Gateway Arch National Park - What Do I Know?

Gateway Arch - Gateway Arch National Park - St. Louis, Missouri
Copyright Andy Richards 2026 - All Rights Reserved

LAST YEAR, I posted a series of blogs on National Parks. The ones I have visited. There are 63 officially designated "National Parks in the U.S." They range in size from over 13 million acres, to just under 100 acres. So lots of variability.

Market Street - St. Louis, Missouri
As we approached the arch area, I saw this traffic light. I hoped for - and was rewarded with - a red light, stopping long enough for me to get the light centered in the arch with the Old Courthouse in the background - image below
Copyright Andy Richards 2026 - All Rights Reserved

GATEWAY ARCH National Park is the smallest National Park in the U.S., at just over 92 acres. Its grounds are on the west side of the Mississipi River near where St. Louis, Missouri's oldest buildings once stood; and very near the start of the Louis and Clark Expedition. Originally built as a monument to the Lewis and Clark Expedition, the Gateway Arch (namesake to the Park) is the tallest structure in the western hemisphere.

Gateway Arch and Old Courthouse - St. Louis, Missouri
Copyright Andy Richards 2026 - All Rights Reserved

THE PARK is one of the newest (4th newest at this writing) of the parks, officially "promoted" as a National Park from its former "national monument" status only in 2018. The new designation was not without controversy, as all other officially designated parks preserve and protect some natural area, resource or phenomena. Construction of the arch, considered the "gateway to the American West" began in 1963 and was completed roughly 2 years later; designated as a national monument.

Market Street - St. Louis, Missouri
Copyright Andy Richards 2026 - All Rights Reserved

LIKE MANY monuments around the world, the arch can be seen from all around St. Louis. In my shot from Market Street with the famous Old Courthouse framed in the arch, I wanted to show the context of the city street, leading down to the Missiippi. The sheer size of the arch creates the illusion of spanning the city street and driving through the arch. In reality, it does not span the street.

Another view of The Arch and The Old Courthouse from Market Street - St. Louis, Missouri
Copyright Andy Richards 2026 - All Rights Reserved

WHEN RESEARCHING the monument, I learned a couple things that hadn't ever entered my mind. It is illegal to fly an airplane through the arch. The FAA warned pilots shortly after completion in 1965 that such fly-throughs would result in not only a heavy fine, but immediate revocation of their license. At least 10 pilots done so over the years. It is said that the U.S. Secret Service forbids a sitting POTUS from going up in the arch because it is such a limited access space.

Gateway Arch - from the St. Louis Cathedral parking lot - St. Louis, Missouri
Copyright Andy Richards 2026 - All Rights Reserved

PHOTOGRAPHICALLY, THIS one is interesting - and potentially a challenge. This is a subject where either living in or near St. Louis would be advantageous. The arch itself is not a particularly photogenic subject, making it important to be able to provide some context or a unique perspective. I have seen some pretty cool images from a distance, and hope someday to be able to find and shoot from those spots. There, the photographer is able to add elements of foreground interest and, if fortunate enough to find a spot across the river, possibly nighttime shots with reflection opportunities. Up closer is going to call for a wide angle perspective and wide angle lens. I recenlty picked up a "travel" lens - a 20 - 40mm f2.8 lens (using a "full frame" camera/sensor). I will be traveling a fair amount this year in old European cities and among some landscape gardens, among other things, and I was hoping the 20 - 40 would give me the versatility I would like to get some of those close perspectives. So I was delighted to learn on this trip that for images like the arch from a close up vantage point, the lens performed very well and its field of view fit my eye and the subject.

Gateway Arch - St. Louis Cathedral entrance to Gateway National Park - St. Louis, Missouri
Copyright Andy Richards 2026 - All Rights Reserved

DODGING BETWEEN rain showers, I only really had one outside-of-the-vehicle opportunity. I approached the park (and the arch) from the old St. Louis Cathedral parking lot. There is an entrance there, and the red flagstone surface gave me an interesting lead-in to the image. This may have been a case where the cloudy skies worked to my advantage, as my (perhaps) favorite of the precious few images I did make looks as if the arch disappeared into the clouds. There was some green foliage in the foregound as well. Any one of those elements alone would probably not been enough. But put together, they gave me a (surprising) opportunity to make a reasonably nice image. When I get back I will try a number of different viewpoints and perspectives. For now - this is the one I had, other than the cell-phone snapshots from the "shotgun" seat in the car.

