Search This Blog (A.K.A. "I Dote On...")

Tuesday, August 26, 2008

This is the very precise point at which you know your region has been irrevocably damaged by suburban sprawl:

"We would also like the St. Louis Symphony to have a summer home here in Chesterfield," said Kathy Higgins, president of Sachs Properties. Cultural resources like the Missouri Botanical Garden, the St. Louis Zoo, as well as public libraries and parks get funded by tax money from all county residents, Sachs said, but the bulk of them are located within St. Louis City.

"We would like to bring at least pieces of those to other places, to Chesterfield," Higgins said.


Ms. Higgins is helping develop a sterile, suburban downtown for Chesterfield.

And she wants to cannibalize St. Louis's historical institutions for her (and other West Countians') driving convenience.

A bold quote if I've ever read one--and, as stated above, a sure sign that St. Louis has some of the world's worst sprawl.

If a suburbanite hypothesizes about handpicking away tourist attractions from the central city, it show a total disconnect between that suburb and its host region, and especially that suburb's relationship to the central city.

Far too many "St. Louisans" grow up without any urban frame of reference. The city, to them, is but another one of the myriad municipalities in the region.

Well, even in their minds, it is a special municipality--one marked by poverty and crime and undeserving of tourist dollars anyway, likely.

Shameful.

(To end on a more light-hearted note, here is some wackiness from Big Small Town Designs in reference to Chesterfield:



).

0 comments:

Fashion STL Style!

Fashion STL Style!
St. Louis Gives You the Shirt Off of Its Own Back!

Next American City

Next American City
Your Go-To Source for Urban Affairs

Join the StreetsBlog Network!

Join the StreetsBlog Network!
Your Source for Livable Streets

Trust in Rust!

Trust in Rust!
News from the Rustbelt

Dotage St. Louis -- Blogging the St. Louis Built Environment Since 2008

Topics: Historic Preservation, Politics and Government, Development, Architecture, Urban Planning, Urban Design, Local Business, Crime and Safety, Neighborhoods, and Anything Else Relating to Making St. Louis a Better City!