Embracing Ruins as Historic Preservation
We tend to ignore ruins or look at them as failures, awaiting either a visionary creative reuse or the wrecking ball. What if we preserved them as they are instead?
Tag Archives: redevelopment
Streets.mn Virtual Happy Hour: Rethinking Duluth’s Core
Have you ever driven, ridden or walked around in Duluth and noticed how Interstate 35 cuts through the city almost impenetrably? Perhaps you have noticed the sheer scale of the freeway and overpasses and their seeming lack of relation to the context of the human-scaled surroundings? Maybe you wish there were more natural spaces, softer […]
Preserve The Future, Not Just The Past
Because I have a lot of important things to fill my time, I recently tuned in to a meeting of the Minneapolis Heritage Preservation Commission. There was just one item on the agenda: the proposed demolition of a low-slung downtown office building at 17 N Washington Avenue, which would then be replaced by a 27 […]
Map Monday: Designated Opportunity Zones of the Twin Cities
This past weekend Star Tribune metro reporter Eric Roper wrote about the census tract that includes the Mall of America and Bloomington’s South Loop being classified as Opportunity Zones. He notes that in the 2017 tax code overhaul, Congress created Opportunity Zones to offer tax advantages for investments made in designated distressed areas. The designations stay in […]
The 21st Century Southdale Vehicle Collapse
The perception that traffic congestion is worse today than in the past is a real phenomenon. Might as well call it traffic nostalgia. Plus, the perception that traffic is only going to get worse is a common objection for constructing new housing anywhere. A fourplex or daycare being proposed can bring forth primal concerns about […]
Sunday Summary – October 15, 2017
A light week here on streets.mn as we cruise toward Minneapolis and Saint Paul elections, Halloween, and mittens. Check out our events calendar for things to do around the metro related to transportation and land use from tours to lectures to meetings. Big ideas Eric Saathoff considers The Next Chapter for Seeger Square which is now […]
Highland Character Quest
Recently, I purchased a home about a half a mile north of this industrial waste site. I was okay with this, since prior to finalizing the contract I had read some very intriguing things about the city’s plans for the site, known in conversation as “The Ford Site.” But after living in my new community a while, […]
Form & Function: Four Corners
I’m often intrigued by the differences in buildings on four corners of a junction — in form and function. Below are the four corners of Selby Avenue and Dale Street in Saint Paul. This had been a vibrant area until Interstate 94 and its destruction of the Rondo neighborhood in the late 1960s. When I first […]