The Lofts and the Changing Face of the Loop

Over the week of August 17, 2014, the first students moved into the Lofts of Washington University. While late August is an exciting time for any college student, students moving into the Lofts had
the added bonus of moving into Washington University Residential Life’s new lofts-style housing. The Lofts are housed in a development that includes a new grocery store on one side, and on the other, a 24/7 diner developed by Joe Edwards, the business guru credited with giving the Loop—the seven block span of Delmar Boulevard just north of Washington U.– its unique flare. And that’s not to mention the list of amenities (the Tempur-Pedic beds, modern design, sleek appliances, etc.) that comes with all Washington U. housing.

“When I first walked into the building, what struck me was that everything was new. It was all just so nice,” said Taylan Turan, a junior living in the Lofts.

But the Lofts development is not typical for Washington U. housing. While there has been University housing in the area before, the Lofts represent Washington University’s most significant investment in off-campus housing to date. After five years of planning, the development consists of three residential buildings, two of which are mixed-use. The first phase of the Lofts, completed in summer 2014, houses 400 students, and includes retail space for the locally-run grocery store, United Provisions, and Edwards’ Peacock Loop Diner. Phase II is set to finish next summer, and will house an additional 200 students. The cost to build all this? $80 million.

While questions have been raised about the cost and construction quality of the development, perhaps the greatest controversy has focused
 on its location. The Lofts are located between Eastgate and Westgate Avenues with the most prominent street entrance on Delmar Boulevard, a street that some say is representative of the St. Louis area’s problem of racial segregation. The area to the north of Delmar is 99 percent African American, while the area to the south is 70 percent white; the median home value north of Delmar is $78,000, compared to $310,000 to the south; five percent of residents 25 years or older to the north hold a bachelor’s degree, compared to 67 percent of their counterparts to the south. A 2012 BBC documentary about racial inequality in St. Louis labeled the street, “The Delmar Divide.”

For students at Washington University, this divide is well known. The dictum “don’t go north of the Loop” is common among students, reinforcing Delmar Boulevard’s segregational elements.

“I was definitely told not to go north of the Loop,” said Turan. “I don’t think I went north of Delmar once in my first semester.”

Jesse Bogdan, a sophomore who lives in on-campus Residential Life housing on the South 40, echoed Turan’s sentiments.

“The general opinion among students of that area is simple: Don’t go there,” Bogdan said. Although Bogdan has a friend who lives just one block north of Delmar Boulevard, most of his other friends “won’t go there unless they drive.”

While students are wary of going north of Delmar, they often frequent Delmar Boulevard itself, a street known for its small businesses
and quirkiness. Recently the street was named “one of the 10 great streets in America” by the American Planning Association. Despite being less than a 10-minute walk from Washington University’s campus, the Loop is not often thought of as a street located in a college town, as many of the businesses cater to the area’s non-student residents. Rather, the Loop has long been considered a regional melting pot, one of the few places in St. Louis where everyone feels welcome.

However, with an $80 million investment that brings in an influx of 400-600 mostly affluent, mostly white students, some wondered if the Lofts might pose a challenge to the Loop’s status as a “melting pot.”

A little over a week into the opening of the Lofts, Student Life published a staff editorial titled, “Lofts demonstrate larger concern with Washington University’s place in the city.”
 The editorial, as the title implies, criticized the development and faulted Washington University for becoming too much of a presence in the unique makeup of the Loop.

“Right now, the Loop still feels like an authentic piece of St. Louis history, and Wash. U. risks becoming a faceless interloper into the area,” the editorial stated.

University leaders say that they were aware of the many issues involved in planning the Lofts. Rather than a project based solely on student needs, those who developed the Lofts point to the extensive five-year-long planning phase in which Wash U reached out to the surrounding community. The University had research teams that worked closely with the University City government to identify needs
 in the area, work with community housing and business associations, and hold a number of community forums. The end result, planners say, was a housing project that was designed to be as good of a fit for Delmar Boulevard and the Loop as possible.

“This project didn’t just come out of the blue,” Cheryl Adelstein, Washington University’s Director of Community Relations and Local Government Affairs, said. For the Lofts, Adelstein worked closely with the neighborhood association in Parkview Gardens, the area abutting the northern part of the Lofts, as well as the Loop Special Business District and the Delmar Commercial Committee.

“It took years of planning to come up with this,” Adelstein said. “And I think we did a pretty good job.”

According to Adelstein, the Lofts development is a project that connects and fills needs in the Loop. United Provisions filled a longstanding need for a grocery store. A walkway between the development’s buildings connects the area to the north with the rest of the Loop, a connection that Adelstein said was designed to make the community more walkable and to help traffic flow to retail. The continuous retail space of United Provisions and the Peacock Loop Diner connects the east and west Loop to create what planners call “a continuous streetscape,”— something that was previously missing on the Loop. Even the look of the building itself, with its tall windows and grayish brick, was designed to fit the unique Loop aesthetic.

