Updates
(07/27/2019)
Yikes…
(02/22/2019)
Kirkwork’s design seems to be a pretty solid one. The structure is built to the street with parking limited to the sides and rear of the building. While dual curb cuts onto Big Bend (one on either side of the building) are less than ideal, they do represent an improvement from the previously existing four. The loss of the small house facing prospect in favor of surface parking is quite not ideal but the parking has to go somewhere and its better there than in front of the structure. The plan also calls for a reduction in parking spaces from the required 58 down to 54, the addition of trees and a five bicycle bike rack.
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Original Story
(02/16/2019)
On Thursday February 21st Kirkwood’s city council will hear a request for the approval of site plan for a project that has largely remained under the radar and out of the news. The Webster-Kirkwood Times has not run a story on the project and yard signs opposing the development have not been made manifest. But big news is not required for a big development, just a simple council majority vote. If local developer Steve Meskill has his way next Thursday that council will take its first steps taken towards approval of a major new office building on Big Bend near Kirkwood road.
The development in question has been preliminarily named Kirkwork and has designs on the four plots along Big Bend (10727-10741) beyond Honey Pit BBQ and a single plot along Prospect (126 Prospect). While Kirkwork is currently branded as a co-working space and theoretically differentiated from an otherwise crowded market the development will be entering an area with a recently shaky commercial leasing track record. All three units of the recently completed retail strip just East along Big Bend and profiled here remain un-leased while over 12,000 square feet of office space a half mile down Kirkwood Road from Meskill’s site and significant space recently vacated by St. Anthony’s are available in the large office/medical building directly across the street from the proposed development.
A Broader Vision
If you came here for details, 1) you should probably find a different news source because 2) that’s all Ive got for you; but, if you’re a big picture kind of person, an idealist perhaps, keep reading. To view this project in isolation would be, in my opinion, a mistake. This proposed Kirkwork development lies within a very peculiar area of Kirkwood: An area part light industrial, part offices, part restaurants, part retail, and part storage. Kirkwood’s planning department, seemingly recognizing the misfit nature of this part of town, has drawn up materials to try and lure investment and development in the area marketing it as “The Triangle”. Nonetheless, it is an area seemingly without a plan. But rest assured, I’m going to try to give it one.
What we already have is a light-industrial business park. The properties facing Big Bend are largely comprised of former houses that have been converted into small businesses, at the corner intersection sits Honey Pit BBQ and on either side of Prospect Road and across the tracks sprawls a combination of semi-industrial properties, offices and —perhaps the only thing that would attract people that didn’t have business there to the area— Seeds of Happiness’s studio and retail shop. While this combination is admittedly not very glamorous, it has two things going for it: relative affordability and a proximity to some fairly dense residential areas. Affordability in Kirkwood is rare. Cool restaurants open in seedier parts of town for a reason. Rent is too high in Kirkwood for us to breed cool new experiments and experiments that turn into destinations. That’s the reason we get proven concepts like Billy G’s and Mod Pizza instead of the Seoul Tacos, Balkan Treat Boxes or Pizza Heads of the world. Affordability is important in attracting creative people and socio-economic diversity in Kirkwood too. The only question is where would they live; let’s address that.
Adding Density
The only reason to put any effort into making a district out of The Triangle or the larger Prospect Industrial area is if there is simultaneously a plan to add residential density either within the Prospect area itself or right at its periphery. While there is plenty of space to add residential, some areas have more potential than others. One of the most likely candidates is a greenfield sight just to the north of the tracks that falls within the footprint of current residential zoning.
Formerly home to two single family residential houses, it’s now just a rather large lot, on a neighborhood street, in the Kirkwood school district, ready for its next chapter in the sun. This site however has a few problems we must address first: First, it is comprised of two separate plots that would both require rezoning and secondly, and more significantly the owners of the single family homes that currently surround this site would likely push back on a new development just as much if not more than those surrounding the recently proposed Big Bend apartments further West. I don’t, however, think it’s a complete non-starter for a few reasons.
First, it’s not like a denser form of development would be entirely out of context. Non-single family residential usages (in the form of Manor Grove, Rose Hill apartments, Woodmont Apartments) all exist fairly close by. Secondly, this property backs up directly to an industrial building, not exactly the platonic ideal for a big new house. With that being said, there are plenty of surface lots and low productivity single story buildings on the southern side of the tracks that could also be developed into 3-5 story apartment buildings with even less NIMBY resistance, because, well, this area is currently in non one’s back yard.
Heal the Grid; Improve Walkability
Perhaps the single biggest improvement that could be made of this section of Kirkwood is the healing of the street grid that is currently cut off by dead ends and train tracks. While adding more streets might seem counter intuitive to this blog’s agenda, a more complete grid spreads out traffic over many routes instead of bottlenecking it along one or two (Geyer & Kirkwood both of which are susceptible to backups due to trains) by giving drivers alternate options. With that being said, I propose that Harrison be extended to Big Bend and Prospect extended to that new stretch of Harrison. These extensions do not necessarily have to be suitable for cars (although the Prospect-Big Bend connection should probably be). Walkable and bikeable routes would at the very least aerate the currently very isolated area and make new uses, restaurants, retail, etc., more plausible. This is especially the case if this expanded grid is pursued in addition to added residential density.
Even if this area is not destined to become a retail dining or residential destination, it at the very least will remain an underrated employment center for the community. With that in mind, immediate and significant upgrades are needed to make access to the Metro bus are needed. Sidewalks would be a start, a bench would be nice and a shelter would be even better. But in any case, a picture like the one above are unacceptable, especially in an area that, unlike perhaps most of Kirkwood, could really use it.
In Conclusion
Kirkwood doesn’t need a new business district. In all honesty, it should focus on the one it has, the economic engine of the area: Downtown. (As an aside, I’m kind of skeptical of this point. While I’m sure downtown Kirkwood does well for the community, I sort of have my doubts that it brings in more tax revenue than say the Manchester corridor with its dealerships, gas stations, grocery stores and car washes or South Kirkwood Road where Target, Walmart, a hotel and a motorcycle dealership are all located and I am similarly skeptical that the quaint downtown supersedes the quality of the school district in why well-to-do families decide to move here, but I have often heard it repeated as “the economic engine of the community,” and so, I digress.) Where were we? Right, so Kirkwood doesn’t need a new downtown. It probably doesn’t even need an expanded one, we’d be better off focusing on the 6ish square blocks that comprise the core. But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t make small improvements to what we already have. Part of that work is already under way. MSD is currently working on a Project Clear effort on which they estimate a value of $420,000 to mitigate flooding from a prominent creek that runs through the area. Kirkwork’s plan could bring even more interest to the area and perhaps, with a little effort, maybe even some good development.
