Drew Langenberg
FOCUS St. Louis
Marketing and Communications Director
Change, they say, is the only constant. I am seeing some changes right now in St. Louis that I hope are part of a larger movement of change, and specifically revitalization on both a large and small scale. The most notable and public projects are: the demolition of the St. Louis Centre Bridge over Washington Avenue, the Arch Design Competition (disclosure: FOCUS St. Louis® is a member of one of the final teams) and the new I-70 interchange.
You can see some good photos of the bridge demolition posted on the vanishingstl blog.
It is important to remember that these projects are not all that is happening in St. Louis. There is a great deal of work being done to revitalize neighborhoods all around the region. These projects may not make headlines but they are just as important to note. Take, for example a beautiful house in the Marine Villa Neighborhood which, according to the
Urban Review STL blog, was rehabbed with the help of federal stimulus dollars.
Sauce Magazine even points out a new grocery Co-op scheduled to open in the Old North neighborhood at the end of this month.
Big projects are great. They can inspire more development and give the larger community and region something to celebrate. But most of the progress, the majority of the change and revitalization in the region won’t be done by one contractor who wins a major job. It will begin with a refurbished home or a new grocery store that helps put a new face on an old neighborhood and helps to make it a more desirable place to live. That development will then, in turn, spur more change and revitalization by neighbors and citizens – the people who will really make change happen.