urbanMSP

Yeah, I was wondering that myself. I wonder if it's because of the way that the new Interchange tail tracks bridge over the entrance to the HERC, raising the grade at that point such that they can't subsequently dive under 7th Street? If so, that would seem to be a case of the tail wagging the dog. ...

Apparently, the city has finally found a way to unencumber the Nicollet Hotel block. This would seem to be a good first step towards getting a park built there.

The City of Minneapolis comments to the SW LRT DEIS are now available . There's some good information in there regarding the freight co-location and also regarding a possible location of the Operations and Maintenance Facility in the North Loop. (Spoiler alert -- the city doesn't like either of thos...

As for market vs. regulation, see also the current effort of Minneapolis Public Schools to expand parking at their new HQ , against the strong wishes of Minneapolis planning staff. To be clear, I'm fully opposed to this expansion, but I just think that it's telling that the nature of the conversatio...

The market doesn't 'require' anything. If a developer or business owner makes the calculation that they can forgo parking, then this option should be open to him/her. Whether they succeed or not is their own business, no? Um, what? The market requires many things. A good location, an appropriate le...

Tuthill, when asked if she would abide by the DFL endorsement – which she got in 2009 — wasn’t as direct. “I can’t imagine not getting it,” she said. “I am going absolutely from the positive. I am not thinking of the negative. I can’t imagine not getting the DFL endorsement.” I do have an issue wit...

This thread suggests that it would be doable.

Comparing this to the examples in the link above is apples-and-oranges. The Strong town Guy is talking about semi-rural or semi-suburban locations with much lower traffic volumes and much lower levels of left-turn activity. Washington Avenue is a whole other beast.

I've got friends in Canada and they rave about Porter Airlines. I'd love to get direct service from Toronto to MSP with them. Toronto City Airport is super-convenient. They fly Q400's, but their level of service is apparently far superior to what everybody else is offering.

1. Parking minimums. There is voluminous literature about this, but in short: parking minimums impose unnecessary and auto-centric costs on developers (inhibiting development/passing on costs on consumers) and result in a built environment hostile to alternative modes of transportation (walking, bi...

I understand that MSP is undertaking some stop-gap measures to improve the capacity of their customs facility to handle demand before the larger work outlined in the master plan takes place.

Everybody knows that parks and buses don't go together, in the same way that allowing a decent restaurant to operate in a park is a terrible idea.

Our parks must be natural. No messing them up with messy transportation or commerce or people.

Just to clarify -- nobody has actually suggested that Tuthill is considering running for mayor, right?

Also, it appears thatshe has a number of challengers lined up should she choose to run for her council seat again.

I'm sorry you're not impressed. Why don't you go to Washington and convince some congressmen that an investment in rail makes sense?

In the meantime, I'd still argue that a 5h30m trip is competitive with air travel and would capture a significant chunk of the travel over this route.

But Montecondeux is good. You should trademark that.

I just don't see any value in making the line marginally faster but not significantly so- I do see a real value to business in being able to move people and goods from Twin Cities to Chicago quickly, predictably and economically. 125MPH (or 110) doesn't do this any more than the current line, makin...

Yes, I really do hope that Rybak runs again.

That is just an awesome picture.

Agreed!

Is that the ramp down to the lower level of parking that we're seeing in the left foreground?

The buildings only have workout facilities because it helps rent the units. Even if people never actually use the facilities. In this respect, it's like gym contracts.

(I kid, of course).

I don't know the current status of transit service here very well, but it appears that York has better service than France does. If our friends at google maps are to be believed, the 6 runs on York.