06.10.10
Posted in Travel Log (N. America & Europe) at 4:47 pm by Benjamin Ross
Quick, without checking Wikipedia, what was the largest American city outside of New York and Philadelphia in 1870? How many of you guessed St. Louis?….(I had to check Wikipedia). For much of the middle of the Nineteenth Century, St. Louis was THE city of the West (now called the Midwest). While its stature has slipped in recent decades and most of the population and wealth have left the urban core, St. Louis still has a rich history and culture. It’s also where my mother spent a good chunk of her childhood, and me, many a Thanksgiving dinner. So it was that I found myself on an impromptu trip to in the Gateway City two weekends ago (don’t worry, everybody is ok). I was only in town for a day and a half, but oustside of family time I was able to get some siteseeing accomplished.
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| I arrived on MegaBus at Union Station which was the largest and busiest rail terminal in the world when it was built in the 1890s. Union Station is actually no longer a rail station per se, the Grand Hall (above) having been converted to a hotel lobby and the rest of the station now functioning as a shopping center. It does have a connection to the MetroLink light rail system, but long distance trains are now all routed through the Gateway Multimodal Transportation Center a block away. |
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| From Union Station I walked directly east on Market Street towards the Mississippi River. |
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| Like my hometown of Kansas City, St. Louis is subject to good ol’ Midwestern summer heat and humidity. If I hadn’t had my camera and laptop on me, I probably would have jumped in too. |
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| This is what much of St. Louis’ downtown looks like. Sporadic high rises, lots of parking lots, not much urban density. |
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| The Gateway Arch, St. Louis’ most famous landmark, is located in a park right right along the River with downtown behind. |
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| In terms of architectural achievements, the Arch has to be one of the few completely non-utilitarian projects to make the “greatest hits” lists. (Even the pyramids served as tombs, right?) |
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| Most of my childhood trips to the Gateway City had centered on Chesterfield (St. Louis’ prototypical megaburb) with intermittant trips to Ted Drewe’s Frozen Custard in the city. This was my first time actually seeing the Arch from up close, and it blew me away. Visitors can take a capsule up to the top, but being that it was Memorial Day weekend I wasn’t about to sacrifice my entire afternoon waiting in line. |
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| Directly across from the Arch is the Old St. Louis Courthouse, site of the famous Dred Scott case. |
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| From the Arch, I wandered north to LeClede’s Landing. Here’s another downtown shot along the way. |
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| The St. Louis metro area spills over the River into Illinois. For purpose of compariosn East St. Louis, IL is St. Louis’ version of Newark. |
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| The two cities are linked by various modes of transportation, including this doouble-decker bridge, with automobile traffic above and the MetroLink light rail below. |
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| MetroLink is one of the country’s younger transit systems having opened in 1993, and overall I was impressed. While coverage is not expansive enough to make car ownership unnecessary, the system does reach the many of St. Louis’ (and inner suburbs’) main points of interest, including Downtown, the Loop, and University City, making it ideal for tourists wanting to explore the city.
The system is called “MetroLink” because it links St. Louis and vicinity with East St. Louis and surrounding towns on the Illinois side. I took the train all the way to its eastern terminus, and was surprised to find that it reaches all the way into the country. For the last fifteen minutes of the ride before reaching Scott Air Force Base, I was literally passing crop fields out the window. |
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| The MetroLink also provides convenient access to the new Busch Stadium. |
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| For a pristine vantage point of the downtown skyline, step off MetroLink at the East Riverfront stop and look out from the south platform. |
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| Since my exploration time was limited, I only had the chance to explore one residential neighborhood and I chose Soulard. One of St. Louis’ oldest neighborhoods, Soulard is located just south of downtown, and was originally settled by the French. |
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| The word “soûlard” is French for “drunkard,” and appropriately so as Soulard is home to many of St. Louis’ trendy watering holes. Accordingly much of the neighborhood is inhabited by the coveted “young professional” demographic. |
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| With only two short afternoons worth of free time and less than half a day to plan my trip, I didn’t get to see as much of St. Louis as I would have wanted. While its place among the ranks of major urban centers has diminished over the decades, St. Louis still has well more than a weekend’s worth of sites to see. And as long as Megabus continues to provide cheap, regular service from Chicago, I’m sure I’ll be back again in the not too distant future. |
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Scotty McCormick
said,
June 10, 2010 at 8:33 pm
Nice read Ben, I really enjoyed the photos and your writing.
Cheers
Sonja
said,
June 10, 2010 at 9:36 pm
the 7 am amtrak train between stl and chicago is $20 and 475848935738947329847329 times nicer than the bus.
Sonja
said,
June 10, 2010 at 9:40 pm
oh yeah, stl is really amazing for being the us’ first major city to become obsolete.
why does it still exist…………………?????????????????
Benjamin Ross
said,
June 10, 2010 at 11:54 pm
@Sonja
The advantage Megabus has over rail travel is cost. Usually Amtrak ends up not being much cheaper than flying. I just did a search for Chicago > St. Louis tickets on Amtrak’s website. They all came up as $66. My last minute Megabus ticket to St. Louis cost only $22.
Justin Liu
said,
June 14, 2010 at 7:05 am
Monsanto is HQ’ in STL but the city is pretty dead from what I can remember. Nice blog
Ashley
said,
June 15, 2010 at 10:16 am
I love your pictures Ben.
AND as always I am smarter for reading it!
Susie Ellsworth
said,
June 17, 2010 at 3:02 pm
I came to Saint Louis for college and after graduating moved to Chicago. I missed Saint Louis so much that I quit my job, moved back to Saint Louis and bought an adorable 1920s brick cottage in the city – not possible in Chicago on my meager salary. It would be a pretty tough city to tour without a guide, and Ben, I applaud your touring accomplishments during your short time here. For those of you who are so quick to put this city down, I can share that it took me well over 6 years to get to know its disparate pockets of funkiness… it’s very disjointed into cultural pockets with strong immigrant or religious bases. You do better with a car and you have to know which little one-way streets to go down and around. Excellent food can be found, the housing is varied, interesting and outstanding from an urban planning point-of-view… my only major complaint is the lack of public pools in the city because it gets pretty freaking hot! Also, as a Kansas City native (like Ben), I consider StL infinitely more captivating than its younger western neighbor.
Ben, if your day job doesn’t work out I think you could write travel guides (with your own photographs)!
Pat
said,
July 4, 2010 at 6:31 am
Why don’t you update this blog anymore?
Benjamin Ross
said,
July 5, 2010 at 11:00 am
@Pat
I wish I had a better answer, but truth be told I have about 3 or 4 posts I have been working on for months, which are about 75% finished. Ideally, I’d like to be posting weekly at the very least, but I just haven’t been putting as much time into it of late as I’d like to. Glad to know people are paying attention though.