In this meeting we heard about the history of housing in FPSE and Kingshighway site, and heard from NorthPoint Development on their proposal for apartments in the neighborhood.

Meeting Called to order (Dan Doelling)

(Note: Mic system was not working and Zoom audio and video was not recorded)

FPSE Neighborhood Business

Treasurer’s Report (Dan Doelling)

  • January 2024 Review
    • Expenses: $15.99 (for Zoom)
    • Revenue: $240.00 (dues and donations)
    • Ending Cash: $2,028.23
  • Membership Dues
    • General Membership dues start over in new year.
    • Dues are pay-what-you-can.
    • Members get voting privileges.
    • How to pay

Neighborhood Events (Dan Doelling)

  • Tree Pruning: Each 1st Sunday of the month, 10am-12pm, from November – April
    • Tools and certified arborist coordination provided by STL Neighborhood Foresters 
    • Upcoming Dates
      • March 3 – Meet at the southwest corner of Chouteau Park (Chouteau Ave and Newstead Ave). We will be cleaning up the honeysuckle at the north end of the park.
      • April 7 – Location TBD
      • Stay updated on our website, Facebook, & email
    • Previous Dates
      • November 5 – Chouteau Ave & Taylor Ave, Gibson Ave & Taylor Ave
      • December 3 – FPSE Dog Park @ Chouteau Park
      • January 7 – Corner Garden at Gibson Ave and Tower Grove Ave
    • Monthly Clean-up: Each 4th Saturday at 10am, from March – October 
      • Meet at Manchester Ave and Newstead Ave
      • 2024 Dates
  • March 23  – Next clean up!
      • April 27
      • May 25
      • June 22
      • July 27
      • August 24
      • September 28
      • October 26
  • Event Committee: Join!
    • Help plan events, design flyers, coordinate events, draft sponsorship opportunities.
    • To join and/or for more information, send an email to forestparksoutheast@gmail.com

History of the Western Edge (Sarah Kogan and 9th Ward Alderman Michael Browning)

The slide deck of this presentation can be found here.

  • Pre-1930s: No Highway
    • The area now known as Forest Park Southeast (FPSE) was originally planned as a suburb.
    • There was no highway (Interstate 64), and the streets were seamlessly connected.
  • Visual: aerial view of the neighborhood
    • 1930s: The Beginning of the Highway
      • The city population started moving westward, but there was pressure from city officials that to maintain downtown as the center of the city.
        • An express highway was planned and implemented – one of the earliest in the country.
        • FPSE was the only neighborhood impacted by the original construction of the expressway. Ultimately, 135 parcels were needed for the right-of-way, which displaced over 600 people.
  • Visuals:
  • Aerial view of the expressway – some familiar landmarks include Lambskin Temple, Central Institute for the Deaf, Laclede Gasometers.
  • View of Kingshighway overpass, gasometer in the background; very dense housing in this area.
  • Boyle overpass – housing on both sides – this divide was part of the “damage” that the express highway caused.
  • 1960s: The Expansion of the Highway 
    • In the 1950s, planning began for a widening project of the expressway to turn it into an interstate: to widen each side of the highway,, traffic improvements to make it easier to get onto the highway w/ cloverleaf, and changed the path of Kingshighway.
    • This expansion annexed space from Forest Park and (what is now known as) FPSE.
      • 65 buildings in this area were torn down.
  • 2000s: 
    • Over time, the cloverleaf was dangerous for semi-trucks.
    • In 2002, the ramps access ramps were redesigned for a single point interchange, which would take up a smaller footprint.
  • Land Assembly: Kingshighway Properties
    • 2002 – Citi U company bought several properties in order to rehab them. They applied for historic tax credits, but did not get them. So they sat on the properties, and eventually decided to sell their properties to KH Ventures.
    • 2007 – KH Venture purchased the properties. The 2006 / 2008 financial crisis ruined their plans and they also let the properties sit.
    • 2008 – Drury Hotels had a grand vision of building a flagship hotel.
      • Their model is hotels directly accessible from the highway. They would have needed to build a frontage road.
      • The first property they bought was the old Green Memorial Church, and begins to acquire several properties.
    • 2010 – The new interstate exchange officially opens up.
    • 2014 – 2015 – Drury buys more properties – KH Ventures sells to Drury
    • 2016 – WashU buys the MoDOT land from the state
      • Drury continues to acquire properties.
    • January 2020 – Drury buys their last property in FPSE
      • Drury had an option to buy land from a woman when she dies – she died in 2021.
    • 2020 – COVID-19 disrupts the hospitality industry  – Drury wanted to divest any unnecessary holdings and began to divest from our neighborhood.
    • 2021 – Drury sold to Lux Living
    • 2023 – NorthPoint Development acquires the properties
  • Proposals over the Years: 
  • 2008-2021 – Drury – (2) 16 story towers, 345 rooms each, with a large surface parking lot in the middle, and underground parking. They planned to move the church and use it as a lobby – would have required the demolition of a lot of buildings.
  • 2007-2013 – KH Ventures – When they couldn’t do what they wanted to do, they started marketing as different options to potential sellers and eventually sold to Drury.
  • Drury rented out some of the properties they bought (the ones that could obtain occupancy permits), but let anything they planned to demo later rot.
  • 2019 – 4559 Oakland Ave – demolished by neglect and required an emergency demolition for safety concerns.
  • The Kingshighway properties fell further and further into disrepair (Visual: comparative photos)
  • After “decades” of disinvestment and the buildings have deteriorated quite rapidly.
    • The demolition that started yesterday is an emergency demolition – they were falling apart quite rapidly – we didn’t want to see a fire, see someone hurt, or the buildings fall onto Kingshighway.
  • 2020 Lux Living
    • A large podium apartment building.
    • During neighborhood engagement, their reputation caught up with them. There were lots of stories about how they build and maintain their buildings and treat their tenants.