St. Louis Cathedral stands as a sentinel to one of the entrances to Gateway Arch National Park - St. Louis, Missouri
Copyright Andy Richards 2026 - All Rights Reserved

THERE WAS sun back there somewhere. Somewhere behind the clouds. I just know there was. 😏I have made it known here from time to time that I am not afraid to use Photoshop to achieve my "vision." This one is not AI though. Just good, old-fashioned "manipulation" using the sky replacement tools in photoshop to create an image that "could have been." One of my "Rich" buddies rolls his eyes whenever I bring up sky replacement. This one is for you Rich (and you know who you are). 😎

Gateway Arch (what "might have been") - Gateway Arch National Park - St. Louis, Missouri
Copyright Andy Richards 2026 - All Rights Reserved

THE GATEWAY Arch has been on my "bucket list" for a number of years. We have family living in suburban St. Louis, and other than a day-long business trip some nearly 40 years ago, we had never visited the area. That really has been inexcusable from the family standpoint. We are planning to remedy that situation, and along with that will undoubtedly come some additional opportunities for photography in a city that has no shortage of photo ops. We were there for only a couple days this trip and unfortunately, the single day we had allocated to a visit to the city and the arch was one in which Mother Nature determined would be a near rainout. Every image here was made between raindrops, or behind a car windshield. But I saw enough. I will be back! 😀

Umbrella Streets - They are a "Thing"

Douglas Street Umbrellas - Dunedin, Florida
Copyright Andy Richards 2024

A LITTLE quick "Google" research informed me that the first known Umbrella Street was (probably) in Portugal (Águeda, specifically for the Ágitagueda Art Festival). Whether truly the first or not, the idea has caught on around the world.

Pink Street; Lison, Portugal
Copyright Andy Richards 2022 - All Rights Reserved

THE UMBRELLA Sky Project, was first conceived as part of an art fair in 2011. Part of the Ágitagueda Art Festival, the project is - as is so much art throughout history - a practical architechtural application evidenced by a striking and colorful visual display. In addition to the artful and photo-friendly presentation, the design is to shade for pedestrians during the hot summer months. The concept has been adopted now world - wide and has grown into a popular tourist attraction in many cities.

Umbrellas lit at night on The Pink Street - Lisbon, Portugal
Copyright Andy Richards 2022 - All Rights Reserved

MY OWN introduction to the concept was in Lisbon, Portugal a few years back. Now a center of nightlife in Lisbon, the Pink Street was once a "red light" district, due to its proximity to the harbor. As part of an urban renewal project, the short, pedestrian street was painted pink - and colorful umbrellas hung, sometime in the early 2000's. Today the street is lined with bars and trendy restaurants.

The Pink Street - Open for Business - Lisbon, Portugal
Copyright Andy Richards 2022

AS A photographer, the Lisbon Pink Street provides two very different photo-ops. The first (and perhaps my preferred) is the early morning visit before things open up. As is my custom, I am often up and out on the streets at dawn, exploring and shooting. One of my planned activities was to find the Pink Street, and that I did, early one morning. It was just a few blocks from our hotel and thankfully in the valley in Lisbon, so I was able to avoid the steep, hilly walks a few of the other days had served up.

Douglas Avenue Umbrellas - Dunedin, Florida
Copyright Andy Richards 2024 - All Rights Reserved

THE SECOND opportunity, though, which "street photographers" will certainly appreciate, is at night, after things have ramped up. I was fortunate to do both.

Douglas Avenue Umbrellas - Dunedin, Florida
Copyright Andy Richards 2024 - All Rights Reserved

WHEN WE left Portugal, I thought of the umbrellas as a decorative addition to the main attraction, the Pink Street. Kind of a one-off in my mind. Some time later, I discovered a "mini" version of the hanging umbrellas motif on Douglas Street in Dunedin, Florida, kind of by coincidence. I knew I had to return early one morning to photograph them. I was still thinking of this motif as a unique event. But it wasn't.

Thomas Angel's Gate - Trondheim, Norway
Copyright Andy Richards 2025 - All Rights Reserved

LAST FALL, on our Norway cruise, our final port stop was in Trondheim, Norway. It was probably my favorite city that we have visited in Norway (though in reality, we haven't visited very many of them). There, once again we encountered the Umbrella Street phenomena, on a popular retail shopping street: Thomas Angel's Gate. It was probably the first time it really ocurred to me that this motif was not at all a one-off, but had become a widespread ocurrence.

Thomas Angel's Gate - Trondheim, Norway
Copyright Andy Richards 2025 - All Rights Reserved

AGAIN, MORE recently, we visited yet another Umbrella Street; this time during our first ever visit to Dominican Republic, on a Celebrity Apex Caribbean cruise.

