Page 31 of 56

Re: Southside - General Topics

Posted: May 29th, 2016, 12:30 pm
by John21
Drove by this one today. It looks like it may be rising from the dead.

Re: Southside - General Topics

Posted: May 29th, 2016, 12:43 pm
by Scottie
They've had a trailer there for quite awhile but I can't tell if they are doing any actual work.

Re: Southside - General Topics

Posted: June 2nd, 2016, 10:14 pm
by minneboom
The Rail Station will be rebranding and opening as the The Howe Daily Kitchen and Bar! It is great to see so many good restaurants options opening up around the 38th Station.

http://www.howempls.com

Town Talk Diner

Posted: June 7th, 2016, 12:18 pm
by sanguinic
The Town Talk Diner's French incarnation is closing Sunday, and will be replaced by new owners:

http://www.startribune.com/historic-tow ... 382114671/

Re: Southside - General Topics

Posted: June 7th, 2016, 1:27 pm
by seanrichardryan
Noticed yesterday that the new liquor license had been applied for.

http://www.minneapolismn.gov/www/groups ... 180613.pdf

Re: Southside - General Topics

Posted: June 8th, 2016, 2:37 pm
by lordmoke
Attractive little single-story building proposed for 27th and Bloomington:
http://minneapolismn.gov/www/groups/pub ... 181246.pdf

Re: Southside - General Topics

Posted: June 8th, 2016, 2:44 pm
by twincitizen
The way I read their narrative, they want to build a spec commercial building, then sell the completed building to whichever business/entrepreneur comes along, rather than own it themselves and lease it out. That's kinda strange, but I hope it works out for them!

Re: Southside - General Topics

Posted: June 9th, 2016, 8:02 am
by jw138
There's something happening at the Roundup Beer Hall building at 2nd Ave & Lake St. As I passed by on the bus yesterday all the exterior windows had plastic taped over them. Looks like there's lots of various permits open with the city for upgrades and remodeling including one for a food plan review.

Re: Southside - General Topics

Posted: June 9th, 2016, 9:31 am
by lordmoke
Awesome. I was really worried that building was going to get demolished, especially after it suffered a fire a couple years ago.

Re: Southside - General Topics

Posted: June 9th, 2016, 10:18 am
by jw138
It looks there are 8 apartments on the top 2 floors. All will be remodeled (including getting A/C). 1st floor will get some sort of restaurant/bar.

Sabri Property is listed as the new tenant.

Re: Southside - General Topics

Posted: June 9th, 2016, 10:49 am
by fehler
27th and Bloomington is not really the nicest neighborhood. I'd be wary of a developer building a building with no declared tenant in that location, either they are very misinformed about the current neighborhood (unlikely) or they are not willing to tell the neighborhood who the actual tenant will be.

Re: Southside - General Topics

Posted: June 9th, 2016, 10:51 am
by mattaudio
Prime opportunity for a wide-radius Bloomington Porkchop for traffic heading from I-35W to eastbound Lake Street. Even add a third eastbound aux lane to 4th Ave if we tear down a few more businesses.

Re: Southside - General Topics

Posted: June 9th, 2016, 7:35 pm
by beige_box
The way I read their narrative, they want to build a spec commercial building, then sell the completed building to whichever business/entrepreneur comes along, rather than own it themselves and lease it out. That's kinda strange, but I hope it works out for them!
27th and Bloomington is not really the nicest neighborhood. I'd be wary of a developer building a building with no declared tenant in that location, either they are very misinformed about the current neighborhood (unlikely) or they are not willing to tell the neighborhood who the actual tenant will be.
I don't see what's so ambiguous or dodgy about this proposal. The developers, who seem to be ethnically Turkish, say they plan to build "for a local entrepreneur or community member." That stretch of Bloomington, and Phillips generally, is thriving with small businesses, mostly immigrant-owned, especially Somali. Have you been inside (or for that matter, outside) the Village Market Somali mall on 24th St.? It's overflowing with businesses--and customers! (But then when the developer wanted to expand, a coalition of mostly White single-family-homeowners blocked the proposal on the grounds of "traffic" and "men on the corner"--sound familiar?) Meanwhile Bloomington is lined with occupied storefronts and empty lots. It's absolutely within reason that a developer would want to build commercial space here, and the commitment to sell it rather than rent it may very well be a good-faith effort to empower another immigrant entrepreneur to generate wealth and stability. I'm sure there will be dozens of prospective buyers.

Of course it's possible I'm wrong--maybe the developer will just sell it to another soon-to-be asshole landlord after seducing the community with talk of economic empowerment (hint: like what already happens with plenty of those developments everyone cheers on in "nicer" neighborhoods). Small business owners are rarely angels anyway. But acting surprised when a developer recognizes the commercial potential here basically amounts to the erasure of a thriving, growing community of immigrant entrepreneurs as well as the buying power of a large and growing swathe of Minneapolitans.

Re: Southside - General Topics

Posted: June 10th, 2016, 8:12 am
by mattaudio
Yeah this seems absolutely fine. We need more good-quality spec storefront space. Just a few blocks away, the Cedar Food & Grill (26th and Cedar) burned down around 2010 and was rebuilt bigger and better in 2012 or so.

