Don’t Park in Front of Curb Ramps

Earlier in the month I did a post about an illegally parked car block the ADA ramp/curb cut which blocked my flow in the wheelchair and required me to backtrack to get to the other side of 10th street.  I’ve been through the same intersection (10th & St Charles) numerous times since then and it has been clear.  The other day, however, a driver decided to make a space where there wasn’t one — blocking the very same ramp.

This time I was ready — I had programmed the police non-emergency number into my phone.  Thankfully I left my number with the dispatcher as the officer called a short time later and didn’t understand the problem.  After directing the officer to look at the blocked ramp he got it.

I came back through the same intersection two hours later and the car was still blocking the ramp but it was ticketed (the rear tire is centered on the ramp).  A friend suggested it should have been towed.  At first I thought that a bit extreme but upon more thought I agree, had the car been blocking auto traffic they would have towed it very quickly.   Towing the car would have been a better lesson for the owner of this car.

Downtown Business Not So Good for Good Works

The giant ribbon-cutting scissors are barely back in their box and Good Works is pulling the rug on their second location, located on Washington at 9th (Banker’s Lofts). I attended the ribbon cutting on December 13th and I must say it was an exciting time, the ribbon cutting for Flamingo Bowl was later that same day.

Above: Deputy Mayor Barb Geisman, Ald Phyllis Young, the store manager and Jim Cloar from the Downtown Partnership cut the ribbon on December 13th, 2007.

In the Post-Dispatch on the 24th of this month the news of their closing:

In the latest blow to downtown St. Louis, Good Works Inc. will close its home-furnishings store next month due to a lack of new customers.Many of the shoppers who visited the store at 901 Washington Avenue were the same ones who frequented the Good Works store at 6323 Delmar Boulevard in University City, said Chris Dougher, one of the owners. Co-owners Dougher and Rita Navarro plan to expand the store in the Delmar Loop.

“We just aren’t generating new business,” Dougher said of the store on Washington Avenue. “It’s a huge disappointment, but we can’t foresee it changing in the near future.”

The 8,000-square-foot store, which opened in November, was one of the larger retailers to locate downtown in recent years.

The store on Delmar, which sells contemporary furniture and accessories, has been successful since opening at that location about 11 years ago.

The owners decided to open a second store on Washington Avenue because they wanted to be part of the downtown renaissance and thought it would become the next Loop.

However, a soft economy has slowed downtown loft purchases, store openings and retail spending.

On opening day I wrote:

“I wish Good Works the best of luck and hope they do get all the support they need from the city — and some on-street parking out front.”

Just imagine the loop as four traffic lanes and no on-street parking, it would totally kill the vibe that it has. That is what exists in front of the Good Works store on Washington — it is a poor pedestrian & retail environment. To do well they needed lots of customers and the area to the immediate East is a dead zone — so dead the taxi cabs get to use the sidewalk as a taxi stand. The loft crowd just doesn’t walk by this location on the way to get groceries, dinner or drinks. Too few people do walk by. OK, back to parking.

As I’ve written before I think so much of St. Louis is auto centric with too many drive-thrus and surface parking lots measured by the acre. Even downtown it is hard to take pictures without getting a damn parking garage in the image. So how can I be arguing for on-street parking? On-street parking does a number of very beneficial things for an area. First it reduces four traffic lanes down to two — much friendlier. This also helps to slow down the traffic on the street. People parking and getting in/out of their cars & feeding the meter creates activity on the street. And finally having parking in front of the store decreases the perception that downtown has a parking shortage. When someone arrives they may have to park in the next block or two but the fact that someone got to park out front helps give the impression that parking is fairly easy. This is not to say that a few on-street spaces out front would have provided a steady stream of customers but it would have changed the feel of the area for the better. Certainly more Loop-like.
Of course they recognize they were basically stealing customers from their Loop location. Not much you can say about that except it takes a lot of marketing to increase a customer base. The Loop didn’t happen overnight and neither will retail downtown. For many places the rents far exceed the number of customers.

This is why we need to take immediate steps to make downtown more pedestrian/retail friendly. On-street parking needs to be added where it doesn’t exist, add street vendors selling hot dogs, toasted ravioli, t-shirts, whatever. Street performers would also be a nice touch. The sidewalks need life to have a good stream of retail customers. If we are not quick to act I can see much of downtown being just a restaurant zone with very little retail.

