Downtown St. Louis has made as little progress in urban revitalization as any big city downtown I have been visiting over the last twenty-five years, despite a number of high-profile projects, like Union Station, and the continued success in a number of other St. Louis neighborhoods, like the Central West End, Grand Center, Lafayette Park and Laclede’s Landing. It is significant that the Downtown does come alive, to a certain extent, on the nights of Cardinals games. But when there is no game, both at night and during the day, the streets and sidewalks of the Downtown are dead.
There are a number of contributing factors to this, beyond the impact of the car and the “white flight” that affected so many post-industrial downtowns in the 1960’s and after. First is how far apart from each other active uses are in the Downtown. Many of the streets, particularly Market, are quite wide. Those streets have little shade. Building entrances, particularly those of structures built after 1960, are far apart – and those buildings have only one pedestrian entrance, limiting the level of visible pedestrian activity. Ground floor retail is unusually discontinuous. The St. Louis climate is particularly hostile to outdoor activity year round. A high level of heat and humidity dissuades pedestrians from remaining outdoors for about half the year. With a serious lack of shade – even in parks and plazas – as a result of very limited tree cover. The city’s major tourist attraction, The Gateway Arch, is set off from the downtown by an at-grade highway, and the classic Dan Kiley landscape around it (which has recently been extensively restored), tends to preference design over people and is generally forbidding. Finally, St. Louis may continue to be the most racially segregated big city in America.
BUILD CRITICAL MASS
But the situation is by no means hopeless – and the required initial placemaking fixes do not, for the most part, require major capital improvements in order to make substantial progress toward improved vitality. The key concepts for Downtown St. Louis involve creating a critical mass of activity around a focal point and creating an environment that prioritizes pedestrians over cars. Given EMB Development’s extensive site control at 7th and Washington Avenue – that corner is an excellent candidate to become the center of placemaking work in order to create a critical mass of pedestrian activity. EMB should focus on moving as much activity from the inside to outside. Retail leasing should be made as continuous as possible. Movable tables and chairs should be as contiguous along store fronts as possible. Any planters enclosing tables and chairs should be in line and as close to the curb as legally permitted. If incentives can be created to get people to sit at the tables, like coupons or free stuff, they should be. A full court press should be put on to create visible activity on the sidewalks adjacent to this corner from noon to 8PM, six days a week. Do not dissipate these efforts with energy spent on other places – until a level of critical mass of activity has been secured at 7th and Washington. When that has occurred, the process of spreading out activity slowly can begin, both towards shoulder hours and adjacent blocks. Additional ideas for sidewalk animation at this location include:
- Find an ice cream retailer
- Sidewalk misters for the summer and propane heaters in the winter
- Decorative lighting (as much as possible hung from streetlights, trees, awnings, etc.)
- Extend activity out into curb lane with parklets and tables and chairs.
- Make sure areas subject to sun have umbrellas and other shade structures
- Maximize visibility of horticultural maintenance with higher levels of activity, uniforms and customer service training for workers.
- Increase density of sidewalk plantings and improve the quality and upkeep of planters, trash baskets and other street furniture.
- Eliminate derelict and outdated street furniture.
MARKETS
One major asset that Downtown St. Louis already has is Cardinals games – and it needs be to leveraged by attracting Cardinals fans before and after games: and encourage their visitation other than on game nights. The fans should be incentivized to come to 7th and Washington. Ticket holders should be provided with free stuff. The pre- and post-game experience must be better than what fans might have at the Stadium Village. Provide them with free live outdoor entertainment (perhaps riffing on the ‘blues” theme established by the museum). My view is that you must “prime the pump” with activity that the placemaker must initially pay for. In relatively short order folks will be asking, and paying to present in the space – and events can then be curated rather than sponsored. But, this doesn’t self-generate. It has to be induced through initial investments.
A Night Market could be a terrific amenity– beginning on game nights (see http://queensnightmarket.com/). The Queens night market has been an outstanding success – drawing tens of thousands of people to an isolated, third-tier location every week. I would do it on Washington between 6th and 7th. It could involve food trucks or food stands. It could be a greenmarket, one day a week during the day. It would prime the pump and might later be moved into the Laurel, once that is ready. Markets draw people in public spaces – as Soulard demonstrates.
OTHER PUBLIC SPACES
The most animated public spaces I observed during my walk around Downtown were in City Garden, as result of the water features and shade. Keiner Plaza, US Bank Plaza and the other plazas around the Downtown need to be made more active and welcoming. People need to be able to use them. “Keep off the Grass” and “Do not Wade in Fountain” signs need to be removed. Water features should be amped up if at all possible. In a climate like St. Louis’ water features with which kids and adults interact can draw people seven days a week. Tables and chairs need to be put out – with umbrellas, where there is no shade. Food vendors and trucks should be encouraged in the spaces. On a longer term basis, shade trees need to be added to plazas – and to sidewalks (think about my favorite street – the Cours Mirabeau in Aix (http://goo.gl/images/ojsKAC)! The trees, retail, wide sidewalks and tables and chairs create an irresistible public space). Building managers have to get used to the idea of people actually USING their spaces. Additional activity in those plazas also needs to be encouraged – carts with reading material, chess, boules, ping-pong – all of these draw people and require minimal personnel to execute. Thousands of people work downtown and it has taken real effort over a series of decades to persuade them not to come outside or patronize downtown retail.
PEOPLE OVER CARS
Just as building managers need to be persuaded that animating the spaces around their buildings are good for building rent levels, transportation planners need to understand that traffic is actually a good thing! No traffic means no economic activity – and poor quality of life for residents and visitors. It is exactly the opposite of how they have been trained. But what is the point of designing to maximize speed and throughput when no one is coming downtown? In Downtown St. Louis the priority needs to be placed on activation of streets and sidewalks – rather than on speeding up traffic. People need to be prioritized over cars. As discussed, this may mean two-way rather than one-way streets. It might mean giving up curb lanes to pedestrians and widening sidewalks so they can accommodate more seating and horticultural programming. It might call for permitting street closings for markets and festivals. This requires leadership from the top – the Mayor or at least the Transportation Commissioner must send the message that managing streets and sidewalks involves multiple priorities – not just speed and volume of traffic. Traffic engineers and planners need to think about streets and sidewalks as public spaces. Downtown St. Louis should only be so lucky as to have traffic congestion!