How Brick Thieves Operate

This video is third-hand. I was reading over Michael Allen's Ecology of Abscence blog, and he posted the following video which originally appeared on PubDef.org. It features St. Louis Alderman Sam Moore (D-4th) explaining how brick thieves do their dirty work.



This is fascinating stuff. Especially if there is an insider in the department that's aiding these thieves.

I always miss all the fun

I was invited to attend an Urban Explorers Labor Day Picnic this afternoon, but due to my rock n' roll party lifestyle, rolled out of bed just a tad too late to make it to the meeting place, and missed the expedition. On top of that, I also missed this little bit of excitement while the UE folks were on their way to their location:



Video courtesy of Thomas Crone from 52nd City.

And another vantage point captured by Steve Smith can be found here.


I always miss the fun. Poop.

Post-Dispatch finally takes an interest in preservation. Kind of...

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch today has a series of articles posted on stltoday.com that deal with the architectural preservation of endangered buildings in the metro area.

The only beef I have with these aticles is that it seems like the editors of the P-D approached this in a way that made it seem like they were more interested in the story itself, rather than the subject of the story. I mean, this isn't exactly "news" in the strictest sense of the word... so some journalistic editorializing would've been acceptable in this case. I would have liked to see reporter Diane Toroian Keaggy inject just a wee bit o' personality into her articles in this set. The story she wrote about Thomas Crone and Michael Allen's recent trip to the Armour Meat Packing Plant in East STL was interesting, but her writing was very flat and uninspired. Writer David Bonetti got it a bit more right with his articles. His articles seem to have a little more meat, and therefore make the avereage reader really want to care about these endangered and crumbling buildings.

But really, the fact that the P-D is doing a story, let alone six plus a video, is pretty cool.

Here's a slideshow of some endangered and demolished buildings in the area.

Video of Thomas and Micheal's trip to the Armour Meat Packing facility.

The accompanying story by Diane Toroian Keaggy.

Keaggy's other story about brick thieves on the North Side.

David Bonetti's article about the quest for preservation.

Cheeky "interview" with The Moolah Theater. Not the manager or owner... the actual building.

Bonetti's other article on developer Craig Heller and his vision for downtown living.

What's also cool is that the P-D gives a shout out for Ecolgy of Absence and Built St. Louis, two of my favorite sites dedicated to documenting the city in which we live.

Hopefully more people will understand just what is at stake here, and demand more from our elected officials. Better still, let's hope that the residents of STL realize that a large part of the solution rests in their hands. The politicians can only do so much. We as a community need to attack the problem of decay and entropy together, in addition to fighting vociferously any plans to tear down historic buildings so that Walgreens can build yet another store. And above all else, let's hope that more and more people document- either by photo, video or the written word- this beautiful city and its beautiful landscape.

Now if you'll excuse me... I'm off to take some pictures.