San Luis Apartments Not A Good Urban Building

The St. Louis Archdiocese wants to raze the San Luis Apartments next door to The New Cathedral for a 150-car surface parking lot. Local efforts to save the building from the wrecking ball give it more urban credit than it deserves. Yes, it is far more urban than any surface parking lot would ever hope to be.

From a recent West End Word article:

A statement issued by Landmarks’ Board of Directors argued that, “Through curvilinear forms and differentiation of wall materials, the hotel possesses a striking geometric presence. With covered parking placed in the rear away from Lindell Boulevard, the Hotel de Ville promotes the pedestrian-friendly quality of the Lindell streetscape.

This building does nothing to promote pedestrian anything. Parking is actually close to the sidewalk —- the fact the building hovers over the parking doesn’t improve the pedestrian experience in the least. Walk along the sidewalk in front of the building — as you would expect from a structure that started life as a 1960’s motor hotel, the pedestrian is not really considered. You look under the building at parking and the entry is set back behind an auto drive.

The best I can say is that the mass of the building does help anchor that corner — a surface parking lot would simply create a big hole in an area lacking holes in the urban fabric. The forms of the building are pleasant enough but I would not lose any sleep over its demolition.

Asked if the proposal on Lindell Boulevard is an example of the Central West End going backward, Thomas Richter, the archdiocese’s director of buildings and real estate, said, “We don’t think it is a step backward.”

The proposed parking lot “represents an investment in the Central West End” because it shows that Rosati-Kain intends to be in the CWE for the long haul, he said.

A surface parking lot is not an investment! To use such valuable real estate to store cars is such a waste. To spend the kind of dough it will take to buy out the HUD contract, raze and pave the land just for parking is shameful. Is this really the best use of the church’s resources?

There was a time not that long ago when churches were an important part of building the physical community and now all over this city we see church leaders worshiping the automobile by razing structures for parking. How much transportation could the church provide by not razing this structure and instead selling the land. If anything they should seek a developer to build low-income housing to help diversify the neighborhood and provided needed affordable housing.

Parking Nightmare on Halliday Continues!

It has been nearly a year now that residents of one block in the Tower Grove East neighborhood have been dealing with a paved front yard that just won’t go away. Sadly the saga continues. Yet another hearing is scheduled before the board of Adjustment on Wednesday afternoon at City Hall (1:30pm, room 200).

Initially the developer just paved the front yard of the property without proper permits. Since then numerous meetings have been held between residents that objected to having a neighbor’s front yard be nothing but parking. The compromise was to be angled on-street parking. The developer and alderman Conway were pushing for the city to vacate part of the street so that real estate could be deeded to each of the four condo units — a bad idea.  I think someone from the city this would br bad policy so that pu the developer back at trying to pave the front yard for parking — this time applying for a permit in advance.

Currently the space remains unplanted and filled with gravel — condo residents are parking on the gravel area.

This is what we gey when we allow aldermen to play development consultant.

SLU Parking Lot Violates City Rules Governing Location and Materials

As Joni Mitchell sang, “They paved paradise and put up a parking lot.” Last year Saint Louis University (aka SLU) razed a building along Lindell Blvd. The former mansion next door was spared for the moment, likely while they finish raising funds for the expanded law school. In the meantime the university has used the site of the razed building for a parking lot.

This parking lot, an extension of what existed behind the now razed structure, has two characteristics which put it at odds with city regulations on parking lots — first, it extends beyond the established building line and two it is gravel.

This is the same issue we saw over on Halliday St. — with all the buildings aligned the last thing we want to see is a parking lot projecting out in the space between the building line and the public street (sidewalk & roadway). Now, you might say, “hey this is only temporary” and you’d be right. But temporary for how long, a couple of years? So what happens when a business person in the city wants to put in a temporary parking lot also in front of the building line until they can make other arrangements?

Also at issue here is the material. Numerous others have tried to get away with having gravel only parking lots. Environmentally speaking, the gravel is better than typical asphalt because storm water can seep back into the ground rather than creating more runoff. However, it also looks a bit tacky, especially in such a prominent location.

Here are a few additional pictures:

Perhaps SLU got a variance from the city to allow the parking to extend beyond the building line and be of gravel for a limited period of time. While I’d like to think that SLU would take such steps when not complying with the rules I’m guessing that is not the case. I’d also like the think the city would not allow SLU to step out of line given they don’t allow others to do the same.  The main SLU campus is located in the city’s 19th Ward.