Category: Freeways

The Future of Freeway Expansions

The future has long been a very popular topic in cinema. A handful of videos posted here on streets.mn concern themselves with the future: Avidor, To New Horizons, The Automobile in the Year 2000, Bobbie Jones, Foreign Exchange Student in the Future, The Astounding World of the Future, and Magic Highway, USA. The Future of […]

Lessons from the 2011 Minnesota Motor Vehicle Crash Facts

What is the true price of our dependence on automobiles? Those in favor of pedestrian-oriented planning say repeatedly that a large contribution to our automobile economy is the cost of driving is simple too cheap. Although gas prices continually rise, they still lack to reflect the current amount of resources we have, and the impact […]

The Enormity of the Hennepin/Lyndale Spaghetti Bowl

There are a lot of ways to subsidize a thing. We subsidize homeownership with tax breaks. We subsidize corn production with price floors. We subsidize highway driving by transferring billions of dollars a year from the general fund to the foundering Highway Trust Fund. Whether or not you agree with these policies, they’re visible and […]

Intersection of Lyndale and Hennepin Avenues

Bottleneck Fix: Turn (Don’t Merge)

One highly trafficked intersection in Minneapolis was layered with interstate lanes in 1971. Although the freeway was buried below, ramps and merging lanes complicate the streets above. This historically influential neighborhood was transformed into a transitory space for the automotive world.   Minneapolis can regain this missing district with one driving modification: ‘turn, instead of […]

What If Interstate 94 Was a Park?

I’ve always wondered what life would be like if we did away with highway infrastructure. Television shows such as Life After Humans depict infrastructure eventually succumbing to the forces of nature, overbearing with moss and exotic animals.  What if this happened while humans still inhabited this world? While only the fantasy of some urban designers, […]

Chart of the Day – 7 Most Congested Corridors in Metropolitan Minneapolis – St. Paul

Rank Metro Area Road From To Distance Freeflow Travel Time (min) Worst Peak Period Peak Travel Time (min) Peak Average Speed Peak Delay (min) Total Delay Per Year (hrs) Total Delay Per Year (days) Worst Day Hour Worst Day Hour Travel Time (min) Worst Day Hour Average Speed Worst Day Hour Delay (min) 42 Minneapolis […]

Could Interstate Lids Unify University Neighborhoods?

Streets.mn writer Chris Iverson did an op-ed in the Minnesota Daily and appeared on the Daily Circuit this week: Could interstate lids unify University neighborhoods?:   Constructing interstate lids over I-35W would better connect the Dinkytown and Marcy Holmes neighborhoods near the University of Minnesota, says a Minnesota Daily columnist. Chris Iverson, senior in civil engineering […]