Notable Quotes #24: Oliver Towne describes Downtown Saint Paul traffic c. 1956

The city is a Dr. Jekyl and Mr. Hyde, a dual personality -- routine, brusque, common as an old shoe during the daylight.

Then the shadows lengthen through the forest of loop buildings, the offices empty one by one, the streets swarm with traffic, and the long lines of pedestrians string out toward the parking lots on the fringes. 

Up from the bowels of the First National Bank, the Pioneer building, the Minnesota and Commerce buildings, the City Hall, Lowry Medical Arts — come the cleaning women and men. 

The surge at the ramp ends, the choking glut of cars flow like thick grease at the near-loop intersections, out Seventh — east and west; down Shepard road, up and down Wabasha, out Como and Rice, into the glens and vales of the residential sections, the rivers of humanity branch off into streams, trickles, ending at last at the front doors. 

And the air is rancid from the exhaust fumes following in their wake.

[from Once Upon a Towne, by Oliver Towne (a.k.a. Gareth Hiebert), "Night Shadows in the City."]

[Seven Corners, Saint Paul, c. 1954.]