urbanMSP

I recently stumbled across some interesting nuggets on a rather outdated website: http://www.wbaba.com/time.html

Apparently White Bear Ave had some actual studies done for redevelopment. I've always thought this street needed a shot in the arm, and apparently I'm not alone. Whatever happened here? Why do we still have a car sewer all these years later?

wbaba.com: that's a great domain

Why do we still have a car sewer all these years later?

Besides NIMBYism, prolly mostly the recession. An anecdote: there was a proposal to build a decent mixed-use condo building on the old bowling alley site by Hillcrest, but it fell through because of the recession.

There is good news in terms of the 54 being extended to the maplewood mall, aBRT to the maplewood mall, and LRT to downtown white bear lake, in that order.

I've noticed over the past couple of days that, particularly at night and in St Paul's portion, WBA actually looks nice and has decent streetscape amenities. If rail is put down the middle and some streetscape improvements are made in Maplewood's portion of WBA, not only would it be a nice commercial corridor, but I'd expect some healthy development.

It will be interesting to see what happens. I was in the area this weekend too. Between 36 and 694 there is SO much retail that they have no left turns. It would be interesting to see how they squeeze the Rush Line in if this is the route they choose.

It might make a slow commute between WBL and the Union Depot, but it would be a great way to connect commercial zones: Lowertown, Payne Ave, Arcade St, WBA, Maplewood Mall, WBL.