Walk the Talk! Taking Steps to Build Community
Our new “Walk the Talk” series will highlight community meetings, slow roll bike rides, walk-and-talk neighborhood tours and other ways to build community and boost activism.
Tag Archives: north loop
How Much are North Loop’s 4th Street Onramps Costing Minneapolis?
Like most freeways, I long took the 4th Street viaducts for granted. They just loomed there at the edge of downtown taking up space, hoisted 30’ in the air like a helium whale. A grey meaningless concrete backdrop generating constant noise and microscopic particles of plastic, sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxide, and other subtle poison. These […]
Minneapolis’ North Loop Viaducts Offer A Unique Opportunity
Some weeks ago, Hennepin County Commissioner Mike Opat and a team of architects unveiled a bold and expensive new idea for Minneapolis’ Mississippi riverfront. The plan received a warm reception from Chamber of Commerce and Editorial Board types, but a more lukewarm response among the two groups of people whose opinions I most often seek: […]
Podcast #125 – Stopping the Federal Reserve Parking Ramp with Nancy Gardner and Tom Mallon
I’m excited to bring you today a conversation with Nancy Gardner and Tom Mallon, who residents of downtown Minneapolis that organized an effort to successfully stop a large parking ramp from being constructed in their neighborhood. Nancy and Tom live near the Mississippi River on the northern part of downtown Minneapolis, located very close to […]
Sunday Summary – March 24, 2019
The usual joke is that Minnesota has four seasons: almost winter, winter, still winter, and construction season. Clearly the joker was a cat person; the proper seasonal lineup is Summer, Fall, Winter, and Muddy Dog season where we find ourselves now (yesterday was also National Puppy Day!). Muddy Dog season does mean easier biking and […]
Another Surface Parking Lot Bites the Dust
This morning, the North Loop was awoken by the sweet sound of pile driving as the Archive project started construction on a surface parking lot near the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. The surface parking lot is one of the last in the area, with several being redeveloped in the last ten years into mixed-use […]
New North Loop Six-Story Rises Up
Framing of the second story has begun on the new North Loop mixed-use development by Solaris Redevelopment Corp. and Weiss Builders. The project broke ground on a set of large surface parking lots in July 2018. When complete, the property will house 156 residential units and approximately 22,670 square feet of commercial space. For parking, the developer […]
Can the West Loop Still Happen?
If you asked one of the thousands of new Minneapolis residents who moved in since 2010 “What are the borders of North Loop?”, you may find they consider the western border to be the 4th Street freeway viaduct. Despite the neighborhood continuing on west up to I-94, the viaduct walls off a landscape of low […]
New Minneapolis Housing Projects Head to Planning Commission – April 2017
There’s a handful of housing projects coming up on the April 13, 2017 Minneapolis Planning Commission Committee of the Whole Agenda. I’m primarily writing this because every time people hear about new housing being built, there are often groans of “Ugh, it’s always more bro/luxury apartments.” It’s not really true, so I wanted to highlight these projects. So here’s a […]
The Day the Laughter Died: Acme Comedy’s Parking Crisis
As someone who follows local development politics pretty closely, I’ve been watching a strange new debate unfold at City Hall. We’re used to hearing concerns about parking and neighborhood “character” from longtime homeowners. Now, that same argument is coming from a cast of comedians in support of Acme Comedy Co’s quest to stop the development […]