At its most basic level, Adelstein’s job is to 
keep tabs on what the community around Washington University is thinking, and report back to the University. The reaction she heard to the Lofts was overwhelmingly positive.

“There was practically no pushback against the Lofts,” she said.

A project with virtually no pushback is highly unusual, said Hank Webber, the University’s Executive Vice Chancellor for Administration.

“I’ve been doing this for a long time, and there’s almost always controversy in communities,” Webber said. “The Lofts was remarkable because we had such widespread support. We truly tried to meet everyone’s needs,”

Webber has dealt with large-scale university-led projects before, having spent 21 years 
at the University of Chicago, where he is credited for being a key player in revitalizing 
the North Kenwood, Oakland and Woodlawn neighborhoods of Chicago’s South Side (a project detailed in The Atlantic). Webber believes that Washington University’s role in the already prosperous Loop neighborhood is inherently different than that of the University of Chicago in blighted South Side communities.

“On the Loop, the problem has been density. The community really needs more people,” Webber said.

Webber admitted that it’s impossible to meet everyone’s needs and make everyone feel comfortable, but the Lofts might be as close as he has come in his career.

According to planners, the Loop simply needed more people living on it—one of the major reasons why the University City government was so supportive of the project.

“The pros [of the project] were an increase in population to support City businesses,” Andrea Riganti, University City’s Director of Community Relations said.

Jodie Lloyd, the University City Economic Development Manager, also stressed the importance of the population increase.

“With so many new people in the area, the development should be an economic boon,” Lloyd said.

And despite some concern that the increase 
in bodies might lead to an uptick in crime, Michael Ransom, Captain of Field Operations in the University City Police Department, has not noticed any difference in crime, again pointing to the importance of the population influx.

“All we’ve seen is more traffic, which is really great for the Loop,” Ransom said.

Such high praise might be rooted in the longstanding relationship between Washington University and the University City government. Riganti, in particular, lauded the University for its efforts throughout the Lofts planning process to reach out to the community and called their relationship “collaborative.”

“I think that the University strives to understand and meet community needs to be a good community partner,” she said.

There is, of course, no single perspective that is representative of the entire community. But it seems that the majority of people that compose the Loop neighborhood — the residents, the business owners, the workers — are generally on board with the Lofts.

At University Commons, a low-income housing community located a few blocks north of the Lofts, residents were pleased with the side effects of Washington University’s increased presence.

“There have absolutely been changes recently,” Angela Ditch, the manager of University Commons, said. “Crime has gone down significantly, residents are staying longer. Everyone is happy with the changes. There’s definitely been an overall positive influence.”

Ditch may have pointed out residents’ longer stays because, historically, University City has had a relatively transient population, particularly around the Loop area. More generally, the University City population has been on a steady decline since its peak in the 1960s of 51,249 people. The population has hovered around 35,000 since 2000. University planners stressed that no long-term residents were displaced in the Lofts project, simply due to fact that the area around the Lofts has been student housing for decades.

Derrick Freeman, an 18-year-old student at University City High School, has lived just a 10-minute walk away from the Loop in University City his whole life. Freeman is among the many UCity High School Students who like to hang out on the Loop after school and on weekends. He, like others, has noticed changes.

“I have noticed that there are more Wash
U students going to the Loop nowadays. I think the Lofts being added to the Loop will make University City more of a college town,” Freeman said, highlighting some of the initial concerns about the Lofts’ changing the feel of the Loop. But Evans is happy with the more student-oriented direction.

“The Loop is is UCity’s trademark, and if it is filled with college students all the time it will change the whole look of the city, in a positive way.”

The shift to a more college-town atmosphere was also mentioned by Cameron McGhee, another senior at University City High School.

“I can’t remember when I started noticing it, but it’s more of a college town now. It’s nice to blend a college atmosphere with the Loop,” he said.

Even McGhee’s grandfather, a longtime resident of the area, has spoken to Cameron about the changes.

“He just said that the area is so different than it was. There are more shops, more homes, more people. It’s more accessible,” McGhee said.

Perhaps these changes are most beneficial to business owners, who can financially capitalize on the uptick in foot traffic. While there have been businesses that blame their closing on the changing face of the Loop—such as Good Works furniture store, which closed 
in September after 23 years—a number of new businesses have opened recently. The businesses that cater to a university crowd are in a better position than ever.

Alex Weir, an owner of Subterranean Books, which has been on the Loop since 2000, welcomes the new foot traffic.

“The street’s always changing, and mainly for the better, and the new Wash U housing was a big part of that. There are simply more people on the street now, which is really nice for us.”

