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Green concrete planters block cars from entering along the south. Black fences fill the breaks between apartment buildings. Some residents say Preservation Square, formerly known as O’Fallon Place, feels more like a prison than neighborhood.

The complex’s owner, , plans to change that perception, opening up the street grid, rehabbing homes and public areas and building retail space and other amenities along 14th Street in the hopes of enlivening the area and creating a better connection to downtown.

Much of the work hinges on a $30 million federal grant St. Louis is one of five finalists to win after beating out 29 other cities. If the city is successful, the federal money could trigger some $75 million more in funds that businesses and nonprofits have pledged for a slew of social services and redevelopment in and around the housing complex.

St. Louis’ bid for the grant is more than just a typical request for federal money to spruce up subsidized housing. It’s another initiative by city leaders to target federal resources in an area mostly neglected by private capital.

Preservation Square sits between downtown and the planned new western headquarters of the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, a $1.75 billion construction project. The city lobbied hard to keep 3,000 jobs in St. Louis, pushing the mapping agency to build a replacement on the north side for its current headquarters near the Anheuser-Busch brewery.

“NGA is going to be a great opportunity, but we don’t know yet what ancillary things are going to come about as a result of it,� said , incoming president of Urban Strategies, the nonprofit firm that helped plan for the grant application and will coordinate human services if it’s successful. “I think Choice (Neighborhoods) gives us an opportunity to create those pathways.�

St. Louis has a good chance to be among the winners when the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development announces them in coming weeks. Four of the five finalists are expected to win funding, Shin said.

Megan Betts, a St. Louis Place resident who has attended meetings on the initiative since they began nearly two years ago, said she believes the projects could benefit residents well beyond Preservation Square’s fences.

“It shows that for an underserved community, there’s some attention happening now,� said Betts, who recently announced she is running to represent the 5th Ward on the Board of Aldermen. “And if we get this grant and all these other things that are happening, it can show people that this stuff can happen north of Delmar, and it can continue.�

Some $20 million of the grant will supplement private financing and state low-income housing tax credits to rebuild Preservation Square over the next several years. Later, another McCormack Baron property, the Brewery Apartments in the old Falstaff brewery at Madison and 20th Streets, will get a face-lift.

But $10 million of the grant would trigger tens of millions more dollars in commitments from partners for health, education and job training. St. Louis Public Schools, SSM Health, Affinia Health, Ranken Technical College and the St. Louis Agency on Training and Employment, among others, all plan to participate.

Some of the money would also help rehab the abandoned Carr School on 14th Street for a new Jonas Hubbard Jr. Family Center, which could be operated jointly by the YMCA and the Carr Square Tenant Management Corp.

Area banks have committed funding for a program to help with down payments or home repairs or to help finance small businesses.

Urban Strategies would coordinate case management for all the residents of Preservation Square, pointing them in the direction of help from health or employment agencies and telling parents about learning assistance and enrichment programs in schools. Residents of adjacent neighborhoods like St. Louis Place, Carr Square and Columbus Square could also use the programs.

“Choice Neighborhoods is the recognition that helping transform a community is not just redeveloping housing,� said Julie DeGraaf Velazquez, managing director of development for McCormack Baron.

The Choice program is part of a new direction in urban policy directed at building up places and neighborhoods, said Todd Swanstrom, a professor at the University of Missouri-St. Louis.

“It’s the right concept, which is when you go into disadvantaged neighborhoods you have to have a comprehensive plan,� he said. “You can’t just build housing, which is the old way.�

One of the issues with Preservation Square and the area in general, Urban Strategies’ Shin said, is that a wall of warehouses separates it from downtown.

“The warehouse district is a huge physical and mental barrier,� Shin said.

McCormack Baron plans to turn the homes along 14th Street into retail spaces or apartments that could easily be converted to storefronts. As downtown continues to redevelop, a newly enhanced 14th Street could serve as a natural connector.

“If we make some of these corridors that go to downtown like 14th Street more pedestrian-friendly, it would make some of those opportunities more successful,� Shin said.

Though $30 million isn’t a lot, it is a “prestigious� grant and could “be important for morale� as the city tries to spark some life into north St. Louis, Swanstrom said. HUD officials and other federal agencies have begun taking a closer look at St. Louis in the wake of the Ferguson unrest, he said, pointing to several other grants and initiatives that focus on north St. Louis and north St. Louis County.

“It will send a message that this is where it’s happening and the federal government is supportive nationally,� Swanstrom said. “Part of this is trying to put St. Louis back on the radar screen in terms of community and economic development.�

If St. Louis is left out of the final round of awards, backers of the effort say the partnerships will remain and many of the projects will still move forward, albeit less quickly and with fewer dollars.

“The fact that we’ve gone through extensive planning and had these conversations, we would just have to find another source of funding,� said Otis Williams, the director of the St. Louis Development Corporation, the city’s economic development arm. “It has generated a lot of enthusiasm and hope, I think, for the folks who live there. So we would hate to lose that energy.