urbanSTL

markinlondon wrote:Lighting:

Architecture: (OK?.maybe I?m pushing it a bit here)

Once most of the old buildings have been converted to lofts downtown, fill in the holes with new building with diverse architecture. Look to Barcelona and Antoni Gaud? for inspiration. Antoni Gaud? and other architects buildings in Barcelona are simply amazing. It seems that when something new is built in St. Louis, it is usually made to complement the more traditional styles. Why not mix it up? London is an excellent example of old and new mixed together. Modern terraced condos and lofts are being built up and down the Thames River in London. Something like this in St. Louis would offer great views if build along the Mississippi River.



Also, I would love to see a ticker tape parade down Washington Avenue. Maybe St. Louis will get one this fall!

MarkinLondon's ideas on architecture for this city are great. We should try and have property built on the Mississippi. I know it's hard with possible flooding, but the river is a signature mark of StL and is the environmental beauty that we can use as a beacon to the rest of the country and world.



London's location as a city makes for a great comparison for things we can do. I mean their environmental eye opener is the river Thames, and we can do well to observe and model some (NOT all) of their use of the river. I especially like their Millenium bridge (the pedestrian only bridge).



Also, getting a architect to make some masterpieces like Gaudi did for Barcelona would be great. Not only does it beautify the city but it can make st. louis into a tourist destination for the country.



Also, I third Xing's motion of creating a Shopping District. That is a big time MUST.

I think St. Louis needs to pay homage to the shoe industry somehow. Also maybe something about being the Mound City. That seems to be a forgotten distinction that the city was once known for.



Finally, I think a really cool sculpture made of St. Louis's signature red brick would be a great monument to our beautiful city.

1. Bring back 2 - 4 street car lines.

I truly believe that this would be the single best thing St. Louis could do. A street car line down grand is a no brainer (even with the new medians - it should still be able to work - the cars would just have to compete with traffic). A street car line connecting soulard and Lafayette square with the convention center and hopefully - old north St. Louis. Another line connecting the west end with U city and Forest Park.

St. Louis is a city with great assets - but those assets are disconnected and separated by vast amounts of urban waste. How many conventions would we get if one could walk out of the convention center - hop onto a street car and/or metro link - and visit soulard, Lafayette square and the central west end?

An aside: I naturally support Joe Edwards' plan to run a street car from the loop to the history museum ... but why not extend the line just a bit further to the west end? Imagine a street car running from the loop to the history museum .. then down lindell all the way to Euclid ... North up Euclid to Delmar and then back down Delmar to U City? It would connect with two metro link stops (forest park and U City) and link two of the city's premier areas together.



2. Keep the street cars and metro link open till 3 am on the weekends. Reasoning is obvious ... more and better night life (not to mention safer night life).



3. Light up Eads bridge. Again a no -brainer.





4. Create some sort of tax incentive program to encourage the conversion of surface lot parking into actual parking garages - with architectural standards and hopefully street level retail.



5. create some sort of tax incentive to develop vacant urban lots. I believe these are currently addressed with Brownfield development incentives ... but whatever system we have appears to need a re-working.



6. Encourage development on the Eastern side of the river. A housing boom on the east side will make the old down town area more central and hopefully allow it to regain its "central business district status."



7. Focus on the cultural institutions that St. Louis already has (which are many) and try to concentrate them in Grand Center. I would love to see the Rep (currently in Webster) open up a theatre down by the black rep and the fox. Why not a Wash U student theatre - a Slu theatre - a combination student theatre? Could we encourage st. Louis artists to live in the area with tax breaks for artists? Could we encourage local st. Louis radio stations to set up shop in the area? Maybe even encourage Wash U, SLU and Webster to build housing and studio space for their art students in the area (wouldn't it be to their advantage to have a thriving "arts" community to market to their potential students?) - St. Louis has the assets to build a world class arts community - we just need to corral them. Once you concentrate them all into a small area interaction occurs, ideas blossom and a real, thriving arts community is born.



8. Talk Nelly into opening up a studio in grand Center. He's pro-St. Louis. He might do it.



9. Convince the local universities to require more public performance from their arts students. I have this vision of every music grad being forced to form a band of some sort and play locally before being allowed to graduate. It would seem to benefit everyone - and could lead to a much more dynamic music scene. Maybe we could even require them to play at certain specific clubs .. in grand center hopefully.



anyway - that?s it ... I have to get back to work

Murals on the exposed sides of buildings.