Weir is also optimistic about the future of the street retaining its racial and socioeconomic diversity, saying, “The Loop still seems to be a place where everyone is welcome. It continues to be a thriving melting pot.”

The Loop as a “melting pot” was one of the main reasons why Tom “Papa” Ray and Lew Prince chose the street as the location for their business, Vintage Vinyl, over 35 years ago.

“When my business partner, Lew Prince, and 
I decided to open a record store, we both had the Delmar Loop in mind because it is racially neutral,” Ray said in a 2011 interview with the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.Today, even after the new Lofts development, Ray said that the Loop is “still more of a melting pot than other places in St. Louis.”

However, Ray has noticed a growth in the “political and physical presence of Wash
U.” This will be helpful for other businesses, Ray believes, but not necessarily for Vintage Vinyl—a result of how students now consume music in a digital manner. When Ray first opened the store, Washington University students would often go to hear live music on the Loop, something that is much less common now. He believes that this is indicative of the “insularity” of current students, similar to what many students call the “Wash. U. bubble.”

“There’s an insularity to the student body at Wash. U., which wasn’t always the case,” Ray noted.

He remains neutral on whether the University’s presence and the influx of these students will be beneficial for the whole community.

“As a longtime business resident, I consider Wash. U. to be a real driving force. And it’s clear that in the past few years that the University’s presence has grown a lot. I just hope that turns into something positive for the neighborhood.”

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For students at Washington University, the overwhelmingly positive remarks from members of the Loop community might seem a bit odd. On campus, Student Life was not alone in the opinion that the University was infringing on the Loop aesthetic.

Shannon Welsh, a junior who lived in
 the Lofts during fall semester but is now studying abroad, pointed to a number of flaws with the development’s presence in the community, specifically focusing on the increased police presence.

“The University developers seemed very aware of the ‘safety issue,’ and continually emphasized all of the different measures
that were going in, like the extension of the blue lights, or the security guards in every building. Is the University saying that we don’t trust that [people living in the surrounding neighborhoods] will leave these facilities and students alone?” Welsh said.

Welsh also addressed the grocery store, which was celebrated by University planners as filling a dire need in the community. Rather than appealing to everyone’s needs, Welsh believes that the grocery store’s international specialty ingredients are catered to the University community.

“It’s not exactly a neighborhood grocery store in the sense that people would want to do their daily shopping there,” she said. “The ingredients are simply not for people who are just trying to get by.”

Jesse Bogdan, the sophomore living on the South 40, said that this change is part of a larger shift that is happening on the Loop. When he first came to the University, the Loop was a “cool place to go.” According to Bogdan that
 has changed.

“Now I think of it as almost a part of campus,” he said. “It’s very much catered to the Wash U community.”

Initially taken with the Loft’s many amenities, Taylan Turan sees similar side effects from the Lofts and the increased student presence.

“Maybe I’m just seeing it more because I’m also there more often, but it feels like there are a lot more [students] now,” Turan said. “They stand out. It feels like there’s a clash between the two communities.”

There are other non-Wash. U. students who also find fault with the broader changes of the Loop. A number of online commenters on a Riverfront Times article about the closing of GoodWorks furniture store yearned for the days before the new developments, when they say the Loop felt like a truly unique community.

“I lived in the Loop 15 years ago. I lived in the Loop 30 years ago. When I didn’t live there, I went often,” wrote a commenter on the article. “The Loop has not been a ‘neighborhood’ street in the sense [the authors] claim in my adult lifetime. The vast majority of businesses have always been either dining/entertainment venues or small shops catering to the Wash. U. crowd.”

Another commenter, who has since moved away, recollected what the old Loop looked like.

“It was local businesses. It was diverse. Remember Ziezo’s? Remember the vacuum cleaner repair shop? Remember the Black nationalist bookstore or the Gay and Lesbian bookstore? Remember when Streetside, Vintage Vinyl and Wuxtry Records had shops there?… It’s not a neighborhood anymore. It’s an extension of Wash U, mostly owned by Edwards.”

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Neighborhoods change. And it seems that the major changes to the Loop have already occurred. The Lofts, while part of that change, might be a side effect rather than a catalyst.

As Sharon Stahl, Washington University’s Vice Chancellor for Students, noted, “We would not have even begun the project if we didn’t feel like the neighborhood was stable.”

To be sure, the concerns are rooted in reality. It’s hard not to be put off by an $80 million investment with over-the-top amenities and a visible security force, especially in the midst of a national discussion of privilege. But it’s not as though University planners were unaware of these larger issues. They simply did not know how to perfectly answer them.

“All of these are legitimate concerns. How do you preserve safety without people feeling infringed upon?” asked Webber. “How do you make a project that everyone will be perfectly happy with?”