Reading the Highland Villager Op-Ed Extra! #3

[Semi-notorious actor Mel Gibson portraying Erich Mische in the popular straight-to-DVD and in-no-way-anti-Semitic film Bicycle Conspiracy Theory Diaries.]

Heavy-handed TLC behind push for bikeway median

by Erich Mische 

[Behold the letter that sums up the results of a lengthy FOIA request by a former Norm Coleman staffer which forced local non-profit transit and complete streets advocates to spend many many hours of valuable time digging through and reproducing extremely boring emails about transportation and bicycle planning. NOTE: I have made a few editorial changes, clearly marked in red.]


I [don't] love to ride bicycles. I [don't] ride bikes for exercise, [or] for recreation and [/or] to raise funds for worthy causes. To me, the issue that has impacted the neighborhood where I raise my family has nothing to do with one’s opinion about bicycles or, for that matter, transit. It has everything to do with an unelected organization having far more power than it should to influence government, the character of a neighborhood and the livability of our communities.

Transit for Livable Communities (TLC), which was founded in 1996, seeks to “reform” Minnesota’s transportation system by offering more of a “balance” between motorized and nonmotorized vehicles. It’s [not] a worthy goal, and [not] one I embrace as a private citizen, a parent and [/or] someone who has [had repeated panic attacks about the fact that they] approached middle age believing that the more I engage in physical activity, the better. [Please stop reading this piece right here. Trust me.]

But my [non-]agreement with TLC’s goals stops there. I object to this organization’s ends-justify-the-means mentality, its methods and tactics, and the process that has led to a neighborhood being forced to accept a project it never requested – a process that has our own tax dollars being used against us by an organization that is unelected.

TLC is not some mom-and-pop outfit engaged in friendly discussion about how to add more bicycles to our streets. [In other words, they don't spend all their time in the basement of their house. They have an office. With windows.] This is a sophisticated, well-funded organization that has chosen an IRS exception to its 501(c)3 status that allows it to lobby on matters of public policy. It receives thousands of dollars from individuals, foundations and other nonprofits to lobby on behalf of its causes. [This sounds like a successful non-profit organization. -Ed.] It has also received millions of dollars from Congress to support communities that want to enhance nonmotorized transportation. [This is referring to a a rather interesting story about the pioneering NMTP project funneling a few million Federal transportation dollars to the Twin Cities to support bicycling and pedestrian amenities. -Ed.]

In St. Paul it has used its political clout and money to push the so-called Jefferson Avenue Bikeway without regard to process and the overwhelming opposition of the neighborhood. [A recent and quite dubiously gathered DOT poll had 54/41 opposition. This kind of opposition is what one would call "underwhelming." -Ed.] What began as a project being forced onto Highland Parkway (after Jefferson Avenue was rejected as an option by TLC), has ended up being forced onto Jefferson Avenue by TLC (after Highland Parkway was rejected y the neighborhood). Deploying an army of advocates [i.e. supporters who live in St Paul], TLC has lobbied, cajoled and threatened city officials and taxpayers with threats to withhold funding for other city projects if Cleveland Avenue isn’t affixed with a median. [TLC is funding a bicycle boulevard, which inherently includes “diverters”, and it's up to St Paul whether or not it wants the money to build it. Bike boulevards inherently include diverters intended to reduce auto traffic flows. This is what bike boulevards are. Not having a median means it's not a bike boulevard, which is why TLC wouldn’t then want to fund it. -Ed]

The executive director of TLC, Barb Thoman, wrote in the August 31 Villager that the Jefferson-Cleveland median was the only option that survived a neighborhood process and the political process of City Hall. Not really. Ward 3 City Council member Pat Harris opposes the median. [As well as painting sharrows on the street. In fact, Harris opposed painting sharrows on the street so strongly that the DOT had to go back and “unpaint” the sharrows, covering them up with black tape after they’d been laid down on the pavement.] The neighborhood has been outspoken against it. Furthermore, 56 percent of those who had an opinion on the median opposed it [according to a poll done using a orange traffic sign with a phone number on it facing car drivers placed next to traffic cones on a busy street. –Ed.].

In just about every aspect of public policy, if the overwhelming majority of people are opposed to something, it stops. [See: 2003 Iraq invasion.] But nothing ever really stops an unelected organization that has an agenda. [Get ready for the list of damning evidence revealing the casa nostra-like network of nefarious all-powerful warlords lurking behind the bike lane agenda.] Not the fact that TLC’s paid director for the Bike Walk Twin Cities program and its Jefferson Avenue Bikeway never publicly disclosed that she lives on Jefferson. Not the fact that her spouse serves on the Macalester-Groveland Community Council’s Transportation Committee that supported this project and he never publicly disclosed that conflict of interest. Not the fact that her spouse made the motion to that same committee to put the Macalester Groveland Community Council on record in support of the Jefferson Avenue Bikeway project. Not the fact that Ms. Thoman serves on the St. Paul Planning Commission’s Transportation Committee, which has played a leading role in advocating this project. Not the fact that two other members of the city’s Transportation Committee are financial contributors to TLC. [Eureka!]

[Semi-notorious actor Nicholas Cage depicting Erich Miche uncovering the secret bicycle lock buried in the riverbluff caves far underneath St Paul City Hall.]

If an elected official had any of these conflicts of interest and never disclosed them, the public outcry would be loud and understandable. [See: Coleman, Norm.]

It is inconceivable that a paid staff member responsible for coordinating this project, who has a vested interest in the outcome of this project, was ever allowed to play an active role in pushing this project forward without ever disclosing the obvious conflict of interest. It can’t be possible for TLC to be even remotely objective when one of its own staff members, who lives on Jefferson Avenue, not only advocates for the project, but gets paid to advance it.

At every single turn, TLC has played hardball with the neighborhood and with elected officials and city staff. When Pat Harris refused to join the chorus at City hall pushing this project, key staff members with TLC suggested he would pay a political price. When private citizens, such as I, requested information about this project in 2009, the executive director at the time [stuck her tongue out at me and made a farting noise and] made it clear that no member of TLC staff should cooperate or provide any information to me.

