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Thank you to the folks who showed up to last week's meeting with Mark Boyko! From what I've heard, he was more than willing to put forward some housing legislation but perhaps not really sure to start. I'm working on some bi-partisan recommendations for him to put forward on behalf of Kirkwood for Everyone, but if anyone else has any recommendations or suggestions, I'm all ears! The state-level really is where the rubber meets the road on housing policy, so I think we need to do a better job of moving the conversation beyond Kirkwood and this could be a good start.
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- The main item on tonight's City Council meeting agenda is the description of the grant application the city plans on submitting for STP funding to overhaul Argonne from Taylor to Geyer. Included in that description is a raised crosswalk at Taylor and Argonne, mid-block crosswalks on either side of Argonne's intersection with Kirkwood Road, and new five-foot wide sidewalks running to Kirkwood Park and the community center. This plan isn't bad and ties in with the plans for the Grant's Trail extension to the Farmer's Market, but I think the plan represents a big missed opportunity to connect Grant's Trail to Kirkwood Park with a protected bike lane on the northern side of the street. I'm hoping to get a story out about this before tonight's meeting, but in the interim please submit testimony to the city clerk (aschelb@kirkwoodmo.org) encouraging the Council to explore a protected bike lane:
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- A few notes on last week's Webster-Kirkwood Times:
- On pg. 6-A, you'll find my letter to the editor in which I rebut the claim made in last week's mailbag that new housing is a fiscal loser for Kirkwood. If that were true, cities like Dallas would be going bankrupt, not Detroit. My one frustration is that the paper added "Kirkwood" under my name instead of using the Brooklyn address I used when I submitted the letter. Some people like to infer that I have some sinister ulterior motives instead of just being a huge dork and I hate to give that sort any excuse to engage me on something other than the actual merits of my arguments.
- I also want to commend the mailbag letters from the past couple of weeks encouraging people to shovel the sidewalks in front of their houses/businesses and shaming those who don't. It's the law, but you're obviously not going to go around arresting people for not shoveling. A heavy dose of shame, on the other hand, is a very fair game.
- On pg. 8-A, there's a nice story on the Meramec CC campus overhaul. My biggest regret I have about this project is that neither it nor the Geyer repaving
- On pg. 9-A, the WKT has the story on the council's recent action on accessory structures pretty screwed up. The piece is titled City Rejects Changes to '"Accessory Dwelling Units" but in reality the legislation had nothing to do with ADUs. The Council rejected a proposal to boost the maximum size of accessory structures from 1,500sqft to 2,500sqft, but the specific accessory structure that is an ADU is already held to the much more limited maximum of 750sqft in a different section of the code. This increased maximum would have applied to other uses like detached garages but would've had no effect on ADUs
- On pg. 9-B, there's notice of a Glendale public hearing for the rezoning of the house located at at 415 N Sappington Rd (right next to Vitale's Deli) from residential to commercial to facilitate the opening of a new coffee shop shop on the property. Adding a coffee shop here would go a long way towards expanding Glendale's nascent Downtown. It also really pairs nicely with the recent agreement Kirkwood reached with Glendale to collaborate on a new sidewalk infill project along East Essex that will soon provide a new connection to this stretch of North Sappington once complete. People love these small scale neighborhood centers where they can walk five minutes to go grab coffee or a lunch and I think we should do more to support them and build more
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Like I said, going to get a new story out on Argonne later today, so stay tuned for that! Events calendar here. Talk to you soon!
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