area. Neither is acceptable, but acting like there is no visibility on these is pretty absurd.

Do you work for the streets department?

Sounds like the city needs a new impound lot
As I have written previously what about the former workhouse on Hall st?
From a no nothing here by the pic it  looks like there is a swath of land  behind the buildings

https://www.bizjournals.com/stlouis/new ... nants.html

500 N Broadway adds 2 new tenants; an engineering consulting firm EMD Inc and law firm Skeleton Moore.

EMD signed an 8 year lease for 9.4k sf while Skeleton Moore's is 3 years for 2.5k sf.

The building underwent $2M in renovations last year, and has since added 4 new tenants, including three office and one retail/cafe.

The building is 83% occupied, well above the overall downtown rate of 72%.

GSA has identified the Robert A. Young Federal Building as "non-core" and disposable.
https://www.gsa.gov/real-estate/real-es ... perty-list

1. City could move here and offer up City hall as a part of redevelopment.
2. Residential conversion

addxb2 wrote: ↑

Mar 04, 2025

1. City could move here and offer up City hall as a part of redevelopment.
2. Residential conversion

I like the idea of City Hall moving to this building. It’s large enough for the City to consolidate many offices of their own.

Playing devil's advocate here because I might be delusional as to how far this administration may go to destroying America:

-Federal government vacates this building and moves moved remaining federal employees to new leases at other buildings. We have plenty of available office space at a cheap rate for the government to move to.
-The city consolidates all the city's downtown offices at the RAY building, including city hall and the city building on Market. Keep some available for leasing, and convert the rest to residential.
-Add City Hall to the Municipal Courts RFP and put out a RFP for the government building on Market.

This maybe would be better than the current reality in the long run. It's a gamble though. I would personally prefer the status quo though and keep the government at the RAY building.

I fear whatever Fed employees are left will be moved to Downtown Chesterfield or some such.

quincunx wrote: ↑

Mar 04, 2025

Instead of giving up City Hall, which sounds cuckoo to me, let's give up the onramp at 14th and Clark. That's about 2 acres.

Agree - that ramp is an eye sore and a no brainer!

Auggie wrote: ↑

Mar 04, 2025

Playing devil's advocate here because I might be delusional as to how far this administration may go to destroying America:

-Federal government vacates this building and moves moved remaining federal employees to new leases at other buildings. We have plenty of available office space at a cheap rate for the government to move to.
-The city consolidates all the city's downtown offices at the RAY building, including city hall and the city building on Market. Keep some available for leasing, and convert the rest to residential.
-Add City Hall to the Municipal Courts RFP and put out a RFP for the government building on Market.

This maybe would be better than the current reality in the long run. It's a gamble though. I would personally prefer the status quo though and keep the government at the RAY building.

Probably more likely a sale and leaseback than they sign leases at other buildings.

The ramp is a non-factor in the possibility of the government vacating a 1M sf building and brainstorming ideas for what the city could do to mitigate the impacts.

I think we all agree that the ramp should be removed, but we'd need MoDOT on board for that.

That list is completely insane and will be the last nail in the coffin of the commercial real estate market.

77M square feet for sale. Wrecking the CRE market even more than it already is is right.

My goodness they are dumping lots of property in Chicago and KC - does this coincide where they are shedding so many workers?

Also, what is “Clyde Cahill Memorial Park”? Says it is St. Louis.

They are also dumping federal building in E StL.

Not downtown but a 380k sf federal building in Overland is listed too.

i think it will all be a mixed bag at this moment.  The Feds on one hand are legitimately downsizing office space with anticipation of a reduced workforce.  On the other hand, I think Jshank is right in that there will be a fair share of lease back in the near term.   Think ATT once upon a time when it sold a lot of properties such as 909 Chestnut and then leased back in the near term.  In the long term, if the downsizing of any magnitude sticks then look out at as Quincunx noted.    For better or worse, Feds just adding one more blow to white collar work force to go along with Corporate consolidation & AI.  
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What kinda crazy to me is the list includes a fair share of great Federal buildings in urban cores across the country that provide a one stop place for a number of agencies to provide regional presence.  Passport offices being one such tenant that comes to mind and where i have made a recent trip to a Federal Building.   To me this is the ideal real estate that the Feds should be hanging onto.     At same time, been to fair share of Corps of Engineers resident engineer offices in non descript office parks that are not exactly full of people and the District or another DOD facility is nearby..  So there is a legit case to be had on how much space needs to be out there.
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Mixed thoughts, St. Louis Fed building seems like a great candidate to consolidate city offices, upgrade and update.    At same time, St Louis does have an iconic City Hall.   I would say do all the above.   Buy out the Fed building for city offices and services, retain current city hall for mayor & alderman, and by all measures get rid of the ramp and expand scope of development.    
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List of all the major cities with significant SF cuts on the list:

Chicago: 3.2M (sf)
Kansas City: 1.6M
St. Louis: 1M
Seattle: 1.6M
NYC: 1M
Boston: 1.5M
Los Angeles: 1.8M
San Francisco: 301k
Minneapolis: 144k
Miami: 562k
Tampa: 210k
Philadelphia: 1.4M
Baltimore: 742k
Indianapolis: 2M
Cincinnati: 691k
Columbus: 331k
Cleveland: 1.2M
Detroit: 516k
Pittsburgh: 678k
Atlanta: 2.2M
Jacksonville: 296k
Memphis: 1.2M
Sacramento: 813k
Portland: 1.1M
Louisville: 419k
Austin: 1M
Dallas: 683k
Fort Worth: 678k
Houston: 716k
Salt Lake City: 328k
Denver: 202k

Hate to say it, but perhaps some of the sacked fed employees could fill open positions with the city.

quincunx wrote: ↑

Mar 05, 2025

Hate to say it, but perhaps some of the sacked fed employees could fill open positions with the city.

Maybe. They'd be taking a massive pay and benefits cut though.