Cedar Avenue corridor - South Minneapolis

Calhoun-Isles, Cedar-Riverside, Longfellow, Nokomis, Phillips, Powderhorn, and Southwest
Wedgeguy
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Re: Cedar Ave - Nokomis Area

Postby Wedgeguy » September 25th, 2014, 10:15 am

You would other wise be putting a busy street skirting the lake and the park around it. 77 and Cedar are not going away. It is still a main entrance into S MPLS.

mattaudio
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Re: Cedar Ave - Nokomis Area

Postby mattaudio » September 25th, 2014, 10:21 am

Let's put a bridge over Lake Calhoun between Uptown and West Lake as well.

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Re: Cedar Ave - Nokomis Area

Postby Tcmetro » September 25th, 2014, 10:33 am

The original plan was to turn Cedar Avenue into a freeway between Highway 62 and downtown, so I would imagine that the Lake Nokomis bridge was built in anticipation of the freeway.

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Re: Cedar Ave - Nokomis Area

Postby seanrichardryan » September 25th, 2014, 10:51 am

I'd bargain the bridge for decent capacity and Improved ramps on 62 between 35w and 77.
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Re: Cedar Ave - Nokomis Area

Postby HiawathaGuy » September 25th, 2014, 10:54 am

The original plan was to turn Cedar Avenue into a freeway between Highway 62 and downtown, so I would imagine that the Lake Nokomis bridge was built in anticipation of the freeway.
According to the streets.mn article, the bridge was still built in 1984, after the proposed freeway had been scrapped.

"Beginning in the late 1940s, Cedar Avenue (then a southward extension of Hwy 36) was scheduled to become a freeway. Streets.mn contributor Adam Froehlig has an excellent overview of this plan on his personal page including a nice map. By 1970, the freeway plan was scrapped, but according to its record at UglyBridges.com it was still decided to replace the bridge in 1984."

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Re: Cedar Ave - Nokomis Area

Postby HiawathaGuy » September 25th, 2014, 10:54 am

I'd bargain the bridge for decent capacity and Improved ramps on 62 between 35w and 77.
Amen!

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Re: Cedar Ave - Nokomis Area

Postby Tom H. » September 25th, 2014, 11:11 am

Cap the lake and sell air rights.

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Re: Cedar Ave - Nokomis Area

Postby Wedgeguy » September 25th, 2014, 11:17 am

Let's put a bridge over Lake Calhoun between Uptown and West Lake as well.
I believe there is a bridge over part of Calhoun where west Lake runs. The bridge is over the body of water that ties Calhoun and Lake of the Isle together. But I'm sure you already knew that!! But I'm sure that bridge will need to be replaced some day.

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Re: Cedar Ave - Nokomis Area

Postby mattaudio » September 25th, 2014, 11:27 am

No, I mean a real bridge.
http://goo.gl/maps/BN2dJ

If that seems ridiculous on Calhoun, why is the same thing not ridiculous on Nokomis?

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Re: Cedar Ave - Nokomis Area

Postby mister.shoes » September 25th, 2014, 11:31 am

I'd bargain the bridge for decent capacity and Improved ramps on 62 between 35w and 77.
Amen!
So here's the trade...

Road users get:
- a third lane on 62 in each direction between 35W and 77
- a flyover ramp from NB 77 to WB 62
- a better non-cloverleaf ramp from WB 62 to SB 77

The citizens of S MPLS get:
- Cedar Ave bridge over Nokomis gone (obviously)
- 77 north of 62 removed. That can mean a stoplight transitioning the freeway to a blvd or maybe just truncate it altogether
- the two lobes of the cloverleaf south of 62 go away. Any access to NB Cedar would be via conventional ramps
- 58th, 57th, Woodlawn all reconnected to Cedar—across Cedar in the case of 58th and Woodlawn


Edit: I did read many of the comments/ideas on the aforelinked streets.mn post. Go there for more rigorously thought-out suggestions.
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Re: Cedar Ave - Nokomis Area

Postby HiawathaGuy » September 25th, 2014, 11:35 am

So here's the trade...