The neighborhood has done its job. We spoke up. We made our voices heard, and we said we didn’t want this median. The ball is now in the court of the media and city officials to do the right thing. If TLC is allowed to have the authority of those we elected to serve us without the elected certificate that goes with it, it should send a chill up the spine of every St. Paul taxpayer. [Who elected Mischkes the editors of the Highland Villager? What ballot allowed this raving looney to get a full page Op-Ed to waste so much valuable paper and ink? I’m almost ashamed to line my birdcage with this thing.]

TLC was given the responsibility of administering funds appropriated by Congress to enhance the use of nonmotorized transportation. It could have done so in a manner that was consistent with the directive of Congress and, in my opinion, might have been strongly supported by many in our community had it done so. Bu neither Congress nor the Constitution has granted TLC the authority to act with impunity. Nor should the people of St Paul.
                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              
Erich Mishe has [spent the last three years eating canned prunes in his basement taping tiny scraps of newspaper and K-Mart receipts onto walls while drawing little pointy beards on pictures of Barb Thoman] owned his home at the corner of Jefferson and Cleveland Avenues since 1995 and has owned the home next door to that for the past five years. [Because one home isn’t enough? Doesn’t living on Jefferson make our writer ineligible to have an opinion about this issue? He clearly has a conflict of interest.  –Ed.]

All or nothing: The Value of Doing It Right The First Time

[White plastic things!]

Riding in downtown Minneapolis last week, I was pleased to discover a shining white row of plastic things along the First Avenue cycletrack. Until this moment, I’d never realized how happy a bunch of white plastic thin two-foot long thingies could make me. Now they routinely visit my dreams, dancing like the broomsticks in Fantasia, and I’m starting to worry about my sanity.

Am I turning into a crappy plastic objects fetishist? Recently in China, a woman started a DIY traffic calming movement by tying a sex doll to a tree at a dangerous intersection. I guess the idea is to get (horny male) drivers to slow down and pay more attention. I’m envisioning a future where I run around the city disbursing traffic cones with a a “real girl” doll strapped to my back so that sexually unsatisfied men don’t run me down with their cars.

[Maybe we could get Sexworld to sponsor the next 1st Avenue pedestrian improvement?]

For those who don’t know, the First Avenue cycletrack is Minneapolis’ first quasi-bona fide cycletrack. A cycletrack is viewed by many as the gold standard of bicycle infrastructure. It’s a bike lane separated from moving traffic not just by a stripe of ‘bike lane’ paint, but by some sort of barrier. For example, you could separate cyclists with row of parked cars, a change in elevation like a curb, a row of plastic white thin things, or all of the above. Cycletracks are common in northern European countries with very high rates of bicycling. Many people (particularly those uncomfortable riding in street traffic) find them to be quite wonderful if done well.

That’s why I was happy when Minneapolis announced a few years back that they were going to build a cycletrack down First Avenue. Despite the protestations of business owners concerned about delivery trucks, the city went ahead with the project.

There was only one problem. They did a half-assed job. Instead of a clearly marked and separated bike lane, they just applied some paint between the parked cars and the curb. They also made the parking lane time-sensitive, so that during rush hour the row of parked cars disappears entirely. (That’s normal on many streets.)

The problem was that, without a some sort of clearly marked area to inform people where the cycle track was, nobody really knew what to do. People parked right in the middle of the bike lane, so the city put up more signs. People still parked in the middle of the bike lane, so the city put up some flashing electronic signs that makes First Avenue seem like Las Vegas in a kaleidoscope. 

Even the current signage funhouse doesn’t always work. You’ll still find people parked in the middle of the bike lane, people who are presumably illiterate or wearing two pairs sunglasses with a sombrero pulled down over their eyes or something. Until those plastic thingies appeared the other day, even the most ardent bike activist would admit that the First Avenue cycle track was a quasi-fiasco.

Minneapolis isn‘t alone in being reluctant to commit to the whole posterior. I’ve covered St Paul’s biggest bike debacle, the Jefferson Avenue bike boulevard, like a blanket in January. It's not a heartwarming story. And the way that it turned out, this bike boulevard should be probably only be labeled a “bike boulevard,” in the same way that Velveeta isn't really cheese.

[The Jefferson Avenue "test median.]

The problem is that the Jefferson project lacks many of the definitive features of a Portland-style bike boulevard (e.g. traffic diverters or traffic calming devices of any kind). And not only did the city approve a watered-down a plan, they built it in a "trial" manner. Instead of simply building a decent pedestrian median (designed to help calm the bicycle street and make it safer to cross busy roads), they built an ugly partially-effective "test median," and then placed a sign next to it encouraging people to call in and complain (which they did). Instead of just doing a good job the first time, St Paul's plan was to do half a good job, and then proceed with it slowly, painfully, displaying all the grace of a circus clown.

[Ha.]

... or get off the pot

I don’t want to be too hard on the Twin Cities. Both of these projects were something new. Both projects were politically difficult. Change is hard! Changing behavior takes a long time. Shifting prioities away from a slavish obsession with the automobile is what they call “a process.” That means that it doesn’t happen all at once. Getting people to bike and walk more is a matter of developing habits literally one step at a time.

At the same time, when faced with a difficult problem, cities are often tempted to compromise. Planners and city leaders end up torn between the politics of compromise and well-designed engineering. It seems that, much of the time, cities make so many compromises that they undermine the very thing they were trying to do in the first place. Sometimes, the perfect is the enemy of the good. Sometimes, you either do it right or you make a complete mockery of the very notion of urban planning. Sometimes, either you build a decent cycletrack that everyone can understand intuitively, or you compromise and construct a bicycle bewilderment with cars parked willy-nilly underneath a flashing LED circus filled with fine print. Then, two years later, you go back and gradually add in some thin white plastic things that you should have installed in the first place, and everyone on the street goes “Oh! That’s what its supposed to look like.”

I know which I prefer...


Update:

A report on white plastic things in Portland that got hit by cars and destroyed. TWICE. 

Reading the Highland Villager #30 (January 12 - 25 Edition)

[Basically the problem is that the best source of Saint Paul streets & sidewalks news is the Highland Villager, a very fine and historical newspaper. This wouldn't be a problem, except that its not available online. You basically have to live in or frequent Saint Paul to read it. That's why I'm reading the Highland Villager so that you don't have to. Until this newspaper goes online, sidewalk information must be set free.]

