urbanMSP

I'm a bit out of my depth on this topic, but nevertheless find myself in some advisory positions. St. Paul Public Works seems to be implying that the best way to improve pedestrian safety at commercial nodes is to improve traffic flow and therefore reduce congestion. I'm initially very dubious since...

This area still has a long way to go. I was trying to give it the benefit of the doubt and frequented the LA Fitness on University often. Then I had my locker broken into and my credit cards stolen. They racked up $1500 in two hours. When I reported it to the police and LA Fitness they both said I ...

The claim (I don't recall if this was made by the UPDC, city, or Met Council) is that the project will be based on the Snelling Station Area Plan. That means new streets, big office buildings, public plazas and fountains, residential and small retail. I'll believe it when I see it.

They claim they can't figure out how to monetize it online. Possibly they are also using a 28.8 modem and looking forward to the final episode of Seinfeld.

Fortunately Bill Lindeke mostly saves them the trouble.

The Villager refuses to go online.

The Getten Credit building and a neighboring house north east of Snelling and Dayton are now rubble, construction on associated Bank should start fairly soon.

Age and distinctiveness doesn't make a bad building worth preserving, especially in a downtown with real topographical limits. If da Vinci himself had designed that building it would still be begging to be demolished.

I don't want to live on this planet anymore.

What a huge improvement in just a few years. The only loss since I lived there seven years ago is Espresso Royals and the falafel place that became the korean rib place that became something else. Heck, for all the crap they get even CVS is better than the dubious pleasure of buying food at Harvard ...

Sometimes I'm embarrassed by UrbanMSP, but then there's E-Democracy.

Yup.

It honestly baffles me how people portray these changes as being inconsequential to the current vibe of Dinkytown. The entire nature of the neighborhood is going to change from tattoo parlors and dirty pizza joints to high rises and Target Expresses. Either that's a false choice, or nobody told the...

Ugh. Ms. Kelly has been busy completely misrepresenting meetings and neighborhood sentiment for days now. I didn't realize she was a blogger to boot.

I was told last night that a master developer has been chosen for the Snelling bus barn site and that the Union Park DC will start dealing with it in meeting over the next six months. Also a rumor that the city turned down a suggestion from Minnesota United that it might be a good site for a soccer ...

I have a couple updates. The site plans were approved by the Zoning Committee WITHOUT the right hand turn lane in part because very nearly every comment they received from residents and businesses focused on that being a bad idea. Also included was a requirement for community meetings on what the in...

What is "Lindsay's"? Is this something I'm just too young to know or care about?

Every time a new report says cities are getting younger and "Millenials" aren't as crazy about suburbs as their parents, we're told that it'll all change when we have kids. And I keep retorting that I live in St. Paul in part FOR my kid, and that my block has more and more children every y...

Eh, the building looks like a typical 2000s apartment building w/retail, but I do like the tower on the corner. I have yet to check out the main section of Whole Foods (never set foot in one before and I say that as a quasi-hipster), but I did check out their beer selection and found it meh. They d...

So this would go from "corridor" investment to essentially adding a couple stops to existing express routes and adding some mid-day trips. Meanwhile, Bottineau. I don't know why you're setting up this false choice. We need high quality transit in both places. It is absolutely wrong to say...

So this would go from "corridor" investment to essentially adding a couple stops to existing express routes and adding some mid-day trips. Meanwhile, Bottineau.

Yeah, no idea why the East Metro feels ignored by the Met Council...

The land use committee voted to approve the site plan last night with requests for further discussion and studies regarding the Snelling/Dayton intersection design, traffic at Saratoga, and potentially Snelby itself. I say potentially because it's being decided behind doors that are closed even to s...