Road users get:
- a third lane on 62 in each direction between 35W and 77
- a flyover ramp from NB 77 to WB 62
- a better non-cloverleaf ramp from WB 62 to SB 77

The citizens of S MPLS get:
- Cedar Ave bridge over Nokomis gone (obviously)
- 77 north of 62 removed. That can mean a stoplight transitioning the freeway to a blvd or maybe just truncate it altogether
- the two lobes of the cloverleaf south of 62 go away. Any access to NB Cedar would be via conventional ramps
- 58th, 57th, Woodlawn all reconnected to Cedar—across Cedar in the case of 58th and Woodlawn


Edit: I did read many of the comments/ideas on the aforelinked streets.mn post. Go there for more rigorously thought-out suggestions.
I would love to see what this would cost... it's truly a great compromise for both suburban commuters, as well as those living in South Minneapolis from Bloomington Ave S all the way to Hiawatha Ave S.

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Re: Cedar Ave - Nokomis Area

Postby Wedgeguy » September 25th, 2014, 11:51 am

I'm sure that the businesses on Cedar will love to see their traffic counts drop by 50% or more. So all of SE MPLS will now have to get onto 62 on at either Portland, 28th, or 34th to go south to EaganPrairie and the airport. So those 3 interchanges will have to be rebuild to handle the new traffic volumes. Plus you will need to widen 62 to 6 lanes to help handle the traffic that you have now created along there. By the way are 28th and 34th considered commercial streets or residential?

As the old saying goes, you can fix a leaky roof in one spot and then find you have created more problems in other areas.

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Re: Cedar Ave - Nokomis Area

Postby mattaudio » September 25th, 2014, 11:54 am

I know about a half dozen business owners on Cedar, and the majority of them claim that there's actually so much traffic that it inhibits their business - it's too difficult for cars to turn into parking lots, or too unpleasant for neighbors to walk to their stores/restaurants. It's clear there's major disinvestment on many Cedar Ave nodes compared to other corridors such as Chicago or Nicollet which see lower traffic.

Regarding your second point, traffic is not water. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Induced_demand

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Re: Cedar Ave - Nokomis Area

Postby mister.shoes » September 25th, 2014, 12:33 pm

Wedgeguy, I never said access to 62/77 at Cedar would be gone. Cedar just wouldn't be the quasi-freeway north of 62 any more. Make a clear delineation between you're-on-a-freeway and you're-in-the-middle-of-the-city. The bizarre transition right now only ruins Cedar for everyone—businesses included. Spend some time eating pizza in front of Fat Lorenzo's and see how awesome it is.
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Re: Cedar Ave - Nokomis Area

Postby Wedgeguy » September 25th, 2014, 12:39 pm

I'll take you at your word on what business owners say. But I find it hard to believe that Cedar has so much more traffic than Nicollet or Chicago. I'd have to say that it would have at least the same numbers as Lyndale which also come directly off a freeway as far as traffic counts. The area at the south end of Lyndale seems to to be thriving before and after the rebuild of Lyndale south of the Minnehaha Creek. So I'll question your theory as much as you are questioning mine. I'll also add that Cedar maybe late to the redevelopment party as there has not really been much new housing put up in that area. You can also look at the demographics of the area around Nicollet, which was also rebuilt not too long ago. After the rebuild there was a rise in redevelopment along that street. Chicago has some strong retail nodes that have been there and strong for along time. Chicago also have the 5 bus line that puts people along the street. Not sure what Cedar has for a bus routes and what ridership numbers would be like. We saw what happened to Nicollet when they put the Kmart in and nearly killed Eat Street 40 years ago by ending a continuous traffic flow on the street. Some places can survive on neighborhood only traffic, but this area does not have the demographics to make that possible. Now you can prove me wrong if you like.

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Re: Cedar Ave - Nokomis Area

Postby mister.shoes » September 25th, 2014, 12:52 pm

The problem with Cedar is that drivers treat it like a freeway, even when it isn't.

It's roughly three eighths of a mile from the 62 overpass to the stoplight south of Nokomis. And it's still divided like a freeway. Sweet! There is a full half mile between the stoplights on either end of the bridge over Nokomis. And no cross-traffic. Sweet! Freeway! There is another full half mile from 52nd to the light at Minnehaha Parkway. One side of the street is ballfields and traffic is prohibited from turning west during commute times. Sweet! Freeway! There's a quarter mile stretch from the parkway to 46th, and the light at 46th is almost always in Cedar's favor. Sweet! Freeway! Then, there's yet another half mile stretch to the next light at 42nd. Sweet! Freeway!