Bodegas, more street vendors, more street performers.



Less parking.

1) Make Riversplash a permenant summer event, it was most definitely a crowd pleaser.



2) How about a concert stage at the Gateway mall, not just for music but outdoor plays



3) Somehow encourage people to pick-nic ( is that spelled right) in the open areas such as Gateway mall and the green areas along Market St and of course the Arch grounds.



4) I agree bringing back the trolleys would be excellent



5) You can never have to much light downtown at night



6) RETAIL! RETAIL! RETAIL!, We have to increase the retail business downtwon not just unique shops but big name companies.

something done in other cities like Minneapolis is having every weekend on Sat. or Sun. a small farmers market type of deal.

I always thought it would be cool to re-paint the old ads on the sides of the buildings in the garment district. How cool would that be?

Repaint the fading Switzer sign on the landing. Now that they are back in business, maybe they would pay for it to be redone.

STLgasm wrote:I always thought it would be cool to re-paint the old ads on the sides of the buildings in the garment district. How cool would that be?

I thought there was actually a group that looked into this several years back... researching original color palettes, etc...

something done in other cities like Minneapolis is having every weekend on Sat. or Sun. a small farmers market type of deal.

AKA: Soulard Market

Not only market Soulard Market and other farmer's markets as a tourist stop, but we need a district (like an artist district) that possibly adjoins soulard or can self stand that is for arts/crafts/music maybe on the weekends and as it grows can be an all year type of thing. Maybe this can come out of the Delmar Loop more as it grows east.

Street car from Edward Jones Dome along Broadway to Soulard.

This came to me last night, Blockbuster video, the closest one is on Lindell in the CWE, having one dowtown would be very nice, and were is our Downtown Walgreens, in the burbs they are like McDonalds, one every mile or so, we need prescriptions too.

There is a Walgreens in the St. Louis Center Mall, which is very convenient other than the hours. There is also a Medicine Shoppe (I believe that is the name) on Tucker. They are much more desireable than Walgreen's in my opinion. There are places to get necessities downtown, contrary to what most people think.





......and yes, a video rental place would be nice. Unfortunately the one place you could rent videos (Farrago (sp?) on Washington) is closing.....but that is another thread on this list

MattH wrote:There is also a Medicine Shoppe (I believe that is the name) on Tucker. They are much more desireable than Walgreen's in my opinion.

From what I last heard, the Medicine Shoppe on Tucker and St. Charles has closed. I have also heard that the <A HREF="http://www.urbanstl.com/viewtopic.php?t=566">Washington Avenue Post</A> at 1310 Washington Avenue will sign for some deliveries from other Medicine Shoppe locations for those who still get their perscriptions filled through them. For anyone who hasn't been to the Washington Avenue Post, is a sort of coffee bar/Internet caf?/office supply shop.

I've been dying for a street car/trolley line for several years now. I think trolley lines from Downtown to Soulard and over to Lafayette Square would be HUGE in terms of making these neighborhoods more accessible to tourists. PLUS, for the residents of the Frenchtown area (of which, I am one), I think this would really encourage more locals to travel/visit the downtown amenities.



Our 3 yo twins love trains/metrolink/etc., and as much as we love the stuff w/in walking distance of our home, we'd like to have a more convenient way to get to downtown stuff. We can walk to the Ballpark, but that's about a far as we venture north (on foot). Having the trolley would definitely get us doing more stuff downtown. I know there's "the bus" but for whatever reason, its just not the same.



trolley lines on Grand and connecting the CWE to the Loop should be "musts", as well.

A trolley is vital and it looks like we'll have one in the Loop before downtown. The Loop trolley will run down to the History museum on Lindell which really sets things up.

As for downtown:

We need to run a trolley down to Soulard/Brewery (hint,hint AB) and up either Russel or Sydney but that would be a secondary phase. For an initial downtown line I would link Soulard to the Landing probably by utilizing 4th, 7th, Broadway, Tucker, Olive, and Washington Ave. Let the trolley loop or turn around at both the landing and Soulard areas and have it head south on Broadway (and stay on Broadway when it splits from 7th, this will leave it one block east of the Soulard Market on it's way south. Besides that area is eventually going to solidify a newer area of Soulard, mark my words). Returning back downtown it would run north on 7th which again merges with Broadway and then it merges with 4th. 4th north to Market, east to Tucker, north to Olive, east to 4th again, north to Wash ave. down to the Landing.