Total # of articles about sidewalks: 12
Total # of articles about sidewalks written by Jane McClure: 11


Headline: University Avenue businesses plead for public assistance to weather disruptions of light-rail project
Reporter: Jane McClure

Short short version: [I wish I could have seen it when] A coalition of business owners "crowded into the Ax-Man Surplus Store" to desperately ask for help from the city and/or state to make up for revenue that will be lost during construction of the LRT line along University Avenue. [Only problem being that nobody has any money these days. -Ed.] Metaphors employed by business owners include "blood on the streets" and "swimming in an ocean with little life jackets." Business owners are looking for about $45M, but only $1.5M is on hand so far for construction mitigation.

Headline: Protecting LGA from further cuts tops city's legislative agenda
Reporter: Jane McClure

Short short version: St Paul wants to stop the incessant cuts to Local Government Aid (from the state to the city). [Fat chance! -Ed.]


Headline: Snelling median performing well in first months of use
Reporter: Jane McClure

Short short version: Report on the ["controversial"] median on Snelling Avenue. [Much to the surprise of reactionary Ward 3 Council Member Pat Harris, ] "Businesses are not seeing any decrease in customer traffic." Includes quotes from a Macalester official who observed slowing of traffic on the busy street. Also includes info about who maintains [i.e. waters & weeds] the plants on landscaped medians. Apparently in some places, this is done by volunteers! [Sounds like an opportunity for TC Sidewalks. -Ed.]


Headline: Renovation preserves pieces of Ramsey Hill's horse-drawn past
Reporter: Jane McClure

Short short version: A 1894 livery stable on Ramsey Hill is going to be renovated and historically preserved by being converted into a house. Article includes some interesting info about the history of livery stables. Somehow, carriages were stored in the ceiling.


Headline: Proposed changes to sidewalk cafe regulations get another going over
Reporter: Jane McClure

Short short version: Another update on the ongoing negotiation over sidewalk cafes in the Capitol City. Breaking news: "No one testified at the third public hearing on the ordinance on January 5." The debate is over whether to have minimum widths at 36 or 48 inches.


Headline: City ballot may allow up to 6 choices
Reporter: Jane McClure

Short short version: Story about IRV / RCV voting for the upcoming city council election.


Headline: Future of Jefferson-Cleveland median discussed January 24
Reporter: Jane McClure

Short short version: Report on the upcoming big meeting on the "controversial" test median for the bike boulevard on Jefferson Avenue. Includes typical McLure-ian language such as "so-called Jefferson Avenue Bike boulevard." [Please show up! Monday the 24th at 7:00 PM at the Edgecumbe Rec Center.]


Headline: Highland developer Mannillo is seeking seat on City Council
Reporter: Jane McClure

Short short version: Report on a candidate to replace [car-loving] Ward 3 Council Member Pat Harris, who is retiring. This candidate is a real estate developer and building owner who has lived in Highland Park for 33 years. Mannillo is also the former chair of the St Paul Heritage Preservation Commission. [$10 says he doesn't touch the bike boulevard issue with a 10-foot pole. -Ed.]


Headline: City Council settlement closes book on another billboard ban
Reporter: Jane McClure

Short short version: Clear Channel Outdoor [booo!] won a $25K lawsuit settlement from the city over billboard regulations.


Headline: I-94 resurfacing will continue this year west of Cretin Avenue
Reporter: Jane McClure

Short short version: MNDOT is repaving ramps along the freeway and installing a noise wall between Pelham and Cretin.


Headline: Op-Ed: Sounding the alarm for light rail in St. Paul
Reporter: Barnaby Weisner

Short short version: über-alarmist op-ed about how "neighborhoods will be destroyed" by the upcoming light rail train. Barnaby's concerns: street parking becoming difficult, the "spectre" of high-rises plaguing South Minneapolis, the sound of the train "alarms," and "alley traffic." The author cites the terrible image of Marshall Avenue after its conversion to a two-lane street as a warning to the disbelievers. [Truly, Marshall today is a nightmare!] The icing on the cake? The gov't will use eminent domain to steal your house to give land to a developer. [Wow! Even for the Highland Villager, this one is a mega-doozy. I'm tempted to re-print the thing in its entirety. -Ed.]


Headline: Culver's looks to bring butter burgers to University Avenue; Project would be one of the first under interim zoning rules created for Central Corridor
Reporter: Jane McClure

Short short version: Great. [Sarcastic tone.] They're opening a Culver's near University and Pascal, where the Spin Cycle laundromat is currently. It looks like they want a drive-thru window, but need a conditional use permit for that.

Last Minute Amendment Strips Traffic Calming from Jefferson Bike Boulevard

[The Jefferson "test median", circa 2010.]

The story of the St Paul Jefferson Avenue bicycle boulevard is long and ugly, and is finally (maybe) coming to an end tonight. There's a meeting down at city hall this evening, where the City Council is going to most likely pass a compromise plan that strips out a lot of the traffic calming circles from the project.

The Story So Far

The problem is that the idea of bicycle boulevards are relatively new to a town like St Paul. They're streets designed to give pedestrians and bicyclists priority, to calm traffic speeds down to the point where only 'local' traffic is using it. They're intended to create spaces where auto speeds are far closer to bicycle speeds. In theory, boulevards are designed so that cars drive around 20 miles per hour, a speed at which any collision is very unlikely to result in the death or injury of small children, grandmothers, cyclists, or people out walking their dog. In theory, these kinds of streets would be seen as an amenity in the neighborhoods where they're constructed, as they create calm, quiet, walkable neighborhoods, accessible by car, that raise property values and quality of life for nearby homes and people.

Anyway, that's the theory. In the actual real world of Highland Park, St Paul, traffic calming that creates safe quiet streets is perceived as a quasi-fascist assault on the inherent freedoms of the automobile individual. (Or, at least that's true if you get your news from Soucheray.)

That might be exaggerating just a hair, because actually the project has received a lot of support and/or ambivalent shrugs. But for various reasons the proposed bicycle boulevard down Jefferson Avenue has for few years now been seen as controversial. The project has gone through a few different iterations, and finally now, after a huge number of community meetings involving hundreds of people, and after the city's Public Works department has spent countless hours doing research and analysis, a compromise plan has emerged that seemingly everyone can mostly agree about.

