urbanMSP

On interesting thing in the gateway plan is that they plan to close 4th at 23rd, or is that already in the works because of the light rail?

Yes, I'm quite sure this has already happened.

It's a cool idea. The execution turned out a bit less whimsical and more cartoony than the renderings promised. Oh well.

Must... resist... making stupid joke about ASU and party buses...

CPM put signs for this project in the yards of a bunch of single-family houses they own around campus. Kinda makes it looks like it's going up all over the place.

Yeah, I had noticed that -- seems to fly in the face of the ban on off-premises advertising, no?

How is it that Ford did not take a single penny from the government and they are thriving; meanwhile the auto makers who took the government bailout are already struggling again? Don't tell me he saved the auto industry!! Foriegn dealers are doing fine and building new plants! If Chrysler puts out ...

OK, just checking.

Is the "rail" corridor the weird pointless bridge between the UofM press and the taller warehouse type building on the north side of that lot?

Yes. Pointless might be a bit strong.

So we shouldn't build these stations because 40 years in the future they may or may not build your fantasy system?

If I'm remembering correctly, this is city owned land, so they should have a fair degree of control over site planning, should the city choose to exercise it. I'm hopeful that they fully express the old rail corridor through the site. The old plans that we'd seen of it didn't do a great job of this ...

Any idea why we are planning two lines that will each have stops at Van White and Penn? Seems like overkill... one of the reasons why the now-LPA was chosen was because it supposedly served transit lacking North Mpls (even TLC was all over this lousy claim). Yet we will likely have stations on thes...

I'll miss Independent for sure....I got lucky there once!

You mean, like, the bartender forgot to charge you for a drink?

Or you didn't get herpes?

It gets a lot of use... Do you think this is true? In my opinion, WFO must be one of the most underused parks in the whole system. Hopefully the Chinese Garden, if it moves forward, is well executed and can help change this. My understanding is that they are only looking at the southeast quadrant o...

Well it's sort of bound to happen (the crane).....are people just surprised it's happening so fast? A tower (and a tower crane) both need pretty substantial footings, even if there's no underground parking. I'm not sure where bedrock sits relative to this site, but I'd anticipate that there will be...

Yes, and at the rates we've been able to sell bonds for lately, the carrying costs are almost negligible. We'd be foolhardy to not take advantage of the current environment.

More than anything, this project needs the economy to turn around. That would fairly quickly drive up demand and cost for downtown parking and add more congestion to the roads. Short of that, you have to cross your fingers and hope for some more exurban sprawl.

Nice! In all of my excitement, I hadn't even thought of this excellent wrinkle.

A tower (and a tower crane) both need pretty substantial footings, even if there's no underground parking. I'm not sure where bedrock sits relative to this site, but I'd anticipate that there will be some piles or augered piers required in place before we see any tower crane here.

I just think of the status quo, where industrial sites turned into the Quarry or Midway strip malls, and I think "THIS happened with site plans and zoning" -- when will we learn from it and allow organic development that naturally follows from a place that has value? I think the projects ...

No plans to widen the tunnel? Then why do the renderings show versions with more lanes within the tunnel (or are the lanes much narrower)?

It's part of this "road diet" action that all of the cool kids are hip to these days.

Very much so. Today there was a crane putting together a crane, which I assume will be used to construct another even larger crane.

And then?