Part 1 of a series: Exploring why a focus on Vision, Control, and Value are so important in the redevelopment of the Historic Gas Plant.

The Gas Plant property is probably the most valuable public asset that St. Petersburg will ever have to be redeveloped.  How St. Petersburg chooses to redevelop it may say as much about how our city governs as it does about what ultimately gets built.

How do great cities think about once-in-a-generation redevelopment opportunities?

After studying successful redevelopment projects across the country, one lesson keeps emerging:

• Great cities do not begin by selecting a developer.
• Great cities begin by creating a vision for the property – a vision consistent with the city’s overall vision.  Only after establishing that vision do they decide how the property should be developed and who should develop it.  
• They decide what kind of place they want to create.
• They determine how neighborhoods should connect, where parks belong, how streets should function, how people should move through the city, and how public investments can create value for generations.
• Only then do they decide who should build it.

Three Principles That Guide Great Cities

• Vision – Smart cities decide what kind of city they want to become before they decide who should build it. They do not begin by asking which developer should build the project.

  Smart cities set the vision.  Developers build within the vision. 

  No single developer – regardless of how talented – should determine how an entire city should function over the next century.  That responsibility belongs to the city and its citizens.  Developers should respond to the city’s vision, not create it.

• Control – Smart cities retain control. Control allows the city to respond to changing priorities, changing economic conditions, and changing community needs over the decades required to complete a project of this magnitude.
  
  In addition, by maintaining control they reduce the risk of any one developer running into challenges that could completely stop the redevelopment.  
  
  
• Value – Smart cities retain value.  Value is created by first establishing a vision, then investing in streets, parks, and infrastructure that make the land more valuable before development occurs.
  
  
  By leading with a clear city vision, cities create long-term public value that supports jobs, lowers the future tax burden on residents, and enhances quality of life—rather than locking in assumptions that could limit options for generations.

Redevelopment of the Historic Gas Plant District should begin with these three fundamental principles.

Every major planning decision should be tested against these three principles. If a decision strengthens the City’s vision, preserves the City’s control, and creates long-term public value, it moves St. Petersburg closer to its goals. If it does not, the City should reconsider it. 

Where are We?

The current administration has chosen to begin with the developer rather than the vision.  That approach assumes many of the city’s most important planning decisions before a comprehensive master plan has ever been created.

Before any final agreement is reached, however, St. Petersburg voters will elect a mayor and City Council that may ultimately oversee this project for decades.  Fortunately, no final agreement has yet been approved.  The city still has the opportunity to step back, establish a comprehensive vision, and then determine the best path forward.  

This first article begins with Vision.

Smart cities don’t delegate their vision to a developer. They create it themselves by engaging professional planners, forming a broadly representative Citizen Advisory Council, and involving the community before selecting a developer.

They begin by asking how this land can best serve the city over the next fifty to one hundred years.

They look far beyond the property lines.

They ask how this redevelopment should connect with downtown, surrounding neighborhoods, Campbell Park, Booker Creek, hospitals, schools, parks, businesses, transit, and the waterfront.

They examine how streets, parks, housing, jobs, public spaces, utilities, and transportation can work together as one integrated system.  Nothing is assumed.  Everything is evaluated against the city’s long-term vision.  

Why I-175 Belongs in the Conversation

Part of the vision process naturally asks whether existing infrastructure still serves the city’s long-term vision—or whether it should be reimagined.  

One of the questions that naturally emerges from a city-led visioning process is the future of Interstate 175.  Not because anyone has already decided it should be removed.  But because a professional approach naturally evaluates every major piece of infrastructure that shapes the future of a city.  

This article is not arguing that Interstate 175 should be removed.

Rather, it argues that a comprehensive, city-led master planning process should evaluate whether I-175 continues to serve St. Petersburg’s long-term vision before redevelopment decisions permanently assume the answer.

Why a Professional Planning Process Would Evaluate I-175

A city-led master planning process should carefully examine questions such as:

• Does I-175 still serve the purpose for which it was built?
• Does it strengthen or weaken connections between downtown and surrounding neighborhoods?
• Could a restored street grid function as well—or better?
• Would additional land become available for housing, parks, businesses, or civic uses?
• How would emergency access be affected?
• How would traffic patterns change?
• How could Campbell Park, Booker Creek, downtown, and the Historic Gas Plant District function as one connected part of the city?
• What are the long-term costs of maintaining the highway compared with alternative approaches?
• Which approach best serves St. Petersburg over the next fifty years?

These questions do not determine the answer.

They simply explain why the future of Interstate 175 belongs in a comprehensive city-led planning process—not in assumptions embedded within a private development proposal.

A professional planner would naturally ask whether Interstate 175 still serves the city’s long-term interests.

Not because the answer is obvious.

Because asking the question is part of good planning.