This plan isn't perfect. For example, it doesn't include any diverters that are common in bicycle boulevards elsewhere. These kinds of diverters do a lot to move 'through' traffic onto adjacent streets, while making sure that pedestrians and bicyclists can safely cross the busier streets that have higher traffic speeds (such as Cleveland and Cretin Avenues). You can see for yourself how these kinds of diverters work in South Minneapolis, where they seem to have not caused any kind of automotive apocalypse.

[An innocuous bike boulevard traffic diverter in Minneapolis.]

[Another Minneapolis boulevard diverter. Incidentally, neither of these diverters have caused the collapse of freedom and democracy.]

Anyway, the final St Paul proposal got rid of these kinds of traffic calming treatments in favor of traffic circles, which you will find elsewhere in the city. Traffic circles are a good compromise, I guess, because they do a nice job of 'calming' through the use of actual concrete that slows down speeds and makes streets safer for pedestrians and cyclists. Not only that, but traffic circles have little gardens on them! These circles have the potential to turn Jefferson Avenue into the kind of space where your kid might play football (as I did growing up with my brothers and sister on St Paul's Portland Avenue).

The Last Minute Deal

Or at least, that's the hope. I've heard that the proposal, passed unanimously through the Transportation Committee and the Planning Commission, is going to be semi-gutted by a last minute amendment during the City Council meeting this evening (5:30 - 6:30, roughly). From what I've heard, the new last minute deal will strip out all but two of the traffic circles from the project, while getting rid of the pedestrian crosswalk signage at the two busy streets, Cretin and Cleveland Avenues. This last minute deal will leave only two real traffic calming treatments on the Western portion of the bicycle boulevard: the traffic circle at Davern street and the one at Finn Street (which isn't scheduled to be built until 2017).

[The Public Works plan showing two of the traffic circles that won't be built under the new deal.]

To my mind, the last minute deal raises two key questions:

• Should the council ignore all the public process that's happened so far, in favor of a backroom deal that has never seen the light of day? 

• Is a bicycle boulevard without much traffic calming still a bicycle boulevard? 

I don't really know the answers to these questions. On the first, I want badly to say "No!" I want to say that the council shouldn't throw over a whole bunch of public meetings in favor of a few opinions of a few decisions makers.

But, on the other hand, most public processes are fraught with problems. If you hold a community meeting on some issue, the people that are most likely to show up are people with a lot of time and/or money on their hands. Those are the people with a voice, that provide "community input."

Meanwhile, not attending the meeting are many other people who almost never participate - people who rent, people with more than one job, young people, people with language barriers. Elected officials need to make decisions with the entire community in mind, not just those people with expensive homes and lots of hard-to-get phone numbers in their phones.

The second question is just as difficult to answer. To my mind, bicycle boulevards are a no brainer. They are streets that don't really mess with the status quo, as people can still drive around their neighborhoods, park on their streets, use their driveways, etc. But they're also streets that really emphasize and welcome the modes of transportation (bicycling, walking) that are the future of our cities. If St Paul wants to attract young people, or be safe for families, or be a place where old people can get around with dignity, they need to build streets that place people first. They have an opportunity to do this right now, basically for free, and it's too bad that it seems like they're going to do a half-assed job of it.

I guess something is better than nothing, here. But I really don't understand why the city cannot pass a common-sense measure that will improve the lives of almost all of the people who live here. Really the only people who 'lose out' when you build a bicycle boulevard are people who enjoy driving too fast through residential neighborhoods. Should we really make public decisions with them in mind?

In five years, nobody living nearby will think bicycle boulevards are a big deal. Neighbors will actually like the traffic circles once they are built. They'll blend into the background of the city and grow flowers. Ideally, Jefferson will subtly shift into a more quiet beautiful safe street for all types of people. Ideally, it'll be a place where even my mom would feel comfortable riding a bicycle and getting exercise on her way to the Highland Grill without feeling like she's 'in the way' of a pickup truck speeding down the hill.

That's the hope. I fear that today's vote will be somewhat different. It'd be nice if the City Council would pass a plan that really calmed traffic along this route. It'd be nice is St Paul embraced a healthy future.

The council meeting is tonight at 5:30 in the basement of City Hall. Show up and testify if you agree!

 [A traffic circle amenity welcomed by its neighbors in Portland, OR.]

[A traffic circle amenity welcomed by its neighbors in Portland, OR.]

Jefferson Bike Boulevard Illustrates Frustrating Pace of Change

Well, if you've been in bicycling in Saint Paul over the last decade, you have probably been following the Jefferson Bicycle Boulevard fiasco-triumph, which began sometime around 2008 when the NTP project funding landed next-door in Minneapolis.

Here's how I recapped the situation when the proposed project was finally passed two years ago:

... for various reasons the proposed bicycle boulevard down Jefferson Avenue has for few years now been seen as controversial. The project has gone through a few different iterations, and finally now, after a huge number of community meetings involving hundreds of people, and after the city's Public Works department has spent countless hours doing research and analysis, a compromise plan has emerged that seemingly everyone can mostly agree about.

This plan isn't perfect. For example, it doesn't include any diverters that are common in bicycle boulevards elsewhere. These kinds of diverters do a lot to move 'through' traffic onto adjacent streets, while making sure that pedestrians and bicyclists can safely cross the busier streets that have higher traffic speeds (such as Cleveland and Cretin Avenues). You can see for yourself how these kinds of diverters work in South Minneapolis, where they seem to have not caused any kind of automotive apocalypse.

Anyway, the final St Paul proposal got rid of these kinds of traffic calming treatments in favor of traffic circles, which you will find elsewhere in the city.

As it turned out, the City Council stripped or delayed many of the proposed traffic circles from the project. And then bids for construction came in too high, which further delayed construction for the Jefferson Boulevard (which has been signed as a boulevard for years already).

[A traffic circle in a place that probably doesn't need it.]

Finally, Real World Progress

That's why it was delightful to see actual concrete construction on Jefferson this last week. Finally after years of wrangling, hair pulling, elections, FOIAs, shenanigans, and endless histrionic community meetings, two small innocuous flower-planted traffic circles will be built along less important parts of an East-West street that might marginally slow down speeding cars.

