St. Louis Beacon covers NorthSide: Past development projects have some clues

The beacon has a well researched and nuanced article covering the NorthSide development through the eyes of several experienced local figures and the Authour of Mapping Decline: St. Louis and the Fate of the American City. Steve Patterson of UrbanReviewSTL expresses confidence in the outcome of the project, whatever it might be:

“McKee has a good track record of getting the big company headquarters, like MasterCard and Express Scripts,” he noted, “so I think he will end up building something.

This outlook frames the development issue around the responsibility of the developer towards the city at large for job creation and unfortunately neglects any responsibility to the existing residents, or as Richard Ward put it:

You have to be respectful of the people who are still living there, through all the decline that took place over the last 50 years.

Gene Mackey, co-founder of the architecture firm Mackey Mitchell took on the issue of performance and the importance of discrete and objective criteria for the development.

To be successful, because the ambition is so great, there ought to be some milestones that allow it to be achievable, things that can stand on their own. That way, he ultimately might get to where he’s going. A lot of things can happen over 20 years; a lot of things are going to change. So the plan he puts forward for a 20-year ambition is probably going to change. Does that mean we shouldn’t be ambitious? No. But it’s such a long reach to pull it off that I’m a little concerned about the staying power of a development business pulling it off over that period of time.

In the face of a two decade long development cycle, citizen participation is absolutely necessary. While McKee is experienced at developing corporate campuses and institutional projects the bulk of the development area is slated to be residential. The amount of change that could happen in terms of demands on residential markets and in terms of personal values over two decades is considerable. Continued resident participation in the process will help to soften whatever changes will occur and help the developer anticipate changes in demand and build accordingly.

We taxpayers must demand the milestones that Mackey references. If the city is to be on the hook for $205,000,000 up front (or roughly 25% of the annual budget) we, as the funders of that money have a right to hold a stake in that process. With so much public money involved we should be able to hold Mr. McKee to the promises that have been made thus far and to force additional performance criteria to make the area a paradigm of sustainable and inclusive urbanism. A development such as this happens once in a century and we must not waste this opportunity. Finally, exisitng residents must have a say in the criteria for the development. Those that have lived through the stunning decline of the neighborhood can best help prevent a recurrence.

If you were to design the perfect neighborhood what would it be like?