What Should Be

The following image is the first in a series of a community visioning effort by What Should Be and nextSTL. Click the image below to view in more detail (vision by Paul Hohman):

Some added context: St. Louis Zoo to Buy 13.5 Acre Forest Park Hospital Site



(click for link to PDF)

The news that the St. Louis Zoo intends to purchase the 13.5 acre Forest Park Hospital site, south of the Zoo in Forest Park and across I-64, was accompanied by a site plan and rendering that left many unenthusiastic about the acquisition. This site, presently occupied by the mostly empty hospital buildings, is in the city's Clayton-Tamm neighborhood, and located at the southwest corner of Oakland and Hampton Avenues. While many are happy to see this site converted into something that serves one of the region's major cultural and scientific amenities, the initial plan was met with less than an enthusiastic response from the urbanism community. The published images show a lot of new surface parking, and suburban-styled landscape features.

Mention has been made of the frequent traffic congestion problem at the exit ramps from the interstate at Hampton Avenue. While providing additional parking may alleviate parking capacity problems, it may only worsen congestion at the intersection of Hampton Avenue and I-64 as the approach to the zoo from eastern and western reaches of the metropolitan area will not change. This, and other criticism of the proposed plan, should be expected and is not unjustified. The published rendering of the proposed plan shows some dreadfully underutilized portions of the hospital site.

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Much has been said about the need to construct a new healthcare facility in midtown. And much has been said about the need to preserve the Pevely and the urban character it provides to the city and the pedestrian realm. It’s absolutely critical to point out that the two needs are not mutually opposed. The urbanist and preservation communities have no issue with SLU building a medical facility, in fact quite the opposite. The issue is not whether the facility should be built, but where.
 
The neighborhood needs more density and activity, especially at this critical intersection. A new healthcare facility, if designed with sensitivity to the now dwindling urban context, would also heavily contribute to connecting South Grand with Grand Center and creating a unified corridor. Saint Louis University owns large amounts of land in the surrounding neighborhood and could- should be a part of the solution to this fragmentation.
 

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What’s there: A really big hole. A fairly astonishing scene from the high vantage of eastbound I-44, to be sure, and it’s a wonder that an expectedly intact neighborhood like Shaw would be home to such a sizable gash in the otherwise dense fabric. A sole two-family home, at the southwest corner of De Tonty Street and Thurman Avenue, is left to bookend the 600 foot-long absence between the far eastern end of the barren half-block, and what remains of the 1920s era historic street wall at the western end of De Tonty. The five houses anchoring the southeastern corner of De Tonty and Klemm Streets offer clues as to what was recently lost on the 4100 block of De Tonty between Klemm Street and Thurman Avenue but the decrepit stature of the rather young ruin, standing alone at the southwest corner of De Tonty and Thurman, reminds us of what could become of some great St. Louis neighborhoods and has already become of so many others. Though any presumption that this really big hole signals sustained and reckless trends in attempted speculative real estate projects is misplaced, the removal of structures to make way only for options or promises is of questionable wisdom.

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