urbanMSP

There really is a lot of traffic on Snelling, though, especially between I94 and Selby. Traffic diversion and calming should be top priorities.

To where should this traffic be diverted?

Ayd Mill Road would seem the logical candidate. It seems to have a lot of spare capacity but is difficult to get to from I94.

Since it's a state trunk highway, you should probably see what they think:

http://www.dot.state.mn.us/metro/projec ... lingstudy/

To where should this traffic be diverted?

After reduction of lanes and even road closures, traffic has often been found to simply disappear, not get pushed to other roads.

To where should this traffic be diverted?

After reduction of lanes and even road closures, traffic has often been found to simply disappear, not get pushed to other roads.

From car count over the years dealing with Ady Mill Road, There is a large number of cars that use that road. I've actually sat thru 3 lights to get my left turn onto Selby from Snelling Why people on the south end of Ady Road wanted it open to I-35E to get rid of traffic. That traffic is now on Selby Snelling and unless they can figure out a way to get to I-94 without have the NIMBY squad attack, that will remain a very busy area.

I think they need to build the connection to 94 at Pascal to help relieve this traffic. I realize the residents would fight this, but I think strategic roads coupled with traffic calming on streets is a good strategy.

A neuron fired and I was reminded that I've seen at least one "To Ayd Mill Road" sign along Concordia:

http://goo.gl/maps/3gVBu

Rather than turning left from Snelling onto Selby, there is an option to go along Concordia, then down Hamline to Ashland. The route is longer, of course.

The article also reiterated that the new building would contain a grocery store, which I think is a surprising use, considering the number of grocery stores in the area -- Whole Foods, Kowalskis, Target, Rainbow, Cub -- but I would welcome it.

I chatted very briefly with the apparent spokesperson from Ryan at the last Union Park DC Land Use Committee meeting. He made it pretty clear that they really think a grocery store will be part of the development and they have one particular store in mind but aren't quite ready to make that information public. Like you said, that corner is already pretty close to a Whole Foods, Kowalski's, Target, Rainbow, and Cub (and a Walmart, for that matter). Tne spokesperson said it would sell, presumably apart from other things, prepared foods like sushi. In an ideal world, that means they'd be putting in a new Mississippi Market. In this world, my money's on a Lund's. The nearest is in Highland and Lund's already has an "urban" mixed-use store in downtown Minneapolis. Or it could be a Trader Joe's, I guess.

Somehow I missed the mention of a grocery earlier. This location might pick up a lot of folks who live along the route 84 bus, since the Midway Rainbow is currently the least bad option in terms of setbacks, and is still 400 to 700 feet away depending on whether you want to go north or south along Snelling.

The Midway grocery stores are the closest to my house, but I routinely go to Lunds in Northeast because it's a much better experience. I feel like a grocery store here would have a similar effect.

Connect Ayd Mill to 94 and do Ayd Mill right and you will have the traffic calming on snelling. Of course that would be a very large project and the nimbyism that borders Ayd Mill will never allow it.

Well, you would have less traffic on Snelling. The actual traffic calming physical changes would need to be done to make sure it didn't return via induced demand (wide open Snelling Ave with excess capacity)

The Buffalo Wild Wings development has spawned a new NIMBY organization, "Citizens for a Better Snelling Avenue" ("better" in this case being strictly defined as "not allowing bars other than O'Gara's anywhere near Grand or Selby") - http://www.facebook.com/CitizensForABet ... 8421441317 . Management at B-Dubs has been pretty accomodating about the whole thing. At this week's UPDC Land Use Committee meeting they suggested that company policies already in place meant that nearly 1/3 of the group's 30-point list of demands were not going to be based in reality (they were nicer about it than that) but that a further 5-6 of them were being dealt with at B-Dubs expense as special considerations that they don't normally worry about at other locations. That leaves a list roughly 15-20 points long with demands like "no alcohol stronger than 3.2 beer" and "close by 10 pm".

The facade at the old Cheapo location is also coming down as of yesterday, and there are crews busy stripping the interior and doing something on the roof.

Anyone want to form a pro development group to counter? Hmmmm such as "citizens for a better Snelling tomorrow, tomorrow"

demands like "no alcohol stronger than 3.2 beer"

There should be a law against this! Someone call Phyllis Kahn!

Whoa, I must have missed that above. Where is Buffalo Wild Wings trying to go?

There is a pro-development (sort-of) group in formation, but it will be focused initially on Minneapolis, due to the municipal elections being held this year. Look for more on that very, very soon. Still working on a name. Nice Colbert PAC reference though.

Isn't the real shame about the B-Dubs development that it will be reusing the existing building that is set WAY back from the road. It's completely suburban in nature, but of course St. Paul residents don't care about that.

We definitely care about it, but the feeling in the neighborhood is that it's a fight for another day. Everyone here seems to be agreed that the strip mall should be redeveloped and the parking lot filled with mixed-use buildings fronting Snelling, but most people (as represented by that NIMBY group) are preoccupied with fighting a particular company moving in for whatever reason. What will be really interesting for those of us who don't oppose the B-Dubs development but do want a better urban environment here is to see what this group does AFTER they lose the B-Dubs fight. Maybe then we can start seeing some pressure to improve Snelling between Ashland and Portland and on the west side between Selby and Hague, which are parking lot and single-story retail respectively.

There is a pro-development (sort-of) group in formation, but it will be focused initially on Minneapolis, due to the municipal elections being held this year. Look for more on that very, very soon. Still working on a name. Nice Colbert PAC reference though.

Isn't the real shame about the B-Dubs development that it will be reusing the existing building that is set WAY back from the road. It's completely suburban in nature, but of course St. Paul residents don't care about that.

How about "Embiggen MSP" ?

Whoa, I must have missed that above. Where is Buffalo Wild Wings trying to go?

What he said.