So if you're adding all that up, from the point 77 "ends" at 62 and becomes Cedar Ave all the way to 42nd street, drivers encounter a grand total of five stoplights over about 2 1/8 miles and only have to deal with true cross traffic for the last 3/4 of a mile of that. It's no wonder that all these "valuable potential customers" in cars don't do the businesses any good. By the time any of them realize they're in the middle of MPLS, they're all the way to 42nd St and have missed everything in between.
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Re: Cedar Ave - Nokomis Area

Postby mister.shoes » September 25th, 2014, 1:01 pm

And as for the businesses that *are* affected by Cedar's high-speed nature, I'd wager most would do considerably better if it was even *slightly* harder for drivers to get to 77. I already covered Fat Lorenzo's and the wonderful atmosphere created by heavy auto traffic. Consider the SuperValu at the intersection with the creek. How many people choose to drive to Target in Richfield instead of shopping locally because it's so easy to hop on Cedar and zoom out of town? Ditto the Cork Dork wine shop vs Richfield Liquors on 66th Street. There are a few vacant storefronts at the Parkway that would probably fill up faster were drivers not in such a hurry to get out of town. And imagine the stretch of Cedar from Nokomis down to 62 if the freeway lanes were ripped out and the old street re-established: there'd be room for 3/8 of a mile of new development facing the street within a stone's throw of Lake Nokomis and the entire MPLS park system. That sounds like a far better recipe for success to me than freeway on-ramps and a sad pedestrian bridge.
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Re: Cedar Ave - Nokomis Area

Postby Wedgeguy » September 25th, 2014, 1:11 pm

Sounds more like you need to do a rebuild of Cedar north of Nokomis like they did on S Lyndale. You see how the traffic backs up on Cedar as it is with the current cloverleaf to west bound 62. I'd rather see traffic backed up south of 58th between 58th and 62 than on 77 itself. I don't see why doing something similar to what they did with South Lyndale would not work on Cedar while keeping the bridges over the lake.
Last edited by Wedgeguy on September 25th, 2014, 1:12 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Cedar Ave - Nokomis Area

Postby mattaudio » September 25th, 2014, 1:11 pm

Everything mister.shoes said. And nobody is arguing about eliminating local access at 62 (except for sdho's suggestion for connecting Cedar Ave to Richfield Pkwy rather than 77, but would still have 62 access). It would still be a major street.

But let's look at north-south streets at a few nodes:
- Lyndale/54th: 12600 on 3+ lanes
- Nicollet/Diamond Lake: 13300 on 3 lanes
- Chicago/48th: 7400 on 2 lanes
- Nicollet/38th: 9300 on 2 lanes
- 34th Ave/50th: 6100 on 2 lanes

Now look at Cedar:
- Edgewater (Fat Lorenzos): 19,400 on sort of 3 lanes
- Parkway (Bergans/Carbones): 19,400 on 2-3 lanes
- 42nd (Cedar Inn): 13300 on 2 lanes
- 38th (Everett's): 13000 on 2 lanes

In my discussions with business owners, as one of the leaders of group that used to be Cedar Avenue United, I kept hearing that Cedar Ave was one of the few places in town that was inhospitable to business because there was *too much* traffic, and that traffic was intent on getting to 62/77 as fast as possible. But yes, some major streetscape improvements would go a long ways to fix the problem and attract private investment even as the bridge will likely stay.

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Re: Cedar Ave - Nokomis Area

Postby HiawathaGuy » September 25th, 2014, 1:13 pm

I'll take you at your word on what business owners say. But I find it hard to believe that Cedar has so much more traffic than Nicollet or Chicago. I'd have to say that it would have at least the same numbers as Lyndale which also come directly off a freeway as far as traffic counts. The area at the south end of Lyndale seems to to be thriving before and after the rebuild of Lyndale south of the Minnehaha Creek.
Traffic counts at a quick glance - many of the intersections you mentioned are circled
(taken from here: http://mndotgis.dot.state.mn.us/tfa/Map)
Image

This is an old map - before the redo of the crosstown, but Cedar is clearly the favorite.


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