Navigation

Author Archive | Bill Lindeke

Dockless Nice Ride 2

Minneapolis Should Embrace Entropy, Dockless Bikes

By on November 12, 2018 in Bicycling, Sidewalks, Streets

If you are interested in Twin Cities history, one of the more amusing things this year was the parallel development in Minneapolis and Saint Paul of dockless bike sharing systems. Dockless bikes are a big leap forward in bike sharing technology —  the use of which is something that tech blogger Kottke recently compared to bluetooth […]

Streets.mn is a non-profit and is volunteer run. We rely on your support to keep the servers running. If you value what you read, please consider becoming a member.

Continue Reading 18

Why You Should Apply for the streets.mn Board of Directors

By on November 8, 2018 in streets.mn

If you’re reading this, chances are good that you like streets.mn. For seven (!) years now, we’ve been leading conversations about the future of our streets, neighborhoods, and cities here in Minnesota. If you can think of a urban design issue, you will probably find articles and ideas about it here in the archive. Depending on […]

Streets.mn is a non-profit and is volunteer run. We rely on your support to keep the servers running. If you value what you read, please consider becoming a member.

Continue Reading 2

Chart of the Day: Child Pedestrian Fatalities, 1990 – 2012 by Day of Year

By on October 31, 2018 in Chart

Here’s an a propos chart. It shows the number of children killed by cars by day of the year: A quote about it the data: BestPlaces analyzed more than four million records of auto fatalities from the Department of Transportation Fatality Analysis Reporting System.  As the graph below shows, there have been 133 child pedestrian […]

Streets.mn is a non-profit and is volunteer run. We rely on your support to keep the servers running. If you value what you read, please consider becoming a member.

Continue Reading 1

Chart of the Day: Minnesota Energy Input and Output Flows, 2014

By on October 23, 2018 in Environment, Transportation

Here’s a fun chart to stare at for long hours. It’s the LIvermore labs energy chart! This is the most recent version available at the state level (though there is one made at the national scale using 2017 info). It might look familiar, as Adam Miller put up a similar chart a year and a […]

Streets.mn is a non-profit and is volunteer run. We rely on your support to keep the servers running. If you value what you read, please consider becoming a member.

Continue Reading

Map Monday: 1897 Rand McNally Minneapolis and Saint Paul

By on October 22, 2018 in History, Maps

Via David Rumsey’s great website, here’s a fun map you can check out from 1897, a colorful atlas view of the Twin Cities during the early heyday of streetcars. The overview: Here’s the close-up of the downtown areas:   It’s fun to Imagine all the farmland that surrounded the streetcar lines that had just been […]

Streets.mn is a non-profit and is volunteer run. We rely on your support to keep the servers running. If you value what you read, please consider becoming a member.

Continue Reading

Podcast #120: Minneapolis 2040 with Heather Worthington and Paul Mogush

By on October 17, 2018 in 2040 Minneapolis Comprehensive Plan, Podcast

Today I’m bringing you a conversation with Heather Worthington and Paul Mogush, two of the people behind the forthcoming Minneapolis 2040 Comprehensive Plan. The Minneapolis 2040 Comprehensive Plan is the basic planning document for the city, a ten-year update required by the regional government, and Minneapolis’ plan has been getting a lot of attention for […]

Streets.mn is a non-profit and is volunteer run. We rely on your support to keep the servers running. If you value what you read, please consider becoming a member.

Continue Reading

Chart of the Day: Population Growth in Largest Midwestern Metros

By on October 16, 2018 in Chart, Demographics, Economics

Bloomberg carried a chart-laden article recently, written by Justin Fox, showing the disparate population growth rates in Northeastern and Midwestern cities. It charts the differences in growth rate distribution along the coasts, where three large metro areas are generating nearly all the population growth, and in the Midwest, where growth rates are more evenly distributed. […]

Streets.mn is a non-profit and is volunteer run. We rely on your support to keep the servers running. If you value what you read, please consider becoming a member.

Continue Reading

Map Monday (Bonus): All The Buildings in Minnesota (and elsewhere) Mapped

By on October 15, 2018 in Land use, Maps

This is a very cool map from the NY Times that reminds me of the famous Nolli map of Rome. It shows all the buildings in the state on a simple black-and-white scale. What fun to play around with! Here are a few views of Minnesota at different scales: Closer up to Mankato… Closer up […]

Streets.mn is a non-profit and is volunteer run. We rely on your support to keep the servers running. If you value what you read, please consider becoming a member.

Continue Reading

Saint Paul and the Incredible Shrinking Downtown

By on October 3, 2018 in Maps, Streets

Maps of “Downtown Saint Paul” are pretty consistent. They almost always depict a small slice of historical urban density, edging a river, and firmly enclosed by a ring of freeways on all sides. The end result is a downtown that is small, quaint, and looks nice in photos taken from a distance. Downtown Saint Paul […]

Streets.mn is a non-profit and is volunteer run. We rely on your support to keep the servers running. If you value what you read, please consider becoming a member.

Continue Reading

Chart of the Day: Mobile Homes as Percentage of Housing, US States

By on September 25, 2018 in Chart, Housing

Here’s a chart via Jason Segedy’s blog that shows manufactured homes as a percentage of housing in each state. Here’s the chart, with Minnesota marked:   Segedy writes about some patterns: One of the things that affects the overall age of housing in any given location is the percentage of mobile homes in the mix.  […]

Streets.mn is a non-profit and is volunteer run. We rely on your support to keep the servers running. If you value what you read, please consider becoming a member.

Continue Reading