Missouri Great Streets Pre-Application Collaboration

What is the Great Streets Program

The regional Metropolitan Planning Organization, the East-West Gateway Council of Governments, releases a grant called Great Streets that supports places in the St. Louis region to create the possibility for corridor plans led by a planning agency. This planning can take the form of district planning and land use policies, reimagining a streetscape, or other locally-focused ideas that promote placemaking and elevating the best parts of the region.

Graphic from East-West Gateway

How a Group Formed

Park Central and residents from the West End neighborhood were both exploring applying for a grant through the Lincoln Institute for Land Policy to receive technical assistance and coaching through the submittal process of a Great Streets grant for Delmar Boulevard. Ultimately, a larger group came together that Park Central is a part of that includes the City of St. Louis, Delmar Main Street, SLDC, WUMCRC and Special Taxing Districts, with an eye towards incorporating at least one more integral partner that represents the eastern portion of the corridor. By bringing together a larger group of engaged partners, the project has a better possibility to create a lasting vision for the corridor.

Why the Geography

Delmar Boulevard represents a symbolic dividing point between two segregated places of sociodemographic realities and outcomes in St. Louis: a more affluent, predominantly White population with higher opportunity south of the line and one with more concentrated poverty in predominantly Black neighborhoods that have experienced disinvestment. A Great Streets plan in this area would invite needed resources to support the creation of a long-term visioning document that calls for connectivity and continuity across the streetscape and equitable outcomes in the neighborhoods on either side of the dividing line.

Why This Program

Connecting preliminary engagement efforts through the Lincoln Legacy Cities Cohort has allowed for this group to have time to continue adapting ideas and gather more input in anticipation of submitting for a larger grant. The presence of the City helps unify the involved stakeholders along the corridor, as there is not just one clear beneficiary, but rather all nine neighborhoods in the vicinity would be able to receive a dedicated planning consultant to step in and collaborate with residents and organizations.

Current Status

While this project is not in the application phase, the group has collected some preliminary feedback from stakeholders along the corridor. Many folks who live and work along Delmar share similar concerns, with some (not all) noted below in the infographic. While there is quite a bit of work being done on Delmar through both private and public investments, a Great Streets program would help create a lasting plan in the area that could help shape future land use, transportation and collaborative implementation over the coming decades. While a Great Streets process would not mean immediate infrastructure investments through the planning process, it would provide a baseline for how residents and businesses think the corridor should look, feel and evolve over time and give a blueprint for future development.

Other Work from Group

Since the Great Streets program is not guaranteed, this group is also working on supporting a platform for more collective engagement and coordination along the corridor. In coming together as a collection of organizations that represents different parts of the corridor, while also deferring to the City’s Planning and Urban Design Agency as well as St. Louis Development Corporation, this group is not trying to elevate certain perspectives over others in the hopes of ultimately passing over the planning process to a consultant through East-West Gateway that would help create a vision for the space.

In the interim, this group has done the following:

  • Tied together different organizations and presented to a group of core stakeholders along the corridor

  • Participated in the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy’s Legacy Cities Cohort for technical assistance and peer learning from other Legacy Cities across the country as well as Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic

  • Created a way to share different infrastructure investments along the corridor, both public and private, to help showcase the types of investments coming through the area in the coming years

  • Began developing a way to measure successful outcomes from interventions

  • Started telling the compelling story for this particular planning opportunity

This project is still in the pre-application phase- the opening of the grant may take place at some point in 2024. In the meantime, please reach out to abdul@pcd-stl.org to stay updated in the process or inquire about having a representative from this group speak at a neighborhood meeting.