Neighborhood Vision and Form-Based Code (Sarah Kogan and 9th Ward Alderman Michael Browning)

  • FPSE Form-Based Code was developed after a series of community engagement workshops between 2014-2018.
  • “Neighborhood Vision” – FPSE settled on a series of criteria that would guide development in the area – new construction and new use in the area – to make sure it aligned with the neighborhood’s goals.
  • Some of the goals:
    • A dense, walkable neighborhood that is car-optional
    • Create a sense of identity (i.e. “The Grove” signs)
    • Value transit access
  • This resulted in the FPSE Form-Based Code (FPSE FBC), also known as City Ordinance 70732
    • FPSE FBC items relevant to the proposed development along Kingshighway:
      • The land along Kingshighway was designated as “neighborhood core” – a requirement for density 
        • An ideal place to build dense and car-optional living, that required a minimum building height of 3 stories, max of 7 stories – “something that doesn’t tower over the neighborhood”
      • Parking minimum – there can be up to 1 parking spot per unit – to create car-optional feel
    • In St. Louis City and across the U.S., construction of new housing has not caught up to the setback during the Great Recession
      • Supply is going down, but demand is the same, so prices go up.
  • Visual: Map of permit issued in the Midwest
  • St. Louis City Census Housing Data:
    • 1990: 194,919 housing units
    • 2020: 176,955 housing units
    • Some causes of housing unit decline: demolitions, conversions of 2 family to single family residences.
    • We are losing housing faster than we are gaining housing.
  • How to “combat” housing decline: provide more housing.
    • Example: Minneapolis
      • The changed building zoning.
      • The result: rents have been dropping relative to inflation, while they’ve been going up in every other city.
  • “This is a very desirable neighborhood.”
  • “As your alderman, the grim reality is, if we continue to lose population, we are not going to be able to afford services for the city.
  • “Key takeaways:”
  • The highway demolished over 200 homes and displaced nearly 1000 people.
  • These two sites have seen speculation, neglect, and abuse by previous actors.
  • The FPSE FBC and the neighborhood vision planned for dense development on these sites.
  • When we don’t build new housing, the current housing becomes unaffordable.

