“All in all, it was a first-class effort, I thought … for a city that needed that,” Lewis said.

He said Downtown Now was not planned as a comprehensive project, but instead focused on particular, targeted areas where planners felt they could make a difference. Lewis is not involved with Design Downtown STL.

As Scott Page describes it, if Downtown Now was about creating the dots, Design Downtown STL is trying to connect them. Page is the principal of Interface Studio, a Philadelphia-based firm tasked with helping develop the new plan.

Design Downtown STL is slated for a one-year planning period, which runs through next June. The project will take into account feedback from residents and stakeholders, through interviews, events and an online survey and interactive map.

Page noted that in the nearly 50 stakeholder interviews conducted thus far, certain takeaways have already begun to emerge. Those interviewed, he said, often say that there is a lot of potential downtown. Some have said that there is not enough density there, and not enough things to do. They also often say that the downtown is disconnected.