Walking Tour of Old Nicollet Avenue on March 22nd

[Nicollet and 17th in 1950.]

Please join me for a walking tour next Thursday of what I call "Old Nicollet Avenue," the area between the south end of the Nicollet Mall (Grant Street) and Franklin Avenue.

This is a stretch of the city that's intrigued me for many years. This is a part of the city that, at least to me, survived in the margins between downtown and the Eat Street part of Nicollet to the south. It sits nestled by the freeway and the convention center on the edge of the Loring Park neighborhood. In a way, this half-mile stretch of Nicollet Avenue feels like what Minneapolis might have been like twenty or thirty years ago, back when the city was struggling with a changing economy, crime and disinvestment, and ongoing suburbanization. And at the same time, this was the era with lots of opportunities for small marginal businesses, historic fabric, and a thriving sense of a counterculture.

[The largest onion dome of its kind in Minneapolis.]

The street is also home to a bunch of antiquated restaurants that are not long for this world -- places from another era like the now-shuttered Jerusalem's (a classic "architecture duck") and the now-shuttered Ichiban Japanese Steak House -- as well as a number of marginal-but-doing-fine restaurants like Salsa a la Salsa, Ping's Szechuan, or Awkaaba, that offer cuisine from around the world. And yet I've always felt these places were ignored by local hipsters and the downtown office crowd. Maybe they survive only on the benevolent ignorance of tourists?

I was thinking about doing this tour for many years and, I swear to god, had it planned on my calendar BEFORE the most historical restaurant on the stretch, Market BBQ, announced they were closing for a new apartment development.

So carpe veteris nicolletum. Let's explore this forgotten and vanishing part of our city on the edge of downtown and see what we can appreciate. I'm looking forward to sharing stories about old Nicollet Village Video, the Triple Espresso theater, Gangchen / Tibet Kitchen, the Marigold Ballroom, and other things that I'm uncovering about this stretch of street.

Please come if you're interested!

[Facebook event is here.]

[Some video of Nicollet, from Franklin to the freeway, in 1983, followed by a bunch of great downtown footage.]

What: Walking tour of Nicollet Avenue from Grant Street to Franklin Avenue.
When: Thursday March 22nd at 6:30
Where: Meet at Market BBQ, 1414 Nicollet
Who: Anyone! Free of charge, but will be collecting money for egg rolls
Why: Because it's there, but not for long it seems.

[Amazing Nicollet Village Video ad and more historic pictures below.]