I'm no urban planner obviously but tying things together such as the Landing, Soulard, Courthouse, Kiener, and the OPO district wouldn't be a bad start. Maybe with the lids over 70/55 we utilize Memorial instead of 4th but it's just an idea (I'm affraid of Leonor K. Sullivan flooding) . From there we add secondary lines out to midtown (which will become our heart again) down to CWE utilizing Olive/Lindell. Our secondary Soulard line could head out Sydney to Gravois to Grand back into midtown bringing South Grand back into the fold. The possibilities are endless, but a starter line along side the Metro would be an amazing coup for the Lou(p)!

1) have concerts at the arch grounds during the summer



2)Develop the gateway mall west of Kiener or fix it up into something resembling a park(I like the ice rink idea)



3) Lid over depressed section/make Memorial drive less of a pedestrian death trap



4) moratorium on new parking garages (unless on surface lot)



5) build one way MetroLink loop downtown see here. This can be used later as a feeder for north/southside lines and the existing system.



6) Convert wider throughfares into two-way streets and better signal timing



7)Finally, convert St Louis Centre into condos with street level retail and a Rams/football Cards Hall of Fame

I've noticed that the "Walk / Don't Walk" signs seem to operate as if they don't really think people are walking at all. You have to push buttons to get them to let you know whats up in some areas. Others, you just have to look at the lights and figure it out. Why can't they improve this? How hard can this be?

MattH wrote:There is a Walgreens in the St. Louis Center Mall, which is very convenient other than the hours.

I did not know there was one in the Center, perhaps because I haven't been there in a few years. I should go there sometime and see what is left.

I always thought another awe inspiring monument was needed downtown. This was always an idea of mine (some I keep to myself, not sure why) place this in the middle parcell of land between gateway tower and the civil courts, make it a round-about or a plaza. But I'd also like to see this across from the Grand Basin as well. Torn, I am. I believe it was 120ft.







Also thought I'd throw in a photo of the vendor area in Pioneer Courthouse Sq. in Portland, something Keiner could use. (Starbucks)

And while eating downtown today I though planting ivy on the walls of the Keiner garages might just do the trick (like to see some ivy on the old courthouse as well).

That is the perfect pic, ibleedlou. I've always thought of Pioneer Square as Kiener done right. Notice that there's no grass, the space is not passive. It's very welcoming, and the vendor stands are a great addition.

It's not even that hard to do. The building for the starbucks is very simple, but it adds so much. Add some nice pavers to the grassy areas, and Kiener Plaza would be completely transformed. I have extensive experience with pavers and landscaping, so I'd even volunteer to help out with landscaping. If the materials were provided, I bet others would volunteer to help out with the landscaping too. The building could be built based on the proceeds from rent. All of the flowers being put in downtown are being paid for through an online auction on kmox.com. The same type thing could be done with this. Eventually new highrise residential could be built where the kiener garages are, maybe another building next to Gateway One like there was supposed to be, and a new Marriot could be built. All could have street level spaces for shops and restaurants, that open up onto the plaza. There could be so much more life. So much wasted potential.



Sometimes I think about things too much.

Okay, Here goes:



1. Bring back Commuter Rail. With the Gateway Transport Center now looking like it will be started soon, Begin commuter rail service between downtown as it was proposed a few years ago. There would be a line out to Pacific through Fenton and Valley Park, and a line to Jeff Co. Both of these lines would use existing rail infrastructure and cost very little (realtively) to get up and running; mostly in the way of station construction.



2. Construct a Soccer specific stadium on the East River front for a MSL team. It would give tremendous views of the arch and the DT skyline.



3. Bring back the trolleys! At the very least there should be a Grand Line, a Jefferson Line, a Broadway/Chippewa Line, An Olive/Lindell Line, A Union Line, and a Chouteau/Manchester Line. These Lines Could be routed to connect with the new Gateway Transport Center as well.



4. Remove the Gateway Mall between the Old Courthouse and Gateway One. Its a dead zone now anyway. It would be a great spot for 2 new residential towers and a permanent skating rink



5. Remove the exit ramps at Market/Pine from I-64 at Union Station. Look at this waste of developable land here http://maps.google.com/maps?q=st+louis& ... &t=k&hl=en



Finally I love a lot of other people's ideas, especially turning the GenAmerica building into a museum of some sort.