Umbrella Street - Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic
Copyright Andy Richards 2026 - All Rights Reserved

I HAVE since learned that there are various versions of this motif in many other places around the world. Some I have visited and apparently missed - Like Camden Market in London, Dublin and San Juan - you can be sure I will seek them out next time. Others are in places I haven't been to, and some of those are already on the travel itinerary, like Istanbul, Thessalononiki, and Paris. I will be looking for them.

Umbrellas - Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic
Copyright Andy Richards 2026 - All Rights Reserved

I HAVE found this subject interesting enough to me that it has become a "project" to photograph as many of them as I can, and I even have a new gallery, dedicated to Umbrella Streets now on my website. With only 4 locations so far, you can see I have my work cut out for me. I don't know when, but there will be more of this. :-)

Remove Reflections in Photoshop - A Year Later - Has It Improved?

JUST OVER a year ago, I wrote about this Photoshop tool, and concluded that for the most part, it was "not ready for prime time yet." In fairness, I also concluded that it was a pretty good tool in many cases to create a starting point, with the additional need to "work" the image afterward. Many of Photoshop's AI and content - aware tools share this issue. There is usually going to be some additional "cleanup" necessary after applying the tool.

IN 2025, a new feature was added to the "Remove" tool in Photoshop's Adobe Camera Raw (ACR) module, to remove reflections. In a blog post in May, 2025, I reviewed that feature. The recently released Photoshop ver. 27.6.0 now includes that "tool" in the main Photoshop program under the Edit Menu labeled "Reflection Removal." The reflection removal in ACR has also been maintained. In ACR, you will be working with raw images and thus generally higher resolution files, making your renders potentially higher quality. The Remove Reflections tool in Photoshop, however, can only be used on 8-bit images. If you don't convert the image to 8-bit, "Remove Reflections" will be greyed out.

USING THE tool in Photoshop (instead of ACR) gives slightly more flexibility and perhaps creativity, but at the expense of image quality. In Photoshop, the tool provides for the use of layers, allowing a layer of just the reflection, which can be adjusted for opacity and also used for creative purposes. When you activate Remove Reflections, it will give you a separate dialog box asking if you want to create a new (reflection) layer. I would do so, just to give yourself that additional flexibility in processing.

HAS THIS utility changed? Most certainly. But has it improved? Lets take a look. The first image below is the original, unretouched image made through the plexiglass up in London's "Shard" skyscraper.

The Thames from "The Shard" - London, England
Copyright Andy Richards 2021 - All Rights Reserved

THE SECOND shot below is the identical image, but with the "Reflections" utility under ACR's Remove Distractions applied using the highest quality. A comparison with the same image using the same adjustments in the prior blog post show that there have not been any improvements made to this tool from the 2025 version. They are virtuallly identical. While some of the high level reflections have been removed, the streaks across the river are still visible.

The Thames from "The Shard" - London, England
Copyright Andy Richards 2021 - All Rights Reserved

THE NEXT image below is the unretouched image brought into Photoshop and after conversion to 8-bits, the new "Remove Reflections" tool under the Edit menu applied. It seems like for this example there is an ever-so-slight improvement, but the tradeoff will be that on larger file applications, it is perhaps made is less effective by requiring that the image be converted to 8-Bit).

The Thames from "The Shard" - London, England
Copyright Andy Richards 2021 - All Rights Reserved

IN THE last image, I applied the ACR reflection removal, and then in Photoshop, converted to 8-bit and applied the new Reflection Removal under the Edit Menu on top of the prior removal process. If anything, in this instance, it looks worse to me, suggesting that they two algorithyms will likely work against each other.

The Thames from "The Shard" - London, England

Copyright Andy Richards 2021 - All Rights Reserved

I NEXT tried just the new Edit Menu "Reflections Removal" tool on another image from the prior blog, showing my own reflection in the window. Similar to the prior result, it did nothing. Doesn't appear to recognize my image as a reflection. That is probably a factor of high contrast that might be better treated if there was a bright, specular reflection.

Window Reflection of Photographer - London, England

Copyright Andy Richards 2021 - All Rights Reserved

CONCLUSION? THEY have added some "bells and whistles," making it usable in PS itself, with layers, but only on 8-bit files. I cannot see any improvement in its effectiveness. For me, it will remain a relatively little used tool (in reality, try not to create such reflections unless I am doing them on purpose), but one that may have some limited utility as part of a more thorough processing session.