Here's the conclusion of my piece, expressing all my hopes and dreams for this street:

In five years, nobody living nearby will think bicycle boulevards are a big deal. Neighbors will actually like the traffic circles once they are built. They'll blend into the background of the city and grow flowers. Ideally, Jefferson will subtly shift into a more quiet beautiful safe street for all types of people. Ideally, it'll be a place where even my mom would feel comfortable riding a bicycle and getting exercise on her way to the Highland Grill without feeling like she's 'in the way' of a pickup truck speeding down the hill.

I still think this can come true, though I wish this project wasn't the very definition of half-assed bike infrastructure.

Mainly, what these small concrete circles signal to me is how painstakingly slow the current rate of change has become in our cities. While this one project has been kicked to death like a sleeping dog, other cities around the country (including the one next door) have built orders of magnitude more miles of higher quality bicycle infrastructure, literally lapping sleepy Saint Paul.

How Much Consensus?

[Copenhagen.]

From one perspective, deliberation is a good thing. We want changes to our city to be aired out, vetted, and presented to the community. We want our officials and engineers to have to answer questions about plans and projects.

But there's a difference between transparency and consensus. I'm reminded of Gil Peñalosa's speech this year at the Saint Paul Transportation Summit (which I wrote about earlier on streets.mn).

I urge you to watch the entire speech, but here's one of the things that he said when discussing a pedestrianization of Nyhavn, a key shopping street in Copenhagen:

Change is difficult, of course. And it doesn't happen by consensus. When they were thinking of making this [Nyhavn] pedestrian, people in these restaurants said "Oh, if the cars don't park in front of my restaurant, we're going to go broke." You have to listen to everybody.

But at the end of the day, what is the general interest? Change will never happen by consensus. If you want change to be unanimous, you have to water down change so much, it's not going to be change any longer. So listen honestly, and then make a decision. Do you think any of these restaurants go broke? 10,000 people buy more food than 83 cars.

So, it's about changing mindsets. And this is why all of us are here.

One of the things that I really enjoyed about Peñalosa was how he didn't settle for platitudes, but challenged Saint Paul leaders with difficult problems. He said that we needed to stop retreating from winter weather, that we needed to compare our city to world leaders rather than Midwestern followers, and he said that we needed to prioritize rather than accommodate non-motorized people.

But this challenge, to move past the desire for continual consensus, is a difficult one for the typically Midwestern mindset. The glacial pace of change on projects like the Jefferson Bicycle Boulevard only serves to highlight this problem.

There are lot of questions that emerge from Peñalosa's advice. How can the city accelerate meaningful change (that conforms with our city vision for the future), without becoming Robert Moses-like despots? How much consensus do we really need?

These are all political questions, but the answers to them do not have to remain in the back rooms and community meetings. I believe that there are plenty of ways to change people's mindsets about sticky problems that don't necessarily need to take the form of elaborate engineering construction or high-blown skyscrapers.

Meanwhile, a couple of traffic circles are popping up in Saint Paul. Soon they'll fade into the background, fill with flowers, and the tempest in the teapot will be forgotten.

[There goes the neighborhood.]

Update:

Apparently the two bike boulevard projects (Griggs and Jefferson) are far over budget. This will really makes it far more difficult to build any kind of support for future bike projects in the city.

Here's the quote from today's paper:

Two bicycle boulevards on Jefferson Avenue and Griggs Street, which once were projected to cost $1.52 million, are $900,000 over budget.

[...] City staff said the Jefferson and Griggs projects were put out to bid twice -- in the fall of 2013 and spring of this year -- and both times came back over budget.

They said costs went up over the course of four years. A bidding process for the Jefferson project, budgeted at $1 million in 2010, was repeatedly delayed as a result of lengthy public discussion and neighborhood opposition in the Mac-Groveland area.

Reading the Highland Villager #60

[A stack of Villagers sit on a stoop.]

[Basically the problem is that the best source of Saint Paul streets & sidewalks news is the Highland Villager, a very fine and historical newspaper. This wouldn't be a problem, except that its not available online. You basically have to live in or frequent Saint Paul to read it. That's why I'm reading the Highland Villager so that you don't have to. Until this newspaper goes online, sidewalk information must be set free.] 

Total # of articles about sidewalks: 17
Total # of articles about sidewalks written by Jane McClure: 16

Headline: Proposed limits on off-campus student rental housing draws mixed response [Note: this is a toned down version of last fortnight’s headline on this same issue]
Reporter: Jane McClure

Short short version: Basic rehash of last fortnight’s article on the proposed student ordinance, again leading with Commissioner Oliver’s quotes critical of the ordinance. Article lists concerns about the ordinance: pushing students into adjacent neighborhoods, ‘grandfathering in’ student homes, singling out the St Thomas neighborhood. Article describes ordinance (150 foot buffer on new student houses). Article includes history of neighborhood groups weighing in: West Summit Neighborhood was for the ordinance, but the Land Use Committee of the Union Park group was against it. Second half of [long long] article basically discusses debate over zoning v. enforcement, using quotes. Article lists upcoming meetings, deadlines, etc. [I’m not even going to talk about this right now. –Ed.]


Headline: Historic steps crumble under weight of repair bill; dispute threatens 111-year partnership between the city and adjacent property owner
Reporter: Jane McClure

Short short version: [Really interesting] article on a dispute between the city and the property owner of a summit avenue and some summit avenue property owners about who is responsible for the maintenance costs for a set of stairs that run near the JJ Hill house down the bluff. article includes detailed history of the steps, that run back to JJ Hill’s son “Louis J. Hill.” Also includes a reference to bureaucracy: “complicating the matter is the number of city departments involved:” Department of Safety and Inspections, Heritage Preservation Commission, and the Department of Public Works. Article includes references to various lawyers, photos of the steps. [They look nice, BTW, until you see the “hole” in the brick wall leading into the JJ Hill house. -Ed.]

Headline: Forum set on St Paul’s industrial zoning
Reporter: Jane McClure

Short short version: St Paul is changing its zoning code for industrial zoning within the city. the city is trying to “streamline” the codes to “protect and enhance industrial areas.” There will be public hearing at the planning commission on June 1st. article references the fact that “conflicts between industrial land uses and adjacent commercial or residential uses are nothing new in St Paul.”

