ULI: Revitalize Historic Railway Building

ST. LOUIS—As reported in GlobeSt.com, downtown St. Louis has seen some significant improvements in its office market recently. However, years of corporate flight have left a lot of challenges. Reenergizing the dormant Railway Exchange Building may be among the most important. The 1.2 million square foot structure has been vacant since 2013, when the Famous-Barr flagship store closed, and TRex, a technology incubator, moved to its own building on Washington Ave.

But the Urban Land Institute St. Louis has stepped in and formed a Technical Assistance Program panel of civic, real estate, design, and institutional professionals to determine how the building could be repurposed. The evaluation was done for Downtown STL, Inc., which manages the Downtown St. Louis Community Improvement District.

The TAP panel toured the building, interviewed a variety of downtown stakeholders and regional leaders and reviewed existing market studies. It recommended a mix of uses including market-rate residential, a hotel, office space, retail and recreational uses. Panelists also felt the building had several areas where future developers could carve out shared amenities such as a ballroom, pool, sky bar and restaurant on the top floor and fitness facilities and indoor recreation space on the lower floors.

The panel also felt it was important to bring more light into building but at the same time preserve the historic façade. Participants recommended several strategies including opening additional floors within the atrium, pulling walls back within spaces to create new space open to the elements, and creating vertical pocket parks.

The ULI St. Louis TAP panel included Chip Crawford, Forum Studio; Andy Trivers, Trivers Associates; John Shreve, Populous; Tyler Meyr, Forum Studio; Wendy Timm, Enhanced Value Strategies, Inc.; Larry James, Faegre Baker Daniels LLP; and Hank Webber, Washington University in St. Louis.