Gary_Kreie

I travel to the Detroit area frequently to Troy and Sterling Heights. Those areas are very nice and I'm getting to like the metro area. I disagree with your comments about St. Louis and Cincy. St. Louis frequently ranks high in most livable, best for young people, most affordable, etc. Although the old "city" of St. Louis ranks high in the "city" crime list, it is a statistical fluke since the city is only 12% of the metro area (300K of 2.8 million) and happens to encircle the only high crime area. The entire St. Louis metro area is not even in the top 100 worst metro areas for crime in the Morgan Quitno metro list. I went to Cincinnati for vacation a few years ago and had a blast. All three cities are older river cities that could only expand one direction easily which left an older core. But all three have booming loft districts blossoming from the old and beautiful garment district buildings starting to rejuvenate the cities from the core out. These rankings are very simplistic and just divide number A by B without taking into account the wide variety of lifestyles available within a large metro area like Detroit.

Your contributor, Jeang, brought up St. Louis to make a point about density downtown, and I was agreeing, if you re-read my post. And then I went on to update your readers on current things going on in St. Louis, versus the old city Jeang live in long ago, apparenly. Since your contributors brought up St. Louis as an example, check out how your city can also turn thing around quickly with tax credits for historic restoration, as St. Louis has.

Yes. They just fixed the search feature allow cities with a period in them to participate on this board, GRDadof3, if that is your real name. Everyone online is so afraid to use their real names to maintain their anonymity I guess.

I agree with you that for a downtown to thrive, it needs lots of foot traffic and people. That usually means people living downtown or very near downtown or with easy access. You probably have not been to downtown St. Louis lately, or you would know about the loft boom going on there in the old garment district and other areas of downtown. The downtown St. Louis population is booming now, and they are starting to get the foot traffic and restaurant scene you refer to. I was there last weekend and car traffic was light, but the restaurants were packed, even with no baseball, football, or hockey in town. Centene corporation just announced it is moving its headquarters to downtown St. Louis in Ballpark Village with 2 new 30 story towers. Wachovia's just bought AG Edwards west of downtown and is moving its Richmond Securities operations there to merge with AG Edwards facilities. The downtown mall you mentioned couldn't compete with the suburbs, but it is being replaced with a large condo and office complex with retail on the first level streets. Hotels construction is everywhere and a new Four Seasons hotel high rise opens downtown in December. St. Louis aspires to having a Boston-style downtown and is getting there faster than anyone would have predicted 8 years ago. St. Louis City got some bad PR for crime, but the Morgan Quitno "cities" report has been largely discredited by the FBI for its "cities" methodology. St. Louis City is only 12% of the metro population, and happens to contain all the metro area core crime pockets, and none of the lower crime suburbs. So the crime rate is distored compared to other cities, such as Houston, whose core crime is diluted by inclusion of suburbs in its vast city limts. In Morgan Quitno metro-area rankings, St. Louis is ranked much better -- #129, vs. #22 for Houston, I believe -- more what you would expect for a stable Midwestern city.

St. Louis has Amtrak service including multiple trains to Chicago each day, as well as Kansas City, and service to Texas via the Texas Eagle. Also, St. Louis is just finishing construction of the new Multi-Modal center downtown near Union Station and the Scottrade Center on I-64 to link Metrolink Light Rail, Amtrak, City Buses, and Inter-City Bus Routes in one central terminal.

The Gateway Arch in St. Louis is 630 feet high (and 630 feet wide). And that has been established as the height limit for all buildings in Downtown St. Louis. That is why St. Louis has a number of skyscrapers just a few feet short of that limit, but none higher. I believe the KC company made their tall building come out to be 632 feet to make sure it surpassed the Arch and therefore would be the tallest building in Missouri. But you can't judge a skyline by tall buildings alone. There are a lot of skylines with tall buildings that look alike to people who don't live there. I'm not sure I could pick KC's skyline out of a lineup with Minneapolis, Charlotte, Atlanta, Houston, Denver, LA, etc. unless they can get something in the foreground to give me a hint, like Union Station. But the St. Louis skyline is unmistakable.

The newest Metrolink Light Rail Line in St. Louis opens tomorrow. Rides are free on the new portion for the weekend. If you know St. Louis, this new line T's off the current line at Forest Park and goes West and then South to link up Washington University, U City, Clayton, Galleria/The Boulevard, Richmond Heights, The Grove, Brentwood, Maplewood, Webster Groves, and Shrewsbury. It currently ends near I-44 almost within walking distance of Ted Drewe's Frozen Custard. All the bus routes have been re-designed to utilize the new branch and will start on the new service Monday. St. Louis MetroLink Map with New Branch New Transit Map with New Shrewsbury Metro-Link Light Rail Branch

Here is an aerial view of the new Cross County extension to the St. Louis -- Illinois Metro Link Light Rail System. This extension will open in October of this year 2006. It starts at the current Forest Park station and branches to West to Clayton, and then South to Maplewood, Webster Groves, and Shrewsbury. St. Louis MetroLink Light Rail -- New CrossCounty Extension