A developer whose proposal for a 24/7 self-storage facility at a prominent intersection in the Lafayette Square neighborhood was shot down earlier this year is not giving up his plan. But this time, he may have found a way around the neighborhood’s disapprobation.
Tom Graddy had put forward the proposal for a self-storage facility at the corner of Jefferson and Chouteau avenues, but suffered a setback this summer. First, the city’s building commissioner denied his building permit, and then in July when the city’s Board of Adjustment denied his appeal of that denial.
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The project drew near universal opposition from residents in Lafayette Square, who panned the concept as unresponsive to their desires for such a prominent intersection. “There is no way that we are ever going to be in favor of anything on that corner that is public storage,” the president of the neighborhood association, Vincent Volpe, testified in July.
Dozens of Lafayette Square residents articulated similar views, along with dozens of emails, written letters and pages of signatures opposing the storage facility. It was enough for members of the Board of Adjustment to essentially tell the developer to go back to the drawing board.
“I think this is wrong for the city. I think that this is a huge important corner. They can come back with a better plan,” said Board of Adjustment member Mona Parsley.
Now the developer has its “better plan,” having filed designs last month seeking a building permit for a $3 million redevelopment of the industrial site. According to city records it would now be a commercial/residential use instead of a warehouse, but a closer look at new designs for the site shows the vast majority of the existing more than 50,000 square foot building still being retrofitted for a self-storage facility. The difference is that squeezed into the south side are five residential units, mostly measuring around 1,000 square feet, and three office spaces, the largest measuring about 1,500 square feet. And because the city’s zoning for this site leaves “mixed use” a bit open to interpretation, the new plans may have an easier time passing muster.
Plans courtesy of Killeen Studio ArchitectsPlans courtesy of Killeen Studio Architects
Plans submitted to St. Louis for a $3 million redevelopment at 2350 Chouteau show self-storage with five small residential lofts and three office spaces.
“It is really skirting a fine line about what mixed use is,” says Lafayette Square resident Matt Negri. He wonders if the inclusion of rental units on the plans is just window dressing: “Who would rent something like that attached to a warehouse where people can store anything? I could see it easily not being rented, because that is not a normal type [of] building that would house people.”
David Sweeney, the lobbyist who represented Graddy at the last meeting, did not respond to several requests seeking comment. The city has yet to act on the request for a building permit.
Negri, who has served as president of the Lafayette Square Neighborhood Association two times in the past and currently sits on the neighborhood’s preservation committee, says he’s also irritated that the developer hasn’t made an effort to show the new plans to the neighborhood association, whose next scheduled meeting is Wednesday at 7 p.m. (Negri says he’s been told the developer declined an invitation to appear.)
Instead, he says the new plan for the site was discovered “by happenstance” by a neighbor.
“We were hoping the developers would come back to the neighborhood and get some input, you know, take a poll, get the pulse of the residents [on] what they would like to see there,” Negri says.
Many, including Negri, have expressed a desire for projects that bring new jobs, residents, or both to the prominent corner. The 2200 LaSalle apartment complex, which sits next to the storage facility, opened in 2022 with the neighborhood’s blessing.
In St. Louis’ own freshly adopted Strategic Land Use Policy, the parcel where Graddy hopes to build the self-storage facility sits in an area where the city wants “many types of housing” or “many types of commercial activities and users” and not “most industrial uses, especially those that create divisions between neighborhoods.” And, the neighborhood’s special use district overlay, which includes the parcel in question, intends for “a high density mixed use development with a potential for taller buildings” in that portion of Lafayette Square.
In recent years, Negri says neighbors have been told the development Graddy is pursuing is “the best Lafayette Square could hope for” because of the presence of a Quik Trip across the street.
Graddy said as much at the July Board of Adjustment meeting, and that potential tenants of Aldi and Butler’s Pantry both fell through after signing letters of intent.
“We have tried to recruit a number of people with that site,” he said. “We’ve interviewed a lot of prospective clients for that business and they have all turned it down. Most recently the reason they’re turning it down is because of the violence coming from across the street.”
Lafayette Square residents like Negri reject the notion that self-storage is the best that such a prominent intersection in the city can attract, especially with new homes nearby selling for $1 million.
“We would really like to work with the developers and give some ideas,” he says. “It’s not just for the neighborhood, it’s really for the city of St. Louis.”