NorthPoint Development and Neighborhood Development Partners (NorthPoint Team and Zimmers)

  • Introductions:
    • Derek Zimmer and Toni Zimmer
  • Moved to the neighborhood in 2020 and have been fortunate enough to acquire and rehab a large portion of the properties at the western end of the neighborhood, adjacent to the proposed development.
  • Last August, Lux Living contacted Derek about purchasing the remainder of the properties.
  • Considered rehabbing them, but they have been sitting vacant and neglected over the years, which makes it tougher to renovate. In such a hard condition and economic landscape, it would be difficult to renovate them 1 by 1.
  • They decided to see if there was a partner that they could bring in to join the project and reached out and found out about NorthPoint.
  • This project means a lot to Derek and Toni.
  • Over the course of 3-4 years, they have seen that corner transform into something that we love.
  • They are looking forward to continue to do things for this neighborhood and the growth for the city
  • Northpoint has been a good partner so far – they chose this location to start working in St. Louis.
  • NorthPoint Project team:
    • Brad Haymond – VP of Development – Multi-Family
    • Jennifer George – Vice President of Development
    • Mark Militzer – Project Manager – Regional Vice President, Midwest Region
    • Rachel and Shannon – Civil Engineers
  • Company background
  • Based in Kansas City
  • Primarily industrial real estate development, but have done everything from renovating historic towers to development in the suburbs.
  • In the KC metro area, they have 5,000 “luxury” apartment units
  • NorthPoint builds “luxury” multifamily – that’s what they know, that’s what they develop.
  • Proposed Development:
    • Phase 1: Apartment building (no retail) @ location of historic buildings
    • Existing historic buildings currently under demolition. They will be managing the dust and try to be as least disruptive as possible.
    • 150 units (ranging from studio to 2 bedroom)
    • 1:1 parking ratio – 2 levels – each level with its own street access, to maximize the use of space (vs. shared street access and losing space to internal ramp)
    • Phase 2: Apartment building (no retail) @ Former MoDOT / Current WashU land near highway interchange
    • Not currently under contract on that and not in a place to do any work on that proposal.
    • Why this site? Why the neighborhood core?
    • The biggest thing is being able to finance a project. Some of the past developers were not able to do that. NorthPoint needs to have a certain amount of density of units in order to support having employees/management on site everyday.
    • Timeline
    • November 2023: Purchased the property
    • Pre-development (zoning, preliminary site plan/elevations, platting, and changes to alleyways, traffic study, variances)
    • This phase can go on for a very long time. This schedule can be 6 months, 18 months, 5 years, depending on the authority having jurisdiction, so NorthPoint cannot give a detailed date yet of when construction would begin.
    • NorthPoint does this without an architect on board, as that is a very substantial investment of capital at an early stage.
    • Not at a technical level of detail right now – just basic renderings.
    • Renderings
    • (2) renderings – very much the same right now, just to give an idea of the feeling and scale at these locations.
    • Materials: lap siding, stucco, and brick (to reflect the neighborhood and historic textures); metal at parapets
    • Scheme 1: Neutral tones/colors
    • Scheme 2: Darker colors – navy blue, brown tones
    • NorthPoint is hoping for feedback – good, clear direction of where to go.
    • Request meeting attendees to write down feedback and slips of paper that will be collected by the project team.
    • Seeking feedback on:
      • Style
      • Color
      • Modern vs. “Traditional”

Questions:

  • Is Northpoint a long-term holder of properties?
    • “We’ve developed about 18, have sold some, but the ones we’ve sold we continue to manage.”
  • Could the proposal include bus stop improvements?
  • Yes it will – seating improvements.
    • Will there be a connection between Kingshighway and Arco?
    • Clarification from Alderman Browning: No streets will be connected to Kingshighway.
  • There is already a saturation of “luxury” apartments in the neighborhood (Woodward Lofts, buildings along Manchester, Chroma and Hue, the Highland, Green Street projects south of Manchester and near BarK) – instead of “luxury” apartments, could there be more “middle-class” apartments?
    • Building “luxury” apartments is the only way to secure financing.
    • They will be market rate apartments.
    • “We appreciate that you think it’s saturated, but there are a lot of employment opportunities nearby.”
  • Other feedback/questions that will be considered:
    • Will there be public art? 
    • Additional brick? 
    • Artistry work on the exterior?

You can download a copy of this meeting’s minutes below.