Joe Henderson
The exit called Interstate 175 toward downtown St. Petersburg is more than a short stretch of asphalt. It’s a demarcation line between Tropicana Field and south St. Pete, and Mayor Rick Kriseman has an idea about what to do with that road.
Knock it down.
Reduce it to rubble.
Eliminate it.
His words came in response to this tweet by former South Bend, Ind. Mayor Pete Buttigieg, who is Joe Biden‘s nominee for Secretary of Transportation.
“Black and brown neighborhoods have been disproportionately divided by highway projects or left isolated by the lack of adequate transit and transportation resources,” he wrote.
“In the Biden-Harris administration, we will make righting these wrongs an imperative.”
Kriseman retweeted that and added his own take.
“This is why I’d like to see 175 come down between the Trop and the neighborhoods to the south,” he wrote. “We’ve broken down some figurative barriers in this city. This is a literal one that should be flattened someday.”
South St. Pete certainly has experienced more than its share of unrest, poverty, and violence. Last month, the area had three shootings in four days. Two of them were deadly. But would knocking down that stretch of road make things any better?
Well, numerous studies about the negative effect road construction can have on neighborhoods suggests it can. The 1619 Project in the New York Times Magazine connected the dots between roadways like the Interstate highway system and racial inequality.
“As in most American cities in the decades after the Second World War, the new highways in Atlanta — local expressways at first, then Interstates — were steered along routes that bulldozed ‘blighted’ neighborhoods that housed its poorest residents, almost always racial minorities,” the Magazine reported.
“This was a common practice not just in Southern cities like Jacksonville, Miami, Nashville, New Orleans, Richmond, and Tampa, but in countless metropolises across the country, including Chicago, Cincinnati, Denver, Detroit, Indianapolis, Los Angeles, Milwaukee, Pittsburgh, St. Louis, Syracuse, and Washington.”
The roadways also served as a figurative wall separating Black neighborhoods from White ones.
Critics made that a centerpiece of their arguments earlier this year against a plan to widen Interstate 275 in Hillsborough County.
The Tampa Bay Times reported that Rick Fernandez, a member of the Tampa Heights Civic Association, spoke forcefully against the idea.
“Urban interstates are 20th Century monuments to segregationist policies. In Hillsborough County, they destroyed, relocated, and marginalized minority communities and communities of concern,” he said.
Douglas Jesseph, a professor of philosophy at the University of South Florida, called Tampa’s interstate highway system “in effect, a gigantic confederate monument. You should treat it as such.”
Those arguments were about stopping another invasive project. Speakers wanted to prevent the kind of division Kriseman talked about.
The problem in St. Pete, though, is that the roadway has been there for many years. Why, you may ask, would the city even consider demolishing it?
The answer is clear: It’s about the future.
Tropicana Field is near the end of its useful life as the home for Major League Baseball. When the Tampa Bay Rays move out of that structure, it likely will be demolished. An upscale retail and entertainment center, or some other project, will likely take its place.
When that happens, eliminating that figurative dividing wall would go miles toward sending a needed message that the city belongs to everyone. That’s an idea worth pursuing.
7 comments
Ron Ogden
December 21, 2020 at 4:52 pm
When you take property for public purposes, when able you take the property that costs the least. That’s why highways gravitate toward farmland, for example. That way, you have more money to spend on the project itself, making roads wider, straighter, more accessible and more durable, for all people, everywhere, regardless of their condition. When it comes to the expense of public funds, the only “figurative wall” you should confront is the figures on the paper that tell you that there isn’t enough money for the project, and you breach that wall. If on the other hand you want to expend private money, you can build a highway through the Jungle, if you wish, and charge a commensurate toll. But then the NYT and Tribune Joe likely would bitch about that, too.
SayItAintSoJoe
December 21, 2020 at 5:54 pm
Mr. Henderson you came so close to the bottom line at the end of your article but somehow missed it. Tearing down 175 is about the coming gentrification of the area. Once the Trop is gone and the new economic investments are made to the site, the continued new growth surrounding the Trop site will be next. Low value property that can be bought and upgraded to fit with the Trop site improvements will expand into the surrounding neighborhoods. This gentrification will see low income minority residents replaced by high income residents. St Pete can not have that nasty 175 as an eyesore for the redevelopment and gentrification of the neighborhoods surrounding the Trop.
Brian
December 21, 2020 at 6:24 pm
BS! More excuses from the corrupt government lifers! Nothing, I mean nothing will ever change in our government with out mandatory term limits. There is a reason the president can only serve 8 years. If the people that voted for Biden don’t see this they are blind.
Karl Nurse
December 21, 2020 at 9:49 pm
As someone who uses I-175 everyday, I can say it is grossly underutilized compared to any other section of the interstate. It might add up to 30 seconds to be trip to and from home. It was built to “define” downtown or less politically correctly stated to “wall off the south side from downtown”. Many cities have learned that moving cars at 65 mph over downtowns does not make much sense and have been tearing them out. Seattle, Boston and San Francisco are three cities that have torn downtown interstates out.
Michael Paris
December 21, 2020 at 10:36 pm
What a BS article. Kriseman knows the south side is going to be bought up and gentrified. Pete Buttigiuge couldn’t fix the pot holes in South Bend. So now we have transportation justice lol. Damn Henderson you whiffed on this.
Jerry Naples
December 23, 2020 at 3:54 pm
This is another stupid idea from Rick Kriseman.
How about spending the money that he plans to use to demo this road and spend it on midtown projects. That would do more good.
I175 is a shortcut to downtown from the interstate.
I’ve lived in Saint Petersburg since 1994 and he has been the worst mayor we have ever had.
Speaking of road projects, how about fixing the 40th Ave bridge that has been “in construction” for years.
Angela
December 26, 2020 at 6:11 pm
Removing that stretch will mean several additional minutes for ambulances to get injured and dying children to All Children’s Hospital. Why isn’t Krooked Kriseman considering that?
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