Kurt Groetsch @ OldTasty.com

It’s not a shock to see St. Louis politicians and civic leaders taken to task for their approach to urban redevelopment. After all, this is a city that’s falling over itself to tear down the historic Century Building (built in 1896, pictured above) to make way for a new 1,050-space parking garage. Never mind that this new garage would be a block away from two new parking garages, neither of which is fully occupied, and catty corner from a similarly-sized vacant parcel of land, owned by the city and slated for “urban green space.” However, this article (~350k .pdf file) by Roberta Brandes Gratz in the Fall edition of the Planning Commissioners Journal illustrates the point in sharp relief, and vividly illustrates why building garage after garage is so counterproductive.