The future ain’t what it used to be. Yogi Berra said it. Phil Shafer believes it. The streets of St Joseph will settle it.

Shafer, a Kansas City area artist who goes by the pseudonym Sike Style, won the recent contest promoted by the Allied Arts Council and the city to decorate the traffic box at 8th and Edmond in downtown St Joseph.

He started at about noon Friday, and by six p.m. was still hard at work. Using spray paint, tape, and newspaper, he has created a modern look for the old public utility structure. He says the wind has been “kicking his butt.”

The title expression can mean whatever you want it to mean. Shafer says different people will interpret it in different ways.

“Some people will say the future is not what it used to be,” he says. “Where’s my flying car? Where’s my hover board? And others will say the future is exactly what they thought it would be, the same old thing. I want people to interpret it in their own way.”

Teresa Fankhauser of Allied Arts says this is the first of several traffic boxes to get the arts treatment, but she says that is subject to future funding. She says none of this would be possible without the help of the City of St Joseph.

She also says that the traffic box project is just one part of a broader vision of public art, not just downtown, but all over the city. Fankhauser sees numerous possibilities, including a sculpture walk, light installations, and paintings and murals on the city’s parking garages.

“You can’t put art in a box, although we did today on a traffic box,” she says