Headline: Victoria, Western light-rail stations may get a second name
Reporter: Jane McClure

Short short version: When the LRT is complete, the ‘station name’ at two of the stops at Victoria and Western may include a slash (“/”) and another word, but only if the neighborhood groups in the areas can agree on what the word should be. Article includes use of the word “moniker.” [This will change everything! -Ed.]

Headline: City celebrates reopening of Jimmy Lee fields
Reporter: Jane McClure

Short short version: The rec center ballfields [looks like football] at Oxford and Concordia are open again.

Headline: Pizza Luce parking dispute is settled though not to the satisfaction of all [Best headline?]
Reporter: Jane McClure

Short short version: The city council voted to deny the neighborhood appeal of the zoning commission’s decisions to approve the across-the-street parking lot for the St Paul Pizza Luce. [However, people are still upset about the state of the world today. –Ed.]

Headline: Historic duplex’s rezoning recommended
Reporter: Jane McClure

Short short version: A “dilapidated duplex” in Irvine Park will be re-zoned to TND zoning. The duplex is called the “McCloud–Edgerton House,” and was built in 1867.

Headline: Union Park supports riverfront plan with added Meeker Island dog park
Reporter: Jane McClure

Short short version: Self explanatory.

Headline: Water quality project begins at Fort Snelling State Park
Reporter: Jane McClure

Short short version: Someone is going to try to reduce the “overflow” of storm water in Snelling Lake.

Headline: Hearing set on proposed Grand-Finn apartment building
Reporter: Jane McClure

Short short version: A developer is going to try to build an apartment building on Grand Avenue. [Primarily to house St Thomas students!!!!!!!!! –Ed.]

Headline: Jefferson Avenue Bikeway rolls on toward completion [I'm disappointed that this is the only pun in the issue.]

Reporter: Jane McClure

Short short version: TLC approved the [somewhat half-assed, perhaps 2/3 assed...] city approval of the Jefferson Avenue bikeway. [For more information see the approximately 1,000,002 other articles on this topic available on this website. -Ed.]

Headline: Lowertown plan suggests arts center if ballpark project fails
 Reporter: Jane McClure

Short short version: Some people [who like art] would like to see a “community arts center” built under the highway 52 bridge if the state doesn’t’ pony up for a Saints’ stadium. [Yeah, I’m sure 5,000 people per day will come to a community arts center, flooding the city with much needed pedestrian density… -Ed.]

Headline: Action delayed on variance for Summit hill garden shed
Reporter: Jane McClure

Short short version: “Rawley Brodeen"’s summit hill “garden shed” will be given “more time to work out” before it gets approved or not.

Headline: Cupcake’s wine and beer license will have a hearing
Reporter: Jane McClure

Short short version: The long [long and also labyrinthine] quest to get approval for the new Cupcake bakery will continue during the Board of Zoning Appeals meeting about the liquor license. There is no hearing date as of yet.

Headline: Cossetta’s seeks variance for stormwater drainage system
Reporter: Jane McClure

Short short version: The guy who owns Cossetta’s [some guy named “Cossetta”] wants a variance for handling stormwater runoff because of “conditions unique to the site … and high cost.”

Headline: Right at home in Ramsey Hill: Commodore’s early ambiance still lingers over 90 years later

Reporter: Lisa Heinrich

Short short version: Awesome report on the bar at old Commodore [the old-school Summit Avenue establishment to which has long long been one of my fantasies to frequent]. Pertinent phrases include: “gallant old building”, Elegant nightspots for dancing,” Russian Born Werner Wittkamp, who after immigrating to the United States designed stage sets for the Ziegfeld Follies,” Played a role in St Paul’s gangster era,” “Two huge gas explosions,” “like the sinking of the Titanic,” “his signature Ralph’s Surprises,” “remained standing only because it had been built of reinforced concrete and was fireproof.”

Headline: St Paul opens pair of solar-powered car-charging stations
Reporter: Jane McClure

Short short version: self-explanatory. [This too will change everything. –Ed.]

Reading the Highland Villager #21 (August 4th - 17th Edition)

[Basically, the problem is that the best source of local streets & sidewalks news in Saint Paul is the Highland Villager. This wouldn't be a problem, except that its not available online. I'm reading the Highland Villager so that you don't have to. Until this newspaper goes online, sidewalk information must be set free.]

Total # of articles about sidewalks: 10
Total # of articles about sidewalks written by Jane McClure: 8



Title: City, club find middle ground on Marshall Avenue sidewalk; St. Paul agrees to pay all construction costs
Author: Jane McClure

Not-so-short version: A [surprisingly slanted] above-the-fold bit which views it a "middle ground" compromise that the wealthy lawyers who golf at the Town and Country threatened a lawsuit and forced city taxpayers to foot 100% of the bill for completing [at long last] the unfinished sidewalk along Marshall. The piece cites the T&C folks prominently, and buries Councilmember Stark's epistolary defense of the sidewalk: "People walking from the east of Town and Country Club 'need to cross busy Marshall Avenue twice in order to cross the bridge or go north on Mississippi River Blvd. ... A street that inconveniences the pedestrians as compared to the motorist or cyclist, is not a street designed to encourage walking. In my mind, and in the estimation of the many community members who conceived and worked to implement this project, this public good outweighs the loss of the crab apple trees and the addition of a modest amount of concrete'". [Seems sensible to me? For years, I've wondered why there was no place to walk there. Plus, cyclists don't exactly have it easy. There's no bike lane on what is a very central route over the Marshall Avenue bridge. -Ed.]


Title: Rings around the city: Ashes, ashes, they'll all come down
Author: Jane McClure

Short short version: The Emerald Ash Borer is forcing the city to cut down 181 ash trees in Highland Park. Article quotes residents who would also like the city to cut down any gingo trees planted in the 80s and 90s. [Time to genetically engineer a "gingko borer"? -Ed.]


Title: Jefferson ash removal tied to paving project
Author: Jane McClure

Short short version: Same as above, only w/ added mention of the upcoming Jefferson bike lane. Includes some mystification prose about the upcoming Jefferson Bike Boulevard, "which largely consist of signs and pavement markings". [So true! That is what streets consist of. -Ed.]


