St. Louis University continues with its tradition of Jesuit humanism and defunct urbanism.

I regret to inform you that, on this blog, St. Louis University will appear as a recurring villain. I can almost assure you of this given its past track record: for every Coronado saved, there's a Livery Stable. And for all the support they've poured into Grand Center, they've given equal or greater force to demolitions in adjacent neighborhoods.

The latest news (presently unverified) is that the next victim on the SLU demo chopping block is the set of "language houses" on Laclede. Laclede was a once residential street (an uncle of mine used to call a brownstone walk-up on Laclede home). Today, SLU has replaced much of the streetscape with mundane campus buildings or their trademark "greenspace" (read: deadspace). So few urban scaled residential buildings remain that, in fact, the language houses of Laclede appear out of the context they once dominated.

According to ever reliable forum members of Urban STL, these venerable buildings will soon be replaced with--who knows? Another failed coffee shop? Another statue? Another grassy knoll? Expect a follow-up report when the time comes.