urbanMSP

New bike corridor set to begin construction next month:
http://www.tcdailyplanet.net/news/2013/ ... -bike-path

Long-term city plans:
http://www.ci.minneapolis.mn.us/cip/all/cip_semi_index

There is a major flaw in the plan. It does not connect to Main St under the bridge.

Here is the 2013 construction site. http://www.ci.minneapolis.mn.us/cip/all ... rail_index

This area needs to be connected! Why keep the disconnect? Who do we contact to get it adjusted?

I bet BNSF still owns the land leading to Main Street. The bikeway is planned to go on land owned by the University of Minnesota, along the south side of the Dinkytown trench.

Im glad that the trench could potentially be used more often and think the Greenway is a great option.

I always thought the Granary would be a great street car line connecting at the Central station, running down the corridor, onto main street possibly to Boom island?

It could be used for a streetcar, diverging from the Stadium Village LRT station and wrapping north of the stadium along 6th/5th St with a station for the Biomed District/Mariucci. Then across the trench, and ramping down to the northern third of the trench, with a stop below grade between 14th and 15th Streets. Then it would follow 2nd St, then cutting up to University or 4th St at that large surface lot behind St. Anthony Main. Then connecting to downtown.

It could be used for a streetcar, diverging from the Stadium Village LRT station and wrapping north of the stadium along 6th/5th St with a station for the Biomed District/Mariucci. Then across the trench, and ramping down to the northern third of the trench, with a stop below grade between 14th and 15th Streets. Then it would follow 2nd St, then cutting up to University or 4th St at that large surface lot behind St. Anthony Main. Then connecting to downtown.

Or both street car AND bike trail!

Yep, the streetcar would probably take 1/3 or less of the ROW. Not really sure why a road is needed through the trench. Funds would be better spent connecting the grid between Stadium Village and Como.

Has anyone heard of any movement on this anytime recently?

Thankfully, no. (I don't like any part of this project. We don't need cars in the Dinkytown Greenway trench adding noise/ exhaust/ potential collision points to what is currently a nice bike path. Built as fully envisioned, it would also significantly increase through traffic on Main St.)

I'm not sure the *best* use of the ROW in the trench is for cars (vs other potential modes that could take advantage of the grade-separation), but I can't say that reducing traffic on University Ave by increasing vehicle connections is a bad thing. I also can't say that adding another E-W backbone as the SEMI area and UMN medical district grow is a bad thing. It's weird to say that having more cars down there would ruin the bike facility when even the full-build design included a generous green space and rail tracks separating the bike path from the street. St Anthony Main might see another 2-4k cars a day, but that street is calmed af thanks to the pavers so I guess I'm not that concerned about it?

Building this could allow us to do significantly more calming or transit priority on University Ave and 4th Street from Hennepin to Huron. We're already planning some form of protected bike facility on these two streets, but by removing 6-12% of traffic, we could potentially do even more.

My biggest concern is the price tag - realistic options are anywhere fro $30-60m - it'd be nice if the U and some of the developing properties chipped in a significant chunk for it.

Giving the Energy Park/Kasota corridor a better connection to downtown Minneapolis would make a lot of commutes from Hamline-Midway/Frogtown/Como/North End much, much easier. I'm not sure it's the best use of the trench, but I wouldn't fight it.

Yep, the streetcar would probably take 1/3 or less of the ROW. Not really sure why a road is needed through the trench. Funds would be better spent connecting the grid between Stadium Village and Como.

I wholly agree. I don't think cars in this trench would provide much long-term benefit. I'd prefer to keep the door open to transit down the line. I'm not sure how you'd go about connecting como and sv but I think that'd be a much more meaningful improvement to the area.

I believe the current plan for Granary Corridor is that car/truck traffic would not go down the trench but be routed off onto SE 8th St.