What Should Be: Call for Forest Park Hospital Site Submissions for St. Louis Zoo

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.