Weep and know Death, Land of Sky Blue Waters. There will be no butter blocks carved of your daughters. Eighteen hundred siblings are already dead. All else holds its breath so The Thing won’t spread. The places you ate, the places you drank, The places you danced and flirted, The places you studied, and the […]
Planted medians are one of those “nice things” people always seem to be referring to in snarky social media posts. They bring visual relief to people near them and inspire traffic calming. We all know this. But where there’s soil, there’s also a place for weed seeds to fall, and those seeds grow into plants […]
During this era of isolation due to COVID-19, I’ve found myself walking, biking, and generally spending more time outside. I’ve had a lot of time to notice the natural world more than I used to and I’ve been able to experience the landscape and soundscape of my yard and neighborhood with a more profound appreciation. […]
Editor’s note: Julia wrote this piece prior to the killing of George Floyd and subsequent unrest. The last few days have again revealed the structural inequality that persists in our cities. These gaps come in many forms, including in access to food. As grocery stories have been destroyed or shuttered throughout many parts of the […]
Today marks the 50th anniversary of Earth Day, and the theme for this year’s celebration is “Climate Action.” Here at streets.mn, we have a lot of ways we’re taking action on climate breakdown, including the formation of our Climate Committee, a carbon audit, hosting trash clean-up events, and, as always, climate-focused articles from our wonderful […]
In a noteworthy scoop, streets.mn editors have obtained a dossier of bicycle infrastructure concepts from the Minnesota Department of Transportation (MnDOT). In the interest of public disclosure, we are sharing them at this juncture. The files convey a number of potential designs that appear to have been rejected through usual agency protocols, part of an ongoing […]
I am aware many Saint Paul people have a sense of and celebrate the fact their city is special in various ways. On the other hand, it seems to me most Minneapolis people acknowledge what their various places have to offer although they do not have an identity with their city, while at the same […]
Is it me? Or is everyone who is brave enough to go outdoors these days a little friendlier, a bit relieved to see another human being? With a record number of people unemployed, and only “essential” workers (a term that makes me feel dispensable) now allowed to report to their offices or shop floors, fewer […]
In October, I took the bus out to Afton State Park, which is located on the Minnesota-Wisconsin border due east of the Twin Cities. But wait, you might think. That’s impossible. There’s no bus service out that way. The nearest Metro Transit route is the 294, which goes to Stillwater and only runs during rush […]
Winter in Minnesota can be delightful, gorgeous, fragile, challenging, and sometimes far too gray. In January of 2018, Melissa Wenzel issued herself a challenge to a winter-weather version of April’s “30 Days of Biking.” Fellow winter bicyclists in Minnesota and around the world joined Melissa in her pledge to bike every day in January. In 2019, […]