Title: Council seeks another opinion on Wild Onion patio request; new hearing pending on liquor service extension
Author: Jane McClure

Short short version: Same old interminable story about booze on the Wild Onion patio. Councilmember Thune is apparently stonewalling the request by asking for another opinion from a judge or something.


Title: Council forgives parkland fee for Carondelet Village development
Author: Jane McClure

Short short version: At the request of Councilmember Harris, the aforementioned senior nun housing complex at Fairview and Randolph will not have to pay $27K in parkland feees. [Insert nun joke here. -Ed.]


Title: Walkable Mac-Grove moves her to exercise more
Author: Betsy Dodder

Short short version: Wonderful op-ed column about older lady who uses "walking sticks" to go on long walks through the neighborhood. Includes multiple admittances of silly / dumb appearance of said walking style .


Title: Summit-U neighbors jump on board new Subway at Selby-Victoria corner
Author: Dave Page

Short short version: Piece on new Subway shop that went in at the long vacant / abandoned Selby corner.


Title: Liquor service extended to sidewalk cafe at Green Mill
Author: Jane McClure

Short short version: Self explanatory. Cites angry neighbor, pissed at "motorists who violate the one-way traffic signs on nearby Lincoln Avenue."


Title: New pedestrian islands tested at Jefferson and Cleveland
Author: Jane McClure

Short short version: Pedestrian streetscape improvements are being tested at Jefferson and Cleveland beginning this month. The city will decide whether or not to keep them sometime next year.


Title: County triples rail budget to prepare for Union Depot hub
Author: Jane McClure

Short short version: Ramsey Co. is paying a lot of dough to help w/ the remodeling of the Union Depot. Most of the money comes from "State and Federal grants".

Reading the Highland Villager #16 (May 12-15 Edition)

[Basically, the problem is that the best source of local streets & sidewalks news in Saint Paul is the Highland Villager. This wouldn't be a problem, except that its not available online. I'm reading the Highland Villager so that you don't have to. Until this newspaper goes online, sidewalk information must be set free.]


Total # of articles about sidewalks: 4
Total # of articles about sidewalks written by Jane McClure: 4


Title: City OK's Walgreens' plan for Highland; Drug store is just one of three new buildings
Author: Jane McClure

Short short version: The long-debated new pharmacy on Ford Parkway will go ahead, and has been approved by the St. Paul Planning Commission. They have forced the Walgreens Corp. to add a two buildings (a one-story and a two-story) on the site, and to include an "outdoor plaza" and a fountain on the corner of Ford and Finn.

Title: City to study potential for parks on Ford site
Author: Jane McClure

Short short version: The St Paul City Council will reroute funds intended for struggling neighborhoods to study putting parkland at the site of the current Ford Plan along the river in Highland Park.


Title: $1 million plan for Jefferson Ave. bike boulevard pedals onward
Author: Jane McClure

Short short version: The City Council finally voted to accept the $750K federal grant to put a bike boulevard along Jefferson Avenue in Highland Park. They did it despite the protests of Highland Park City Council member Pat Harris, who "believes the improvements would work better on another street, though he did not specify which one". Also, he is "concerned about a traffic diverter that will be installed on Cleveland Avenue".


Title: St. Paul adopts plan to enhance walking bicycling in Central Corridor
Author: Jane McClure

Short short version: The St. Paul City Council adopted a plan which will allow them to apply for grants to build bike and pedestrian amenities along the Central Corridor route (both on University Avenue, and in the neighborhoods nearby). The article includes some comments by cyclists who are concerned that University Avenue will no longer be a bike route, and that "moving bicycles onto Charles Avenue" won't work because its not a through street.

The 19 Best Twin City Sidewalks Posts of 2012

Well the time has come once to dawdle on the sidewalk of life, to loiter in the nook under the awning of the holidays, and glance quickly behind us to look the footprints trailing behind in the newfallen snow. It's time to think about where we've been, where we're going, and why in hell we found ourselves in a North Loop alley at one in the morning carrying a half-eaten bag full of pretzels. What have I been doing with my time? Why I am I still writing this blog about sidewalks? Why don't I start writing a blog about something people actually care about, like European dog leashes or Ricky Rubio's neck hair? How long can I continue this meaningless charade?

Well, it turns out that there's still plenty to say about the state of sidewalks in the Twin Cities. In many respects, 2012 was a banner year. Traffic is growing at a glacial pace, and I put up more posts than ever before this year: 227 (including this one). What's not to celebrate?

Looking back, there was a lot of great stuff on the Twin City Sidewalks radar during the 2012 calendar. Here are my favorites, in roughly chronological order...


#1 The Top 19 Vikings Stadium Renderings of All Time

About a year ago, when the Vikings stadium still seemed like a really stupid idea that would never actually happen, I stayed up late into the night compiling the definitive partial history of factually incorrect and aesthetically misleading stadium renderings. I'm still quite proud of the fact that when you search for "vikings stadium rendering", this blog is #5 search result. I did it for science.

#2 Climate as Proxy for Capital in the Minneapolis Skyway System & Happy 50th Birthday to the Minneapolis Skyways

I suppose that, for this blog, 2012 was the year of the skyways. My January post of an old research paper I wrote for a graduate class in landscape architecture was re-blogged by Kottke, and became the most read post in the history of this blog. (I suppose that means that careful research and analysis is a good idea. Note to self.) Later that year, I noticed that the Minneapolis Skyways were about to celebrate their 50th anniversary, and wrote up a semi-snarky birthday message. Both of these proved to be very well-read posts, and show that skyways are still one of the most unique (and terrible) parts of the Twin Cities' urban fabric.

#3 "The Village" in Highland Park receives coveted Sidewalk of the Week honors

My favorite part of this blog is the Sidewalk of the Week feature, a concept with which (alas) I rarely follow through. The SOTW feature is supposed to be a celebration of the city's great sidewalk spaces, but occasionally (as with Edina) I will become a bit too snarky. That happened in Highland Park back in February, sort of. I feel like I was pretty even-keeled and generous with a part of my city that often annoys me, but which still boasts some of the more walkable and well people'd sidewalks you'll find in St Paul. Highland Park is one of the better attempts at suburban urbanism. There's a lot to like, and a lot that can still be improved. Plus, in this writeup, I got to come up with the best metaphors (I'm particularly fond of "Highland Park: paddleball of my soul").

