It sounds ominous because it is. A major national publication has announced that they believe St. Louis, Missouri is spiraling down a ‘doom loop’ and there’s no escape in sight. It may mean the St. Louis many of us has grown up with will soon be no more.

I saw this phrase uttered by none other than The Wall St Journal. Many took notice when they described St. Louis and specifically the downtown area as a “real estate nightmare” and few in the big city are disagreeing. Their description of boarded up buildings and lots of theft sounds very familiar for anyone who’s traveled through the inner city lately.

The one stunning example they use of the plummeting real estate values in St. Louis is the former AT&T building. I saw a story by The Sun that says the building was sold for $206 million 18 years ago yet the most recent sale price was a mere $3.6 million and it’s still unoccupied.

I saw KSDK document the fact that this building in St. Louis went up for auction again, but there’s no confirmation if it actually sold. According to Wikipedia, it did sell for $3.6 million to the Goldman Group. It also notes that as of the date of this writing, there’s no stated plan for what they’ll do with the building.

The point of The Wall St Journal article appears to be that what is happening to downtown St. Louis is a view at the fate that awaits many United States metro areas unless “they can reinvent themselves”.

Considering how much crime is prevalent in downtown St. Louis, it’s hard to imagine what the many groups who are trying to save it can actually come up with. Sadly, the ‘doom loop’ sounds like an accurate description of what used to be an iconic Missouri downtown area. Let’s hope some groups and businesses can bring it back from the brink.