For one weekend this September, downtown St. Louis was alive.  Over Labor Day weekend, the Cardinals played a series with the Reds, which at the time was of the utmost importance, the Missouri Tigers opened their football season versus Illinois with their annual archrivalry game and the Big Muddy Blues Festival featured nationally known artists at Laclede’s Landing.

Mix these activities with some great weather and this was a very memorable weekend by St. Louis standards.

I acted as a tourist for the weekend, going to a Cardinals game, playing Frisbee on the arch grounds, checking out the recently built Schnucks market, the Culinaria, and staying overnight at a hotel on the riverfront.

Unfortunately, the Cardinals lost the game.  It was ugly.  But uglier was the view from our nosebleed seats.  The stadium overlooks a parking lot on two sides.

Sure, Citygarden was a nice addition, but the original Ballpark Village plan needs to be at least partially reconsidered.

Playing Frisbee on the arch grounds gave me a new appreciation for the size and majesty of the arch.  The 2015 City-Arch-River Project will highlight the arch and give it the true surrounding it needs.

The Culinaria was a great dining experience.  Seemingly out of place, this market is a gem for downtown St. Louis.  Not only was my turkey sandwich delightful, but it was great to see how many people utilized the store.  The Culinaria should be used as a precedent for any other grocery store being built in downtown St. Louis.

I acted as a tourist, but also as a guide. Never before in my life had I been asked which way was the arch.  The streets were not quite bustling, but still full of people. The scene was not quite reminiscent of a destination like Chicago, but was similar to my visits to Kansas City.  This convinced me that downtown St. Louis should and will become a much more tourist friendly place.

The goal of expanding the tourist industry is of course to help the local economy recover and move forward.  The Kansas City Power & Light District has received rave reviews since its completion in 2007.  With this and other developments, Kansas City is now considered a top inexpensive tourist destination.

Having visited many other mid-sized cities nearby, namely Indianapolis, Louisville and Little Rock, I can attest that they have much better centralized entertainment districts.  However, St. Louis has a couple of assets which these cities don’t: the arch and a downtown baseball stadium.

The arch will be much better utilized after the 2015 City-Arch-River Project.  The next step is to make the area surrounding Busch stadium more tourist friendly and better connected to the arch grounds.

Having visited downtown St. Louis from the point of a tourist and looking at the projects in the planning stages, I believe that the perception of downtown St. Louis will soon change for the better.