Re: Southside - General Topics

Posted: June 10th, 2016, 9:19 am
by mplsjaromir
lol another man named Erdogan leading Justice and Development.

In all seriousness looks like a good project.

Re: Southside - General Topics

Posted: June 10th, 2016, 9:37 am
by fehler
I'm not aware of the Village Market, the google reviews are mixed. I am aware of the work being done by the Banyon Foundation in the area, and am hopeful of the future of the Philips neighborhood. The intersection of Bloomington and 24th has at one point been considered the "most dangerous intersection in Minneapolis" (sorry, can't provide a link for that, it may be from the old "Murderapolis" era.)

I don't know any motives for the developer or possible tenants. But I've always been under the assumption that a neighborhood has the most say in a development before the shovels start moving dirt. Any neighborhood organization needs to ask questions about what it wants at this location before things get going, not after the lease is signed. Unanswered questions just lead to more questions.

Re: Southside - General Topics

Posted: June 10th, 2016, 9:52 am
by RailBaronYarr
beige_box's comments seem a bit all over the place. Small business owners are good, unless they're landlords who are jerks, but also most small business owners are also not great anyway? Not trying to pick on you, but you seem to be conflicted as to whether capitalism in land use is good or bad, or whether it's worth trying to sort the good from the bad. Regardless, I think there's some nugget of agreement in there that oftentimes land use regulations -- catering to wealthy, often white, residents and their definition of what makes a place livable or whatever, which has historically included thinking minorities are as much of a problem as bad architecture or traffic -- are the problem holding back empowerment for lower-income (often minority/immigrant) residents. At least, insofar as land use matters (I'll definitely admit not *everything* is about land use and transpo). The mall at 24th is a great example, and I was very much in support of expansion and eyerolled at the stuff people were worried about. Any lot zoned RX in the city (there are many!) that doesn't allow anything more than a daycare (ban the rhetoric of "families"!!) as far as commercial uses are other good examples. Rules discriminating against housing occupancy, or allowing the low-income people who do happen to own property from making better use of it and renting out to other people for some side income are other good examples.

Re: Southside - General Topics

Posted: June 10th, 2016, 5:11 pm
by beige_box
beige_box's comments seem a bit all over the place. Small business owners are good, unless they're landlords who are jerks, but also most small business owners are also not great anyway? Not trying to pick on you, but you seem to be conflicted as to whether capitalism in land use is good or bad, or whether it's worth trying to sort the good from the bad.
To clarify, some small business owners are decent people, others are not, but under capitalism, under typical arrangements, the profits of even the most well-intended business owner will inevitably be at least partially premised on extracting wealth via the exploitation their employees and/or from the State-enforced exclusive ownership of the means of production -- i.e., at someone else's expense.

That said, as someone capable of thinking even slightly complex thoughts, even under late capitalism I recognize that some market-driven economic arrangements and developments are "better" than others when it comes to the big-picture societal good. Many here scoff at shrill CPC commenters who characterize certain developments as "white housing" and the like, as though there was some rigid racial segregation written into certain plans or regulations, which, obviously, there is not! But it should also be obvious that there does exist a diversity of development models, each benefiting and empowering different groups of people--just as, obviously, there are different business models an entrepreneur might employ, and different markets they might target.

The bigger share of projects being built tend toward one particular set of practices, conventions and institutional frameworks, including an a priori assumption that building in a minority-majority, lower-income area is a poor investment. My position is that this development regime--and this is where some of us have a fundamental disagreement, which we needn't explore here--generally reinforces existing racial inequalities. As commenters here have pointed out, this 27th & Bloomington project does not check the usual boxes for speculative commercial construction. The particulars of the thing seem to point to the concept being (or at least seeming to be) intentionally aimed at creating wealth-generating opportunities that otherwise wouldn't exist for members of a community that is otherwise relatively disempowered and neglected under the usual-boxes-checked development regime. That's a relative win for equity, but no it does not invalidate critiques of capitalism in general! Moving on:
I am aware of the work being done by the Banyon Foundation in the area, and am hopeful of the future of the Philips neighborhood. The intersection of Bloomington and 24th has at one point been considered the "most dangerous intersection in Minneapolis" (sorry, can't provide a link for that, it may be from the old "Murderapolis" era.)
Go check out the interactive crime data map at MinnPost. These days, during most months, Phillips, even East Phillips, has crime data comparable to, and sometimes better than, places like Lowry Hill East and Downtown--areas where no one bats an eye when there is speculative construction. The reality is that Phillips is already a place where commerce can and does happen, and the fact that a certain group of people feel the need to cram it into some stereotyped, punitive narrative of far-off neighborhood 'improvement' is a perpetuation of the institutional racism that creates barriers for non-White entrepreneurs to generate wealth.

Re: Southside - General Topics

Posted: June 11th, 2016, 11:13 am
by grant1simons2
Speaking of Bloomington Ave, this popped up on Zillow a week ago

http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/2647- ... 2203_zpid/

Good opportunity for re-use

Re: Southside - General Topics

Posted: June 13th, 2016, 8:26 am
by mattaudio
Speaking of Bloomington Ave, I may be purchasing a lot along it in the next two or three months to build a fourplex or a storefront/apartment combo. Still working on making a concept pencil out.