#4 Como Avenue "anarchist burma-shave" street art

Often this blog will trace my actual footsteps through the city, and in this case, my daily commute to the U of MN campus from St Paul's North End took me along an interesting path. Gradually, I began to notice an odd pattern of signage along telephone poles on Como Avenue. It turned out to be one of the better attempts at street art that I've seen in the Twin Cities, and I was lucky to have captured it...

#5 The World Weary Tour of St Paul's Union Depot

As part of my role as a new planning commissioner, I was taken on a "behind the scenes" tour of the Union Depot (then still under construction). It not only provided me with a chance to explore my existential side, but my writeup got subsequently picked up by the Pioneer Press and got my name in the paper. Now, the Union Depot is open and its gorgeous. The only thing this wonderful train station needs now is actual trains.

#6 The dreaded Jefferson Avenue City Council liveblog

There's no issue that has been more of a festering sore in my sidewalk skin than the Jefferson Avenue bike boulevard, which pretty much summarized everything frustrating about St Paul parochial politics. The issue, which I won't go into here but which (needless to say) has a long and tortured history, was finally resolved at a City Council meeting in April. After years of fruitless debate, the (shoulda been noncontroversial) project was passed in a watered-down form. During the meeting, I took copious (and I'd say not overly snarky) notes. (They got me into a bit of hot water with a nameless local news reporter.) I'll probably not be liveblogging any more city council meetings. I can think about 10005+ better things to do.

#7 An ode to my barber, Pete

I love my barber Pete, and he was really struggling during the Central Corridor construction period. He was unlucky enough to be right on a 'seam' between two construction 'phases', which meant that the street in front of his shop was torn up for twice as long as for most people. Thankfully, he seems to have made it through the hassle, and is still going strong. I wrote some thoughts about him, and the trade-offs that come with any large capital project for small businesses. This one was close to my heart.

#8 The Forgotten Beauty of Forlorn Windows

Also in May, I was lucky enough to participate my friend Joan's wonderful "Artists in Storefronts" project along Nicollet Avenue in Whittier (one of my favorite places in either city). Doing the prep work for this project made me start thinking about the role of empty shop windows, and whether or not these empty windows are longing for the eyes that used to look through them. If the eyes are the windows of the soul, perhaps eyes are also the souls of windows.


#9 A snarky narrative of what its like to walk around the greater West Palm Beach area

This year, I was lucky to get some money to go to the CNU conference in West Palm Beach, Florida. As with most trips I take, I did my best to walk around the city situationist / flaneur style and I found out the reason why Florida was named the least pedestrian friendly state in the USA. Also, I eventually found the ocean after walking past the large gates and parked yachts of many wealthy people.

#10 Electronic Pulltabs!

With few exceptions, whether or not a bar has pulltabs is a litmus test for whether or not I'm going to like it. Believe me, electronic pulltabs will ruin everything. This post generated perhaps the comment about which I am proudest this year:

Prescott said...

In the most positive sense of the word, this is maybe the most inane piece I've read regarding urban planning possibly ever, but I totally enjoyed it.

 

I think history will prove me very very right on this one.

#11 Defenses for Challenging a Red Light Ticket

This year also marked my first encounter with "the man" in quite sometime (ever since I stopped driving a car). I was dumb enough to (carefully) run a red light right in front of a Minneapolis police officer on SE Como Avenue. He gave me an expensive ticket, and I spent much of the next month or so brainstorming possible defenses for my behavior. I shared them in this post, and later ended up winning in court (using the "red light law" defense). Still, I like to imagine what it might have been like had I opted for one of my other legal strategies.

#12 Help! It's the War on Cars!!!!!!

Sometimes, I'll just read something in the media that's so stupid that I need to write something right away. (Right something write away?) That happened in July with an NPR story dealing with bicycles and the so-called "war on cars." These kinds of posts are very thereapeutic, and I often remember them very fondly. That said, I'm not sure how useful they are for anyone besides myself...

#13 Another bike tragedy in Dinkytown by the U of MN

School started in September, and like clockwork, a student on a bicycle was hit by a bus (professionally trained driver!) in the substandard bike lanes around the U of MN. This has long been one of my #1 issues, and this kind of thing won't stop until the city and the University develop different priorities that make life safer for vulnerable students.

#14 The most snarky post of 2012: naming Edina's neighborhoods

Sometimes things just fall into your laps. That's what happened when I picked up the Star Tribune back in September and found a story there about the struggle to come up with official names for Edina's "neighborhoods." Sometimes it's just too easy, and nothing was more fun than writing this post. (Later, someone made a similar attempt and crafted an actual map, something which I shoulda done if I wanted this to go viral.)

#15 Meta-post making fun of City Rankings

After architecture slideshows, probably the laziest bit of urban linkbait are City Ranking lists. I decided to try my hand at one of my own, and it worked.

#16 Linking up urban politics with the Voter ID amendment

Since I was a page in the State Legislature (for the Republican party, no less), I've been very passionate about voting equality. (Those committee hearings about disenfranchising people really stuck with me, especially with Tom Emmer leading the charge.) Our core cities are home to a disproportionate number of people of color and poor people, and lots of state politics can be explained by this simple urban / suburban / rural dynamic. Well, probably the most heartwarming story of 2012 was the election, and particularly the defeat of this harmful amendment that would have thrown up roadblocks for democracy for poor people, people of color, and students. Thank god this didn't pass! It really makes me feel good about living in Minnesota.

#17 Halloween post

I love Halloween, and so can you. This was my attempt to explain why. Among other things, it's the only time EVER when parents actually encourage their children to take candy from strangers...

#18 Interview with the Hiking Club

This was a long time coming, but if I ever have more time to devote to this fruitless and unpaid blogging thing, I'm going to do more interviews like this one. I really enjoy this kind of writing, and am glad to share the stories of people like George and Maryann with the two or three people that read this site.

#19 This post... this post is awesome!

That's it! Thanks for the great year, everybody. I'm looking forward to 2013...