This article first appeared in the St. Louis Beacon, March 1, 2013: You know the saying there’s no use crying over spilt milk? Well, what about bricks?
After a tough fight, Saint Louis University got approval to tear down the Pevely Dairy complex at Grand and Chouteau last year, when the Planning Commission reversed the decision by the Preservation Board to protect the site, which is on the National Register of Historic Places, and allow SLU to build a new ambulatory care center.
SLU’s president, Father Lawrence Biondi, told KMOX at the time that shovels were expected to hit ground in the fall.
Today, all but the corner building remains on site. The iconic sign came down in October last year, and what’s left now are passed deadlines, no public plan and lots of questions.
“The way SLU argued for its demolition was so emphatic about how this was the perfect site and the only site they could use,” says Andrew Weil, executive director of Landmarks Association of St. Louis, Inc.
But in a memo that surfaced earlier in the month on NextSTL, SLU’s Department of Internal Medicine’s summary for 2012 includes a section entitled “Remaining Questions.”
“We end the year with some questions still unanswered. One of them is the fate of a much discussed new ambulatory care center. During the last year, a very large tract of land immediately north of Saint Louis University Hospital was cleared in preparation for the possible construction of a new ambulatory care center. At the time of this writing, no plans have been finalized with regard to the exact location of the building, who will occupy it, or how it might be financed. Nonetheless, this initiative remains very important to the future of SLUCare and the University Medical Group.”
Weil, who was among many hoping to see the site preserved and repurposed, thought that while St. Louis would lose something, the city would gain something, too, with the new medical center.
Tuesday marked the deadline for St. Louis University to apply for the permit to tear the final building down, which was contingent on their obtaining a building permit. Now, if and when they solidify plans to build, they’ll have to reapply for a permit to tear the building down and begin the process all over again.
“I think it’s a shame all the way around,” Weil says.
The news of SLU’s lack of a plan or capital for the site surfaced early in February on NextSTL, raising questions about the project.
One year ago, Alex Ihnen, editor and writer for NextSTL, wasn’t sure if Pevely would still be standing today. Regardless, if the space was to be reused, it worked better as a complex, he says.
“It’s a bit of a hollow victory to see one building standing there.”
"It really kind of adds insult to injury," says Randy Vines, on the board of the Landmarks Association and co-owner of STL-Style.
Like Weil, Vines felt dismayed at the missed opportunity in reviving the complex, but accepted that a shiny new medical building would go in its place.
"The public was deceived," he says.
For Vines, the whole fiasco points to a broken government. What's the point of having a preservation board, which did their due dilligence and voted one way, when another city entity can overturn it?
The situation continues 50 years of poor decisions and disenfranchises the younger people working hard to rejuvenate city neighborhoods, Vines says.
Weil’s issues with SLU right now are two-pronged. First, the complex was both an icon and an anchor to the south side of the new bridge, and despite claims by SLU, the buildings there weren’t useless.
Second, at the time, Weil says, SLU claimed this was the only spot for the new medical center. Leading up to the final hearing, Biondi said that if the request wasn’t approved, the medical school would be shut down and moved to a space in west county, according to press reports.
Weil still wants to know why another building had to come down when SLU has other land cleared and ready. As part of the approval they got to tear down the last piece of Pevely, however, was a contingency that they first get a building permit, which is expensive, Weil says.
“Many people think they (the Planning Commission) did that because they didn’t trust that St. Louis University would follow through on their plans,” he says.
Alderman Joe Roddy of the 17th Ward, which includes the site, argued for demolition throughout the process.
“It’s a disappointment that they’ve taken this long,” he says. “But ultimately, I think it’s going to prove to be the right decision.”
In retrospect, Roddy thought approving the demolition of the buildings should have been held off until there was more certainty.
“I was led to believe that the new building was imminent,” he says.
But Roddy is confident that, ultimately, SLU will move forward with a plan and said he met with the school a few weeks ago. Sometimes, he says, historical buildings have to come down in the name of progress, and this is one of those times.
Getting approval again, Roddy thought, would be contingent on SLU’s ultimate plan.
“I think they’re working now trying to develop that,” he says. “They are still actively analyzing what their needs will be and trying to methodically comb through that.”
Weil isn’t sure if the remaining building could be salvaged at this point, with water damage likely taking place on the historic masonry, thanks to damage the building has suffered from surrounding demolition.
He expects that SLU will get a plan together and tear it down, “or the situation will stay like it is right now and everything becomes destabilized and everything becomes demolished.”
That happens if the structure is deemed unsound and a public safety issue. Weil also isn’t sure if, without the entire complex, the site would still remain on the historic register.
When approved last year, he says, the argument was that a new building was coming in place of the old one. Now, much of the site is gone and the corner building damaged.
If their argument no longer exists, he says, “it just seems like it’s lose, lose, lose, lose, lose.”
Ihnen, however, thinks the remaining building could be saved, even if it’s neglected.
“The issue is almost never, can it be saved,” Ihnen says. “It’s: Does the owner want it to be saved, and in this case, they don’t.”
And he expects that if SLU made it through the approval process the first time, they will again.
Clayton Berry, assistant vice president for communications at SLU, wrote in an e-mail to the Beacon that “planning and negotiations are ongoing. Beyond that, we don’t have anything to add at this time.”
“Who know what their long-term plan is,” Weil says. “I don’t think they know. If they do, they haven’t done a good job sharing it with the public.”
They’re not obliged to do so, he adds, but it would be the gesture of a good neighbor.
On Friday, SLU’s law school hosts a symposium called “Saving the Cities: How to make America’s urban core sustainable in the 21st Century,” Weil points out, with experts from around the country speaking on what it means to build a sustainable city and citizen participation in development. SLU has reused some buildings in the dense part of the campus, Weil says, and he doesn’t mean to sound antagonistic or unaware of the good the school has done on several quality rehab projects.
But they’re also amassing a lot of land with land banking, and that land is sitting empty right now, he says, along with a historic complex they claimed essential to progress, now mostly in piles of bricks.
“It’s pretty ironic.