Today, I-175 occupies a substantial amount of valuable urban land.

If it were ever reconfigured or removed, additional land could become available for housing, parks, businesses, civic uses, and new neighborhood streets.

More importantly, that land would not simply become available for development. It would become part of the City’s vision for reconnecting neighborhoods. It could help integrate the Historic Gas Plant District with Campbell Park, restore portions of the traditional street grid, create new parks and public spaces, and transform what is now a barrier into part of one connected community. Those possibilities are exactly the kinds of questions a comprehensive master planning process should explore.

The highway also separates downtown from the South Side, limiting opportunities to reconnect neighborhoods, integrate Campbell Park with the Historic Gas Plant District, improve walkability, strengthen the street grid, and create a more continuous urban fabric.

Those possibilities may or may not prove practical.  That is precisely why they deserve objective study rather than assumptions.  

But they deserve to be examined before redevelopment decisions permanently assume that today’s configuration must remain forever.

Equity Should Help Shape the Vision

Mayor Welch has consistently emphasized that redevelopment of the Historic Gas Plant District should honor the history of the community that once stood here and create opportunities for those who were displaced and for their descendants.

But honoring that history should involve more than deciding where buildings are located or how benefits are distributed.

It should also include examining the physical decisions that reshaped the community.

The destruction of the Gas Plant neighborhood was followed by construction of Interstate 175, creating a physical barrier between downtown and the South Side.

For many descendants of the Gas Plant community, I-175 is more than a transportation facility.

It is part of the history of displacement and separation.

If equity is to be one of the guiding principles of this redevelopment, then the role that I-175 has played in physically separating neighborhoods deserves to be part of the planning conversation. 

There is Precedent

Cities across the country have reconsidered similar urban highways as they have reimagined their downtowns and surrounding neighborhoods.

San Francisco removed freeway segments and reconnected valuable waterfront land to the city.

Milwaukee removed the Park East Freeway, opening land for redevelopment and reconnecting neighborhoods.

Rochester, New York, replaced the Inner Loop with city streets, creating opportunities for housing, businesses, parks, and new investment.

Other cities—including Portland, Seattle, and New Orleans—have also studied, removed, or transformed urban highways where they no longer reflected the community’s long-term vision.

Each city reached its own conclusion.

The lesson is not that every highway should be removed.

The lesson is that great cities are willing to ask the question.

The purpose of studying these cities is not to copy them.  It is to learn from them before making irreversible decisions of our own.  

Concerns about removing a highway

Some people have expressed concern that Interstate 175 is essential for access to hospitals and other downtown destinations.

Those concerns are legitimate.

They deserve careful professional analysis—not assumptions.

Major hospitals throughout the country operate successfully without interstate highway spurs ending at their front doors.

The question is not whether a highway exists.

The question is whether the transportation network as a whole provides safe, reliable, and efficient access for emergency vehicles, patients, employees, visitors, and the public.

I also recognize that Interstate 175 is controlled by the Florida Department of Transportation, and current state policy may make major changes difficult—or even impossible.

But that is not a reason to avoid asking the question.

Master planning begins by identifying the best long-term vision.

Only then do cities determine what is politically, financially, and legally achievable.

Looking Ahead

This article has focused on one example of why vision matters: the future of Interstate 175.

In the next article, I’ll explore another equally important planning question: parks.

How much parkland should the Historic Gas Plant District include? Where should those parks be located? Should they connect with Campbell Park, Booker Creek, and downtown? Should they become part of a larger network of public spaces?

Over the years, a number of thoughtful ideas have been proposed—including the concept of creating a signature downtown park. Those ideas deserve to be evaluated as part of a comprehensive city-led visioning process before any single development proposal determines the answer.

Like the future of I-175, the question isn’t what one developer thinks is best. The question is what best serves St. Petersburg’s long-term vision.

Before We Decide, We Should Set the Vision

The St. Petersburg we enjoy today was shaped by the vision of those who came before us.

They preserved one of America’s great public waterfronts. They created a remarkable system of parks and public spaces. They invested in neighborhoods, streets, and civic places that continue to define the character of our city today.

Now it is our turn.

The Historic Gas Plant District gives our generation a once-in-a-generation opportunity to shape the next chapter of St. Petersburg’s history.

We may ultimately conclude that Interstate 175 should remain exactly where it is. We may conclude something different.

But before we permanently build around today’s assumptions, we owe it to future generations to ask the right questions and create a vision worthy of this extraordinary public asset.

That is what great cities do.

They begin with a vision.

Then they create a plan.

Only then do they decide who should build it.

The Historic Gas Plant deserves nothing less. 

Related Reading

Before We Vote We Deserve Clear Answers

Next in the Series

Vision: Parks and Public Spaces – How much parkland should the Historic Gas Plant include – and who should decide?